Mystical systems
Nazirite
Direct answer
Nazirite: A nazirite was an Israelite man or woman who vowed to be set apart to God for a time, abstaining from wine and all grape products, leaving the hair uncut and avoiding the dead.
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At a glance
- Also called
- nazarite, nazarite vow
- Found in
- Mystical Systems
- Related
- Asceticism, Yom Kippur, Lent, Prayer and Fasting
A nazirite was an Israelite man or woman who vowed to be set apart to God for a time, abstaining from wine and all grape products, leaving the hair uncut and avoiding the dead.
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What were the three rules of the nazirite vow?
Nazirite comes from the Hebrew nazir, one who is consecrated or set apart. The law is in the sixth chapter of Numbers. Any man or woman could take the vow, and while it lasted three things were forbidden: wine, vinegar, grapes and anything else from the vine; cutting the hair; and going near a corpse, even that of a parent.
The vow was normally for a fixed term. At its end the nazirite brought offerings to the sanctuary, shaved the head and put the hair on the altar fire. A few figures are presented as nazirites for life, dedicated before birth: Samson in the book of Judges, and Samuel, whose mother promises that no razor shall touch his head. Luke says of John the Baptist that he would drink no wine or strong drink, and many readers place him in the same line.
On the tree of the hidden arts: Fasting and discipline.
What sets Nazirite apart
The nazirite vow borrows the restraints of the priesthood and hands them to anyone. A priest on duty drank no wine and the high priest could not mourn even his parents; the nazirite took on both for a chosen time without being born to the office. The hair is the vow's visible sign and also its ending: it grows as a kind of crown, the Hebrew nezer, and is burned with the final sacrifice. If a nazirite came near a death by accident, the count of days began again from nothing.
- Word: Hebrew nazir, consecrated or set apart
- Law: Numbers 6:1 to 21
- Three restraints: no produce of the vine, no razor, no contact with the dead
- Usual length: thirty days where no term is named, by the Mishnah
- Lifelong nazirites: Samson (Judges 13) and Samuel (1 Samuel 1)
- Rabbinic tractate: Nazir, in the Mishnah, about 200 CE
Often mistaken for something else: A Nazarene is a person from Nazareth, the name given to Jesus and his first followers; a nazirite is someone under the vow of Numbers 6, whatever town they come from.
The story behind Nazirite
The Mishnah gives the vow a whole tractate, Nazir, compiled about 200 CE, which sets the default length at thirty days. The book of Acts shows Paul paying the expenses of four men completing a vow in the Temple. Because the closing offerings required the Temple, destroyed in 70 CE, the vow could no longer be properly finished, and the rabbis discouraged it. The Rastafari wearing of uncut locks appeals to the same chapter of Numbers.
Why Nazirite matters
Nazirite is the Hebrew Bible's one form of voluntary asceticism open to lay people, women included, and it explains the stories of Samson and Samuel.
How to read Nazirite
Readers use the term to explain the long hair and abstinence of several biblical figures, and to trace later vows of abstinence back to a source.
Nazirite in practice: an example
Samson is the reader's usual nazirite: his strength is tied to hair that has never been cut, and it leaves him when Delilah has it shaved.
Where readings of Nazirite go wrong
Nazirite is not the same word as Nazarene; Jesus is called a man of Nazareth, and the gospels show him drinking wine.
Sources and editorial method
This entry summarizes the tradition in the Almanac's own words; where no source is listed, it is an editorial summary rather than a primary text, and symbolic readings are named as the tradition's, not as fact.
- Source
- The Great Almanac Dictionary
- Category
- Mystical Systems
- Aliases
- nazirite vow, nazarite, nazirite meaning, nazir, nazarite vow
- Last updated
- 2026-09-26
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Common questions
What were the three rules of the nazirite vow?
No wine or anything made from grapes, no cutting of the hair, and no contact with a dead body. They are set out in Numbers 6:1 to 21 and applied for as long as the vow ran.
Was Samson a nazirite?
Yes. In Judges 13 an angel tells his mother that the boy is to be a nazirite to God from the womb. The stories then show him breaking the rules, touching a carcass and at last losing his hair.
Do people still take the nazirite vow?
Very rarely. Without the Temple the vow cannot be completed with the offerings Numbers requires, so Jewish authorities have long advised against taking it.
