This post is made to help my learning. I have visited hamams when on holiday in Turkey (Istanbul) and Morocco (Fez and Marrakesch).

I have no hang ups about these places. I find them very relaxing and therapeutic.

I have been to Japan a lot, where the onsen is a part of life. They started for similar reasons as the Hamam, to provide communal bathing facilities out of necessity because it was impossible to have them in separate houses. In Japan they are the great social leveller. As with hamams, they are segregated for men and women for obvious reasons. When people are in them, no matter who you are and what you have, all that is irrelevant when the trappings of life are taken away.

When I lived in London there was also a great interfaith facility near Canary Wharf, where Russian orthodox practices Russian twig techniques, and Jews did as well.

I am asking what significance, if any, these places have in a religious sense for Muslims ... or are they more a cultural phenomenon like in Japan and Korea, spawned initially by necessity.