Ritual purification in the end is just ritual, a gesture of hope. It remains “water,” just as everything man does on his own remains “water” before God. Ritual purification is in the end never sufficient to make man capable of God, to make him really “pure” for God. Water becomes wine. Man’s own efforts now encounter the gift of God, who gives himself and thereby creates the feast of joy that can only be instituted by the presence of God and his gift.
