Linen is a fabric that provides comfortable, long-wearing cloth that is beautiful, easy to decorate and durable under harsh cleaning methods. Therefore, it is a sanitary fabric, long used in sickness, death and for sacramental purposes. The growing, harvesting and processing of flax into linen has been going on for many thousands of years. By 3,000 B.C., flax was providing raw material for textiles in the Mediterranean Coast and islands, Anatolia, Mesopotamia, Egypt, the Balkans and Central Europe. In the ancient bogs in Switzerland's lake district, five-thousand-year-old linen thread and linen thread and linen fabric have been preserved in the alkaline, oxygen-starved muck into which they sank so many thousands of years ago.
The production of linen fabric was important enough in the Jewish culture in Biblical times that a poem of praise to the woman textile maker is recorded in Proverbs 31:10-25
"Who can find a virtuous woman? for her price is far above rubies. The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he shall have no need of spoil. She will do him good and not evil all the days of her life. She seeketh wool, and flax, and worketh willingly with her hands. She is like the merchants' ships; she bringeth her food from afar. She riseth also while it is yet night, and giveth meat to her household, and a portion to her maidens. She considereth a field, and buyeth it; with the fruit of her hands she planteth a vineyard. She girdeth her loins with strength, and strengtheneth her arms. She perceiveth that her merchandise is good: her candle goeth not out by night. She layeth her hands to the spindle, and her hands hold the distaff. She stretcheth out her hand to the poor; yea, she reacheth forth her hands to the needy. She is not afraid of the snow for her household: for all her household are clothed with scarlet. She maketh herself coverings of tapestry; her clothing is silk and purple.
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