Genital integrity
Encyclopedia
Male circumcision
has often been, and remains, the subject of controversy on a number of grounds—including religious, ethical, sexual, and health.
The Ancient Greeks and Romans
valued the foreskin and were opposed to circumcision – an opposition inherited by the canon and secular legal systems of the Christian West
that lasted at least through to the Middle Ages, according to Hodges. Traditional Judaism
and Islam
have advocated male circumcision as a religious obligation.
The ethics of circumcision are sometimes controversial. From the mid 19th century, there has been advocacy in Anglophone countries on medical grounds, such as the prevention of masturbation
and "reflex neurosis". Modern proponents, such as Morris, argue that circumcision reduces the risks of urinary tract infections, penile cancer, HIV, balanitis, posthitis, phimosis, and prostate cancer as well as conferring sexual benefits. In contrast, opponents of infant circumcision often question its effectiveness in preventing disease, and object to subjecting newborn boys, without their consent, to a procedure they consider to have questionable benefits, significant risks and a potentially negative impact on later sexual enjoyment.
Genesis explains circumcision as a covenant
with God given to Abraham
, but many liberal scholars reject the historicity of these accounts and look elsewhere for the origin of Jewish circumcision. The most common historical explanation, dating from Herodotus
, is that the custom was acquired from the Egyptians, possibly during the period of enslavement. A competing hypothesis is based on linguistic/ethnographic work begun in the 19th century, and suggests circumcision was a common tribal custom among many Semitic tribes, including Jews, Arabs and Phoenecians, before they migrated from the Arabian peninsula. Recent linguistic analysis is strengthening the case for the latter explanation, that is also more likely to convince those who consider the Bible to be a reliable historical document.
The Jewish and Islamic traditions both see circumcision as a way to distinguish a group from its neighbours. The Bible
records "uncircumcised" being used as a derogatory reference for opponents and Jewish victory in battle that culminated in mass post-mortem circumcision, to provide an account of the number of enemy casualties. Jews were also required to circumcise all household members, including slaves – a practice that would later put them into collision with Roman and Christian law (see below).
Hellenistic culture found circumcision
to be repulsive. In 167 BCE Judea
was part of the Seleucid Empire
. Its ruler, Antiochus
(175–165), smarting from a defeat in a war against Ptolemaic Egypt
, banned traditional Jewish religious practice, and attempted to forcibly convert the Jews to Hellenism
. The Olympian Zeus
was placed on the altar of the Temple, and throughout the country Jews were ordered, with the threat of execution, to sacrifice pigs
to Greek gods (the normal practice in the Ancient Greek religion
), desecrate the Shabbat
, eat unkosher animals (especially pork
), and relinquish their Jewish scriptures. Antiochus's decree also outlawed Jewish circumcision, and parents who violated his order were hanged along with their infants. according to Tacitus
, as quoted by Hodges, Antiochus "endeavoured to abolish Jewish superstition and to introduce Greek civilization
."
In the Roman Empire
, circumcision was regarded as a barbaric and disgusting custom. The consul Titus Flavius Clemens
was condemned to death by the Roman Senate
in 95 CE for, according to the Talmud
, circumcising himself and converting to Judaism
. The emperor Hadrian
(117-138) forbade circumcision.
Perhaps the most prominent Jewish response during these times, was rebellion. Antiochus's decree motivated the Maccabees Revolt, which ultimated in the reestablishment of an independent Jewish kingdom.
As for the anti-circumcision law passed by Hadrian
, it is considered by many, to be, together with his decision to build a new temple upon the ruins of the Second Temple
, which was dedicated to Jupiter, one of the main causes of the Bar Kokhba revolt (132-135). The revolt was brutally crushed. According to Cassius Dio, 580,000 Jews were killed, and 50 fortified towns and 985 villages razed. Cassius Dio claimed that "Many Romans, moreover, perished in this war. Therefore, Hadrian, in writing to the Senate, did not employ the opening phrase commonly affected by the emperors: 'If you and your children are in health, it is well; I and the army are in health.'" Because of the great loss of life in the war, even though Hadrian was victorious, he refused a triumph. Hadrian said regarding the war, "I forbade the Jews to mutilate themselves, and they started a war."
Hadrian policy after the rebelion reflected an attempt to root out Judaism. All Jews were forbidden to enter Jerusalem upon pain of death and the city was renamed Aelia Capitolina
. Around 140, His successor Antoninus Pius
(138-161) exempted Jews who circumcised their sons, though not their servants or slaves, from the decree against circumcision.
Jewish response to the decrees also took a more moderate form: circumcisions were secretly performed – even on dead Jews –. Other Jews pursued a completely different approach, accepting the decrees, and even making efforts to restore their foreskins
to better assimilate into Hellenistic society
. The latter approach was common during the reign of Antiochus, and again under Roman rule. The foreskin was restored by one of two methods, that were later revived in the late twentieth century. The surgical method, described in detail by the physician Celsus (around 25BC - 50AD), involved freeing the skin covering the penis by dissection, and then pulling it forward over the glans. Celsus also described a simpler surgical technique used on men whose prepuce is naturally insufficient to cover their glans. The second approach was nonsurgical. A device called a Pondus Judaeus (Jewish burden), a special weight made of bronze, copper, or leather, was affixed to the penis
, pulling its skin downward. Overtime, a new foreskin was generated, or a short prepuce was lengthened, by means of tissue expansion
. Martial
mentioned the instrument in Epigrammaton Libri 7:35.
The apostle Paul
referred to these practices, saying: "Was a man already circumcised when he was called? He should not become uncircumcised." But he also explicitly denounced circumcision of non-Jews, rejecting and condemning those who promoted the ritual to Gentile Christians, labelling such advocates of circumcision "false brothers". According to the same researchers, in the mid 2nd century Jewish leaders introduced a radical method of circumcision, the periah, that left the glans totally uncovered, making it almost impossible to restore the foreskin.
Under the first Christian emperor, Constantine
, the two rescripts of Antoninus on circumcision were re-enacted and again in the 6th century under Justinian. These restrictions on circumcision made their way into both secular and canon law and "at least through the Middle Ages, preserved and enhanced laws banning Hebrews from circumcising non-Hebrews and banning Christians or slaves of any religious affiliation from undergoing circumcision for any reason."
, held in approximately 50 AD decreed that circumcision
was not a requirement for Gentile
converts. This became known as the "Apostolic Decree" and is one of the first acts differentiating Early Christianity
from Rabbinic Judaism
At roughly the same time Rabbinic Judaism made their circumcision requirement
even stricter.
According to the Columbia Encyclopedia
, "the decision that Christians need not practice circumcision is recorded in Acts 15; there was never, however, a prohibition of circumcision, and it is practiced by Coptic Christians."
The main focus of Christian proselytizing in the early Christian Church were the God-Fearers, gentile
inhabitants of the Roman Empire who were allowed to attend Jewish synagogues as quasi-Jews without the necessity of undergoing the hated rite of circumcision. All they had to do was swear that there was "One God". Converts from this group was the primary kernel from which the early Christian Church grew. (About 10% of the inhabitants of the Roman Empire were full Jews and God-Fearers.)
had specifically mentioned circumcision as a tradition among Arabs in the first century CE. After the introduction of Islam, female circumcision was prohibited, though some Muslims continued to practice it. This practice is not approved by orthodox Islam.
The practice of circumcision is sometimes characterized as a part of fitrah as mentioned in the hadith
of Sahih al-Bukhari
(Quotations of Prophet Muhammad)
in his Summa Theologica
questioned why, if under Jewish doctrine circumcision removed original sin
, Jesus
was circumcised – as Jesus had no original sin. Steve Jones suggests there is a theological tradition that Jesus regained his foreskin at the Ascension. "Had he failed to do so, the Saved would themselves have to be operated upon in Paradise so as not to be more perfect than their Saviour."
The Jews were expelled from England by Edward I in 1290, ostensibly over social tensions concerning usury. But the public imagination had been gripped by blood libel, since at least the 12th century: "So pervasive was the belief that Jews circumcised their victims ... that Menasseh ben Israil, the Dutch Rabbi who sought from Cromwell the readmission of the Jews in 1656, had to dwell at considerable length in his Vindiciae Judaeorum at refuting the claim."
In 15th century Spain, most Jews and Muslims were expelled and the Spanish Inquisition
monitored and prosecuted converts to Christianity to ensure they were not secretly consorting with Jews or engaging in Jewish practices such as circumcision.
In 1521 Cortés
defeated the Aztec empire in Mesoamerica, which was followed by a large influx of Spanish clergy, whose writings provide most of information about pre-conquest Aztec life and customs largely assembled from interviews with those who survived the invasion and subsequent epidemics, and their descendents. Diego Durán
, a Dominican friar, was convinced that the Aztecs were one of the lost tribes of Israel, with a crucial piece of supporting evidence being that they had practised circumcision.
So influential was this notion that 300 years later Bancroft
in his monumental Native Races began his discussion of circumcision by writing: "Whether the custom of circumcision, which has been the great prop of argument in favor of the Jewish origin of the Aztecs, really obtained among these people, has been doubted by numerous authors," concluding that it probably existed in a "certain form among some tribes" (p278). The key being "a certain form", since Bancroft makes clear in a footnote that the majority of his sources, including Clavigero, Ternaux-Compans, Carbajal Espinosa, Oviedo y Herrera, and especially Acosta
, believed Durán and others "confounded the custom of drawing blood from the secret organs with circumcision", and "the incision on the prepuce and ear to have been mistaken for circumcision", adding that this blood-letting rite was "chiefly performed upon sons of great men" (p279). The case was not helped by the fact no reports of seeing a circumcised adult Aztec existed in the literature. Remondino says it is "a matter of controversy" whether the foreskin had actually been removed (p46).
In regard to the Mayans, Bancroft says that in 1858 Brasseur de Bourbourg reported finding "traces"
of circumcision in the sources, despite Cogolludo
having reported that "circumcision was unknown to the Indians of Yucatan" (pp279, 679). But in 1864 Brasseur published his French translation of Diego de Landa
's recently recovered 1556 ethnographic manuscript, which decisively rejected the notion of Mayan circumcision, and in a footnote he acknowledged there had probably been a "mistake", an admission that never found its way into the English-language literature although modern ethnography has long since understood the nature of these rituals. However, the Aztecs and Mayans are included by many authors from other disciplines among the list of pre-modern people who practised circumcision. Examples of such sources include UNAIDS, Kaplan, and Weiss.
Countries that do not circumcise have often held antipathy for those that do. Being circumcised was a often seen as a sign of disgrace. According to Darby, it was also seen as a serious loss of erogenous tissue: "During the Renaissance and 18th century the centrality of the foreskin to male sexual function and the pleasure of both partners was recognised by anatomists Berengario da Carpi, Gabriello Fallopio and William Harvey, in popular sex manuals like Aristotle's master-piece, and by physicians like John Hunter, who also appreciated the importance of the foreskin in providing the slack tissue needed to accommodate an erection."
In 1650, English physician John Bulwer
in his study of body modification, Anthropometamorphosis: Man Transform'd, or the Artificial Changeling, wrote of the loss in sexual pleasure resulting from circumcision: "the part which hangeth over the end of the foreskin, is moved up and down in coition, that in this attrition it might gather more heat, and increase the pleasure of the other sexe; a contentation of which they [the circumcised] are defrauded by this injurious invention. For, the shortnesse of the prepuce is reckoned among the organical defects of the yard, … yet circumcision detracts somewhat from the delight of women, by lessening their titillation." The English historian Edward Gibbon
, author of The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
, referred to the practice as "a painful and often dangerous rite", and a "singular mutilation" practiced only by Jews and Turks
.
The first formal objection to circumcision within Judaism occurred in 1843 in Frankfurt
. The Society for the Friends of Reform, a group that attacked traditional Jewish practices, said that brit milah
was not a mitzvah
but an outworn legacy from Israel
's earlier phases, an obsolete throwback to primitive religion. With the expanding role of medicine came further opposition; certain aspects of Jewish circumcision such as periah and metzitzah (drawing the blood from the circumcision wound through sucking or a cloth) were deemed unhygienic. Later evidence that syphilis and tuberculosis
– two of the most feared infectious diseases in the 19th century – were spread by mohels, caused various rabbis to advocate metzitzah to be done using a sponge or a tube. (Today, the Rabbinical Council of America
, the largest group of Modern Orthodox rabbis, endorses using a glass tube)
Ephron reports that Gentiles and also some Jewish reformers in early 19th century Germany had criticized ritual circumcision as "barbaric" and that Jewish doctors responded to these criticisms with defences of the ritual or proposals for modification or reform. By the late 19th century some German Jewish doctors defended circumcision by claiming it had health advantages.
in England wrote articles in favour of the procedure. Peter Charles Remondino, a San Diego physician, wrote a History of Circumcision from the Earliest Times to the Present: Moral and Physical Reasons for Its Performance (1891), to promote circumcision. Lewis Sayre, a prominent orthopedic surgeon at the time, was another early American advocate. However, the theories on which many early claims were made, such as the reflex theory of disease and the alleged harmful effects of masturbation, have long since been abandoned by the medical profession.
Dr. John Harvey Kellogg
recommended circumcision of boys caught masturbating, writing: "A remedy for masturbation which is almost always successful in small boys is circumcision, especially when there is any degree of phimosis. The operation should be performed by a surgeon without administering anaesthetic, as the pain attending the operation will have a salutary effect upon the mind, especially if it be connected with the idea of punishment." (page 295) But he was opposed to routine circumcision of infants: "It is doubtful, however, whether as much harm as good does not result from circumcision, since it has been shown by extensive observation among the Jews that very great contraction of the meatus, or external orifice of the urethra, is exceedingly common among them, being undoubtedly the result of the prolonged irritation and subsequent cicatricial contraction resulting from circumcision in infancy." (page 107)
An early British opponent of circumcision was Herbert Snow, who wrote a short book called The barbarity of circumcision as a remedy for congenital abnormality in 1890. But as late as 1936, L. E. Holt, an author of pediatric textbooks, advocated male and female circumcision as a treatment for masturbation.
The first serious questioning of the practice did not occur until late 1949 when Gairdner published The Fate of the Foreskin in the British Medical Journal
; according to Wallerstein this began to affect the practice of circumcision in Britain
.
According to Darby and Cox, the persistence of circumcision in the USA has led to more vigorous protest movements. A 1980 protest march at the California State Capitol
was reported in an Associated Press
article. The National Organization of Circumcision Information Resource Centers (NOCIRC), was formed by Marilyn Milos
, R.N., in 1985. The organization's stated objective is to secure the birthright of male, female, and intersex children and babies to keep their sex organs intact. Protest rallies have been held in the USA and other areas. NOCIRC have consistently criticised the American medical community's circumcision guidelines. According to Milos and Donna Macris, "The need to defend the baby's right to a peaceful beginning was brought to light by Dr. Frederick Leboyer in his landmark work, Birth Without Violence".
This period also saw the formation of anti-circumcision organizations in Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom and South Africa. Activists began creating websites in the mid-1990s, and this process has continued. One such organization distributed questionnaires to circumcised men. The complaints included prominent scarring
(33%), insufficient penile skin for comfortable erection (27%), erectile curvature from uneven skin loss (16%), and pain and bleeding upon erection/manipulation (17%). Psychological complaints included feelings of mutilation (60%), low self esteem/inferiority to intact men (50%), genital dysmorphia (55%), rage (52%), resentment/depression (59%), violation (46%), or parental betrayal (30%). Many respondents reported that their physical/emotional suffering impeded emotional intimacy with their partner(s), resulting in sexual dysfunction
. Prominent men known to be unhappy about being circumcised include A E Houseman, W.H. Auden, Geoffrey Keynes
and his brother John Maynard Keynes
, the famous economist. In 1996 the British Medical Journal published a letter by 20 men saying that "we have been harmed by circumcision in childhood"; they argued that "it cannot be ethical for a doctor to amputate normal tissue from a normal child". Dr. Benjamin Spock
(d. 1998), whose Baby and Child Care is the biggest selling American single-author book in history, originally supported circumcision but changed his mind near the end of his life.
Prominent American advocates for infant circumcision include Dr. Thomas Wiswell, who began publishing research on the relative incidence of urinary tract infections in the mid 1980s; Dr. Edgar Schoen, (b. 1925) former chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics' Task Force on Circumcision, who maintains a web site promoting circumcision and claims physical benefits in sexual performance in addition to medical arguments; and Aaron J. Fink, M.D. (d. 1990), who self-published Circumcision: A Parent's Decision for Life to promote his ideas.
In Australia, Professor Brian Morris
, author of In Favour of Circumcision, asserts that circumcision confers many medical benefits including reduced risk of UTIs, penile cancer, HIV, balanitis, posthitis, phimosis, and prostate cancer and argues that circumcision has sexual benefits. Morris also claims that circumcision prevents "physical problems" such as "Bathroom splatter" and "Zipper injury". However, Morris's views have been strongly criticised by Professor Basil Donovan who argues that the protection from HIV argued by Morris is not an accurate depiction of the HIV research. David Forbes, chair of the pediatrics and child health policy and advocacy committee of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians has stated that Morris has not been asked to review the college's circumcision policy and is not a member of the college.
The American Academy of Pediatrics
(AAP) circumcision policy has been criticised, both by those who believe that it is too negative about the practice, and those who believe that it is too positive. Hill has also criticised the Academy's circumcision information brochure for parents, arguing that the brochure is inadequate to persuade parents to avoid circumcision.
The WHO and UNAIDS recommend male circumcision as a means of reducing the rate of HIV infection, but this has also proved controversial, with doubts raised about the efficacy of mass circumcision campaigns in sub-Saharan Africa. Critics have themselves been the subject of criticism; Kalichman writes: "Anticircumcision groups have long existed and are increasingly vocal as MC programs for HIV prevention are promoted. Anticircumcision groups resemble other antiscience and antimedicine extremists including AIDS denialists who refute public health realities to maintain entrenched belief systems"
Another area of continuing dispute is the effect of circumcision on penile sensitivity. In April 2007, the British Journal of Urology
published a study (Sorrells et al., 2007) that stated it "conclusively shows that circumcised males have a significant penile sensory deficit as compared with non-circumcised intact men" and that "the most sensitive regions in the uncircumcised penis are those removed by circumcision." But in June 2007, the BJU published a letter in response by Waskett and Morris, which concluded that "despite a poorly representative sample and a methodology prone to exaggerating the sensitivity of the prepuce, NOCIRC's claims remain unproven. When the authors' data are analysed properly, no significant differences exist. Thus the claim that circumcision adversely affects penile sensitivity is poorly supported, and this study provides no evidence for the belief that circumcision adversely affects sexual pleasure." Hugh Young, a critic of circumcision, responded to this, stating that Waskett and Morris "critique the finding of Sorrells et al. that 'circumcision ablates [removes] the most sensitive part of the penis' by excluding that part from consideration... That the foreskin itself has a sexual function was well-known for centuries before secular circumcision became widespread. What would need to be proved rigorously is that cutting a significant part of the distal penis off does not diminish sexual pleasure." Payne et al. reported that direct measurement of penile sensation in the shaft and glans during sexual arousal
failed to support the hypothesised sensory differences associated with circumcision status.
Hammond asserts that every person has a right to a whole and intact body and that, where minors are concerned, "the unnecessary removal of a functioning body organ in the name of tradition, custom or any other non-disease related cause should never be acceptable to the health profession." He says that such interventions are violations of individual bodily rights and "a breach of fundamental medical ethics principles". Others also see the genital cutting of children as a human rights issue, opposing the genital modification and mutilation
of children, including circumcision
and female genital mutilation. Several anti-circumcision organizations also oppose the sexual-reassignment surgery
of infants with ambiguous genitalia.
Current laws in many countries, and United States Federal Law as well as laws in several U.S. states, prohibit the genital modification and mutilation of female minors, with some exceptions based on medical need. Opponents of male circumcision assert that laws against genital modification and mutilation of minors should apply equally to males and females. Many anti-circumcision groups have joined the International Coalition for Genital Integrity and endorsed its declaration, which was adopted by the First International Symposium on Circumcision, on March 3, 1989, at Anaheim, California. (There have been nine such further symposia held since, with the proceedings of several subsequently published in book form.)
However, linking male circumcision to female genital mutilation (FGM) is itself highly controversial. Organizations actually involved in combating FGM have been at considerable pains to distinguish the two, as this UNICEF document explains: "When the practice first came to be known beyond the societies in which it was traditionally carried out, it was generally referred to as "female circumcision". This term, however, draws a direct parallel with male circumcision and, as a result, creates confusion between these two distinct practices."
This stance has been largely echoed by Western medical and political authorities. The Australian Medical Association states: "The AMA rejects the euphemism "female circumcision", sometimes used to describe the various forms of female genital mutilation, because the use of this phrase trivialises the severe and often irreparable physical and psychological damage occasioned to girls and women by these practices." In the United States, the organization MGMbill.org sent a proposed bill to the US Congress and 15 state legislatures between 2004 and 2007 to extend the prohibition on genital modification and mutilation
of minors to include male
and intersex
children. But the proposed bill has not been endorsed by any member of Congress.
Opposition to circumcision exists among Jews in Israel
. Even though there is often pressure from family to circumcise their sons, a small but growing number of Jews are choosing to forgo the procedure. Islamic anti-circumcision groups, such as Qur'an Alone, have also emerged, arguing among other things that routine circumcision is an insult to Allah since it tries to improve on his perfect creation.
Northern Europe, which has no tradition of routine circumcision, has been struggling with the challenges of its Jewish and Muslim minorities. Finland is considering legislation to legalise male circumcision. Sweden in 2001 passed a law requiring traditional circumcisers to be certified and for the infants to be given a medically administered anaesthetic. The World Jewish Congress said that "[t]his is the first legal restriction placed on a Jewish rite in Europe since the Nazi era."
In the Xhosa areas of South Africa, the large death toll from traditional circumcision provide a constant source of friction between traditional leaders, who oppose medicalised procedures, and health authorities. In 2009 in Eastern Cape Province alone, 80 boys died and hundreds were hospitalised after attending initiation schools. The controversy looks set to spread to the Zulu, whose present-day king Goodwill Zwelithini has called for the reintroduction of customary circumcision after it was banned by Zulu king Shaka
in the 19th century. Similar issues, though on a smaller scale, have arisen with traditional circumcision of Aborigines in remote areas of central Australia.
Circumcision
Male circumcision is the surgical removal of some or all of the foreskin from the penis. The word "circumcision" comes from Latin and ....
has often been, and remains, the subject of controversy on a number of grounds—including religious, ethical, sexual, and health.
The Ancient Greeks and Romans
Ancient Rome
Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
valued the foreskin and were opposed to circumcision – an opposition inherited by the canon and secular legal systems of the Christian West
Western Christianity
Western Christianity is a term used to include the Latin Rite of the Catholic Church and groups historically derivative thereof, including the churches of the Anglican and Protestant traditions, which share common attributes that can be traced back to their medieval heritage...
that lasted at least through to the Middle Ages, according to Hodges. Traditional Judaism
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
and Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
have advocated male circumcision as a religious obligation.
The ethics of circumcision are sometimes controversial. From the mid 19th century, there has been advocacy in Anglophone countries on medical grounds, such as the prevention of masturbation
Masturbation
Masturbation refers to sexual stimulation of a person's own genitals, usually to the point of orgasm. The stimulation can be performed manually, by use of objects or tools, or by some combination of these methods. Masturbation is a common form of autoeroticism...
and "reflex neurosis". Modern proponents, such as Morris, argue that circumcision reduces the risks of urinary tract infections, penile cancer, HIV, balanitis, posthitis, phimosis, and prostate cancer as well as conferring sexual benefits. In contrast, opponents of infant circumcision often question its effectiveness in preventing disease, and object to subjecting newborn boys, without their consent, to a procedure they consider to have questionable benefits, significant risks and a potentially negative impact on later sexual enjoyment.
Ancient world
Covenant (biblical)
A biblical covenant is an agreement found in the Bible between God and His people in which God makes specific promises and demands. It is the customary word used to translate the Hebrew word berith. It it is used in the Tanakh 286 times . All Abrahamic religions consider the Biblical covenant...
with God given to Abraham
Abraham
Abraham , whose birth name was Abram, is the eponym of the Abrahamic religions, among which are Judaism, Christianity and Islam...
, but many liberal scholars reject the historicity of these accounts and look elsewhere for the origin of Jewish circumcision. The most common historical explanation, dating from Herodotus
Herodotus
Herodotus was an ancient Greek historian who was born in Halicarnassus, Caria and lived in the 5th century BC . He has been called the "Father of History", and was the first historian known to collect his materials systematically, test their accuracy to a certain extent and arrange them in a...
, is that the custom was acquired from the Egyptians, possibly during the period of enslavement. A competing hypothesis is based on linguistic/ethnographic work begun in the 19th century, and suggests circumcision was a common tribal custom among many Semitic tribes, including Jews, Arabs and Phoenecians, before they migrated from the Arabian peninsula. Recent linguistic analysis is strengthening the case for the latter explanation, that is also more likely to convince those who consider the Bible to be a reliable historical document.
The Jewish and Islamic traditions both see circumcision as a way to distinguish a group from its neighbours. The Bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
records "uncircumcised" being used as a derogatory reference for opponents and Jewish victory in battle that culminated in mass post-mortem circumcision, to provide an account of the number of enemy casualties. Jews were also required to circumcise all household members, including slaves – a practice that would later put them into collision with Roman and Christian law (see below).
Hellenistic culture found circumcision
Circumcision
Male circumcision is the surgical removal of some or all of the foreskin from the penis. The word "circumcision" comes from Latin and ....
to be repulsive. In 167 BCE Judea
Judea
Judea or Judæa was the name of the mountainous southern part of the historic Land of Israel from the 8th century BCE to the 2nd century CE, when Roman Judea was renamed Syria Palaestina following the Jewish Bar Kokhba revolt.-Etymology:The...
was part of the Seleucid Empire
Seleucid Empire
The Seleucid Empire was a Greek-Macedonian state that was created out of the eastern conquests of Alexander the Great. At the height of its power, it included central Anatolia, the Levant, Mesopotamia, Persia, today's Turkmenistan, Pamir and parts of Pakistan.The Seleucid Empire was a major centre...
. Its ruler, Antiochus
Antiochus IV Epiphanes
Antiochus IV Epiphanes ruled the Seleucid Empire from 175 BC until his death in 164 BC. He was a son of King Antiochus III the Great. His original name was Mithridates; he assumed the name Antiochus after he ascended the throne....
(175–165), smarting from a defeat in a war against Ptolemaic Egypt
Ptolemaic Egypt
Ptolemaic Egypt began when Ptolemy I Soter invaded Egypt and declared himself Pharaoh of Egypt in 305 BC and ended with the death of queen Cleopatra VII of Egypt and the Roman conquest in 30 BC. The Ptolemaic Kingdom was a powerful Hellenistic state, extending from southern Syria in the east, to...
, banned traditional Jewish religious practice, and attempted to forcibly convert the Jews to Hellenism
Hellenism
Hellenism may refer to:*Hellenic studies*Hellenistic civilization*Hellenistic period, in Greek antiquity*Hellenistic Greece*Hellenization, the spread of Greek culture over foreign peoples*Hellenistic philosophy in the Hellenistic period and late antiquity...
. The Olympian Zeus
Zeus
In the ancient Greek religion, Zeus was the "Father of Gods and men" who ruled the Olympians of Mount Olympus as a father ruled the family. He was the god of sky and thunder in Greek mythology. His Roman counterpart is Jupiter and his Etruscan counterpart is Tinia.Zeus was the child of Cronus...
was placed on the altar of the Temple, and throughout the country Jews were ordered, with the threat of execution, to sacrifice pigs
PIGS
PIGS is a four letter acronym that can stand for:* PIGS , Phosphatidylinositol glycan anchor biosynthesis, class S, a human gene* PIGS , the economies of Portugal, Italy , Greece and Spain...
to Greek gods (the normal practice in the Ancient Greek religion
Ancient Greek religion
Greek religion encompasses the collection of beliefs and rituals practiced in ancient Greece in the form of both popular public religion and cult practices. These different groups varied enough for it to be possible to speak of Greek religions or "cults" in the plural, though most of them shared...
), desecrate the Shabbat
Shabbat
Shabbat is the seventh day of the Jewish week and a day of rest in Judaism. Shabbat is observed from a few minutes before sunset on Friday evening until a few minutes after when one would expect to be able to see three stars in the sky on Saturday night. The exact times, therefore, differ from...
, eat unkosher animals (especially pork
Pork
Pork is the culinary name for meat from the domestic pig , which is eaten in many countries. It is one of the most commonly consumed meats worldwide, with evidence of pig husbandry dating back to 5000 BC....
), and relinquish their Jewish scriptures. Antiochus's decree also outlawed Jewish circumcision, and parents who violated his order were hanged along with their infants. according to Tacitus
Tacitus
Publius Cornelius Tacitus was a senator and a historian of the Roman Empire. The surviving portions of his two major works—the Annals and the Histories—examine the reigns of the Roman Emperors Tiberius, Claudius, Nero and those who reigned in the Year of the Four Emperors...
, as quoted by Hodges, Antiochus "endeavoured to abolish Jewish superstition and to introduce Greek civilization
Hellenization
Hellenization is a term used to describe the spread of ancient Greek culture, and, to a lesser extent, language. It is mainly used to describe the spread of Hellenistic civilization during the Hellenistic period following the campaigns of Alexander the Great of Macedon...
."
In the Roman Empire
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
, circumcision was regarded as a barbaric and disgusting custom. The consul Titus Flavius Clemens
Titus Flavius Clemens (consul)
Titus Flavius Clemens was a great-nephew of the Roman Emperor Vespasian. He was the son of Titus Flavius Sabinus , brother to Titus Flavius Sabinus and a second cousin to Roman Emperors to Titus and Domitian.-In classical sources:...
was condemned to death by the Roman Senate
Roman Senate
The Senate of the Roman Republic was a political institution in the ancient Roman Republic, however, it was not an elected body, but one whose members were appointed by the consuls, and later by the censors. After a magistrate served his term in office, it usually was followed with automatic...
in 95 CE for, according to the Talmud
Talmud
The Talmud is a central text of mainstream Judaism. It takes the form of a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, philosophy, customs and history....
, circumcising himself and converting to Judaism
Conversion to Judaism
Conversion to Judaism is a formal act undertaken by a non-Jewish person who wishes to be recognised as a full member of the Jewish community. A Jewish conversion is both a religious act and an expression of association with the Jewish people...
. The emperor Hadrian
Hadrian
Hadrian , was Roman Emperor from 117 to 138. He is best known for building Hadrian's Wall, which marked the northern limit of Roman Britain. In Rome, he re-built the Pantheon and constructed the Temple of Venus and Roma. In addition to being emperor, Hadrian was a humanist and was philhellene in...
(117-138) forbade circumcision.
Perhaps the most prominent Jewish response during these times, was rebellion. Antiochus's decree motivated the Maccabees Revolt, which ultimated in the reestablishment of an independent Jewish kingdom.
As for the anti-circumcision law passed by Hadrian
Hadrian
Hadrian , was Roman Emperor from 117 to 138. He is best known for building Hadrian's Wall, which marked the northern limit of Roman Britain. In Rome, he re-built the Pantheon and constructed the Temple of Venus and Roma. In addition to being emperor, Hadrian was a humanist and was philhellene in...
, it is considered by many, to be, together with his decision to build a new temple upon the ruins of the Second Temple
Second Temple
The Jewish Second Temple was an important shrine which stood on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem between 516 BCE and 70 CE. It replaced the First Temple which was destroyed in 586 BCE, when the Jewish nation was exiled to Babylon...
, which was dedicated to Jupiter, one of the main causes of the Bar Kokhba revolt (132-135). The revolt was brutally crushed. According to Cassius Dio, 580,000 Jews were killed, and 50 fortified towns and 985 villages razed. Cassius Dio claimed that "Many Romans, moreover, perished in this war. Therefore, Hadrian, in writing to the Senate, did not employ the opening phrase commonly affected by the emperors: 'If you and your children are in health, it is well; I and the army are in health.'" Because of the great loss of life in the war, even though Hadrian was victorious, he refused a triumph. Hadrian said regarding the war, "I forbade the Jews to mutilate themselves, and they started a war."
Hadrian policy after the rebelion reflected an attempt to root out Judaism. All Jews were forbidden to enter Jerusalem upon pain of death and the city was renamed Aelia Capitolina
Aelia Capitolina
Aelia Capitolina was a city built by the emperor Hadrian, and occupied by a Roman colony, on the site of Jerusalem, which was in ruins since 70 AD, leading in part to the Bar Kokhba revolt of 132–136.-Politics:...
. Around 140, His successor Antoninus Pius
Antoninus Pius
Antoninus Pius , also known as Antoninus, was Roman Emperor from 138 to 161. He was a member of the Nerva-Antonine dynasty and the Aurelii. He did not possess the sobriquet "Pius" until after his accession to the throne...
(138-161) exempted Jews who circumcised their sons, though not their servants or slaves, from the decree against circumcision.
Jewish response to the decrees also took a more moderate form: circumcisions were secretly performed – even on dead Jews –. Other Jews pursued a completely different approach, accepting the decrees, and even making efforts to restore their foreskins
Foreskin restoration
Foreskin restoration is the process of expanding the residual skin on the penis, via surgical or non-surgical methods. It can be performed for several reasons, among them being a desire to create the appearance of a natural foreskin covering the glans penis, or to increase sexual sensitivity of...
to better assimilate into Hellenistic society
Hellenistic civilization
Hellenistic civilization represents the zenith of Greek influence in the ancient world from 323 BCE to about 146 BCE...
. The latter approach was common during the reign of Antiochus, and again under Roman rule. The foreskin was restored by one of two methods, that were later revived in the late twentieth century. The surgical method, described in detail by the physician Celsus (around 25BC - 50AD), involved freeing the skin covering the penis by dissection, and then pulling it forward over the glans. Celsus also described a simpler surgical technique used on men whose prepuce is naturally insufficient to cover their glans. The second approach was nonsurgical. A device called a Pondus Judaeus (Jewish burden), a special weight made of bronze, copper, or leather, was affixed to the penis
Penis
The penis is a biological feature of male animals including both vertebrates and invertebrates...
, pulling its skin downward. Overtime, a new foreskin was generated, or a short prepuce was lengthened, by means of tissue expansion
Tissue expansion
Tissue expansion is a technique used by plastic and restorative surgeons to cause the body to grow additional skin, bone or other tissues.-Skin expansion:...
. Martial
Martial
Marcus Valerius Martialis , was a Latin poet from Hispania best known for his twelve books of Epigrams, published in Rome between AD 86 and 103, during the reigns of the emperors Domitian, Nerva and Trajan...
mentioned the instrument in Epigrammaton Libri 7:35.
The apostle Paul
Paul of Tarsus
Paul the Apostle , also known as Saul of Tarsus, is described in the Christian New Testament as one of the most influential early Christian missionaries, with the writings ascribed to him by the church forming a considerable portion of the New Testament...
referred to these practices, saying: "Was a man already circumcised when he was called? He should not become uncircumcised." But he also explicitly denounced circumcision of non-Jews, rejecting and condemning those who promoted the ritual to Gentile Christians, labelling such advocates of circumcision "false brothers". According to the same researchers, in the mid 2nd century Jewish leaders introduced a radical method of circumcision, the periah, that left the glans totally uncovered, making it almost impossible to restore the foreskin.
Under the first Christian emperor, Constantine
Constantine I
Constantine the Great , also known as Constantine I or Saint Constantine, was Roman Emperor from 306 to 337. Well known for being the first Roman emperor to convert to Christianity, Constantine and co-Emperor Licinius issued the Edict of Milan in 313, which proclaimed religious tolerance of all...
, the two rescripts of Antoninus on circumcision were re-enacted and again in the 6th century under Justinian. These restrictions on circumcision made their way into both secular and canon law and "at least through the Middle Ages, preserved and enhanced laws banning Hebrews from circumcising non-Hebrews and banning Christians or slaves of any religious affiliation from undergoing circumcision for any reason."
Circumcision controversy in early Christianity
The first Christian Church Council in JerusalemCouncil of Jerusalem
The Council of Jerusalem is a name applied by historians and theologians to an Early Christian council that was held in Jerusalem and dated to around the year 50. It is considered by Catholics and Orthodox to be a prototype and forerunner of the later Ecumenical Councils...
, held in approximately 50 AD decreed that circumcision
Circumcision in the Bible
Religious male circumcision generally occurs shortly after birth, during childhood or around puberty as part of a rite of passage. Circumcision is most prevalent in Muslim countries and Israel, and is most prevalent in the Jewish and Muslim faiths, although also common in the United States, the...
was not a requirement for Gentile
Gentile
The term Gentile refers to non-Israelite peoples or nations in English translations of the Bible....
converts. This became known as the "Apostolic Decree" and is one of the first acts differentiating Early Christianity
Early Christianity
Early Christianity is generally considered as Christianity before 325. The New Testament's Book of Acts and Epistle to the Galatians records that the first Christian community was centered in Jerusalem and its leaders included James, Peter and John....
from Rabbinic Judaism
Rabbinic Judaism
Rabbinic Judaism or Rabbinism has been the mainstream form of Judaism since the 6th century CE, after the codification of the Talmud...
At roughly the same time Rabbinic Judaism made their circumcision requirement
Brit milah
The brit milah is a Jewish religious circumcision ceremony performed on 8-day old male infants by a mohel. The brit milah is followed by a celebratory meal .-Biblical references:...
even stricter.
According to the Columbia Encyclopedia
Columbia Encyclopedia
The Columbia Encyclopedia is a one-volume encyclopedia produced by Columbia University Press and sold by the Gale Group. First published in 1935, and continuing its important relationship with Columbia University, the encyclopedia underwent major revisions in 1950 and 1963; the current edition is...
, "the decision that Christians need not practice circumcision is recorded in Acts 15; there was never, however, a prohibition of circumcision, and it is practiced by Coptic Christians."
The main focus of Christian proselytizing in the early Christian Church were the God-Fearers, gentile
Gentile
The term Gentile refers to non-Israelite peoples or nations in English translations of the Bible....
inhabitants of the Roman Empire who were allowed to attend Jewish synagogues as quasi-Jews without the necessity of undergoing the hated rite of circumcision. All they had to do was swear that there was "One God". Converts from this group was the primary kernel from which the early Christian Church grew. (About 10% of the inhabitants of the Roman Empire were full Jews and God-Fearers.)
Islam
In the early 7th century, Muhammad welded together many Semitic tribes of the Arabian peninsula into the kernel of a rapidly expanding Muslim movement. The one thing that can be said with some certainty is that male and female circumcision was already well established among these tribes, and probably had been for more than a thousand years, most likely as a fertility rite. Herodotus had noticed the practice among various Semite nations in the 5th century BCE, and JosephusJosephus
Titus Flavius Josephus , also called Joseph ben Matityahu , was a 1st-century Romano-Jewish historian and hagiographer of priestly and royal ancestry who recorded Jewish history, with special emphasis on the 1st century AD and the First Jewish–Roman War, which resulted in the Destruction of...
had specifically mentioned circumcision as a tradition among Arabs in the first century CE. After the introduction of Islam, female circumcision was prohibited, though some Muslims continued to practice it. This practice is not approved by orthodox Islam.
The practice of circumcision is sometimes characterized as a part of fitrah as mentioned in the hadith
Hadith
The term Hadīth is used to denote a saying or an act or tacit approval or criticism ascribed either validly or invalidly to the Islamic prophet Muhammad....
of Sahih al-Bukhari
Sahih al-Bukhari
Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī , as it is commonly referred to, is one of the six canonical hadith collections of Islam. These prophetic traditions, or hadith, were collected by the Persian Muslim scholar Muhammad ibn Ismail al-Bukhari, after being transmitted orally for generations. Muslims view this as one of...
(Quotations of Prophet Muhammad)
Middle Ages to 19th century
Thomas AquinasThomas Aquinas
Thomas Aquinas, O.P. , also Thomas of Aquin or Aquino, was an Italian Dominican priest of the Catholic Church, and an immensely influential philosopher and theologian in the tradition of scholasticism, known as Doctor Angelicus, Doctor Communis, or Doctor Universalis...
in his Summa Theologica
Summa Theologica
The Summa Theologiæ is the best-known work of Thomas Aquinas , and although unfinished, "one of the classics of the history of philosophy and one of the most influential works of Western literature." It is intended as a manual for beginners in theology and a compendium of all of the main...
questioned why, if under Jewish doctrine circumcision removed original sin
Original sin
Original sin is, according to a Christian theological doctrine, humanity's state of sin resulting from the Fall of Man. This condition has been characterized in many ways, ranging from something as insignificant as a slight deficiency, or a tendency toward sin yet without collective guilt, referred...
, Jesus
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
was circumcised – as Jesus had no original sin. Steve Jones suggests there is a theological tradition that Jesus regained his foreskin at the Ascension. "Had he failed to do so, the Saved would themselves have to be operated upon in Paradise so as not to be more perfect than their Saviour."
The Jews were expelled from England by Edward I in 1290, ostensibly over social tensions concerning usury. But the public imagination had been gripped by blood libel, since at least the 12th century: "So pervasive was the belief that Jews circumcised their victims ... that Menasseh ben Israil, the Dutch Rabbi who sought from Cromwell the readmission of the Jews in 1656, had to dwell at considerable length in his Vindiciae Judaeorum at refuting the claim."
In 15th century Spain, most Jews and Muslims were expelled and the Spanish Inquisition
Spanish Inquisition
The Tribunal of the Holy Office of the Inquisition , commonly known as the Spanish Inquisition , was a tribunal established in 1480 by Catholic Monarchs Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile. It was intended to maintain Catholic orthodoxy in their kingdoms, and to replace the Medieval...
monitored and prosecuted converts to Christianity to ensure they were not secretly consorting with Jews or engaging in Jewish practices such as circumcision.
In 1521 Cortés
Cortes
Cortes is surname of Spanish and Portuguese origin. Cortes or Cortés may also refer to:-Institutions:* The Cortes , the national legislative assembly of Spain...
defeated the Aztec empire in Mesoamerica, which was followed by a large influx of Spanish clergy, whose writings provide most of information about pre-conquest Aztec life and customs largely assembled from interviews with those who survived the invasion and subsequent epidemics, and their descendents. Diego Durán
Diego Durán
Diego Durán was a Dominican friar best known for his authorship of one of the earliest Western books on the history and culture of the Aztecs, The History of the Indies of New Spain, a book that was much criticized in his lifetime for helping the "heathen" maintain their culture.Also known as the...
, a Dominican friar, was convinced that the Aztecs were one of the lost tribes of Israel, with a crucial piece of supporting evidence being that they had practised circumcision.
So influential was this notion that 300 years later Bancroft
Hubert Howe Bancroft
Hubert Howe Bancroft was an American historian and ethnologist who wrote and published works concerning the western United States, Texas, Mexico, Central America, British Columbia and Alaska.-Biography:...
in his monumental Native Races began his discussion of circumcision by writing: "Whether the custom of circumcision, which has been the great prop of argument in favor of the Jewish origin of the Aztecs, really obtained among these people, has been doubted by numerous authors," concluding that it probably existed in a "certain form among some tribes" (p278). The key being "a certain form", since Bancroft makes clear in a footnote that the majority of his sources, including Clavigero, Ternaux-Compans, Carbajal Espinosa, Oviedo y Herrera, and especially Acosta
José de Acosta
José de Acosta was a Spanish 16th-century Jesuit missionary and naturalist in Latin America.-Life:...
, believed Durán and others "confounded the custom of drawing blood from the secret organs with circumcision", and "the incision on the prepuce and ear to have been mistaken for circumcision", adding that this blood-letting rite was "chiefly performed upon sons of great men" (p279). The case was not helped by the fact no reports of seeing a circumcised adult Aztec existed in the literature. Remondino says it is "a matter of controversy" whether the foreskin had actually been removed (p46).
In regard to the Mayans, Bancroft says that in 1858 Brasseur de Bourbourg reported finding "traces"
of circumcision in the sources, despite Cogolludo
Diego López de Cogolludo
Diego López de Cogolludo was a Spanish Franciscan historian of Yucatán.His work, the Historia de Yucatán, appeared at Madrid in 1688, and was reprinted in 1842 and 1867. It contains information personally gathered at a time when older sources, written and oral, that have now partly disappeared,...
having reported that "circumcision was unknown to the Indians of Yucatan" (pp279, 679). But in 1864 Brasseur published his French translation of Diego de Landa
Diego de Landa
Diego de Landa Calderón was a Spanish Bishop of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Yucatán. He left future generations with a mixed legacy in his writings, which contain much valuable information on pre-Columbian Maya civilization, and his actions which destroyed much of that civilization's...
's recently recovered 1556 ethnographic manuscript, which decisively rejected the notion of Mayan circumcision, and in a footnote he acknowledged there had probably been a "mistake", an admission that never found its way into the English-language literature although modern ethnography has long since understood the nature of these rituals. However, the Aztecs and Mayans are included by many authors from other disciplines among the list of pre-modern people who practised circumcision. Examples of such sources include UNAIDS, Kaplan, and Weiss.
Countries that do not circumcise have often held antipathy for those that do. Being circumcised was a often seen as a sign of disgrace. According to Darby, it was also seen as a serious loss of erogenous tissue: "During the Renaissance and 18th century the centrality of the foreskin to male sexual function and the pleasure of both partners was recognised by anatomists Berengario da Carpi, Gabriello Fallopio and William Harvey, in popular sex manuals like Aristotle's master-piece, and by physicians like John Hunter, who also appreciated the importance of the foreskin in providing the slack tissue needed to accommodate an erection."
In 1650, English physician John Bulwer
John Bulwer
John Bulwer was an English physician and early Baconian natural philosopher who wrote five works exploring the Body and human communication, particularly by gesture....
in his study of body modification, Anthropometamorphosis: Man Transform'd, or the Artificial Changeling, wrote of the loss in sexual pleasure resulting from circumcision: "the part which hangeth over the end of the foreskin, is moved up and down in coition, that in this attrition it might gather more heat, and increase the pleasure of the other sexe; a contentation of which they [the circumcised] are defrauded by this injurious invention. For, the shortnesse of the prepuce is reckoned among the organical defects of the yard, … yet circumcision detracts somewhat from the delight of women, by lessening their titillation." The English historian Edward Gibbon
Edward Gibbon
Edward Gibbon was an English historian and Member of Parliament...
, author of The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire is a non-fiction history book written by English historian Edward Gibbon and published in six volumes. Volume I was published in 1776, and went through six printings. Volumes II and III were published in 1781; volumes IV, V, VI in 1788–89...
, referred to the practice as "a painful and often dangerous rite", and a "singular mutilation" practiced only by Jews and Turks
Turkish people
Turkish people, also known as the "Turks" , are an ethnic group primarily living in Turkey and in the former lands of the Ottoman Empire where Turkish minorities had been established in Bulgaria, Cyprus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Greece, Kosovo, Macedonia, and Romania...
.
The first formal objection to circumcision within Judaism occurred in 1843 in Frankfurt
Frankfurt
Frankfurt am Main , commonly known simply as Frankfurt, is the largest city in the German state of Hesse and the fifth-largest city in Germany, with a 2010 population of 688,249. The urban area had an estimated population of 2,300,000 in 2010...
. The Society for the Friends of Reform, a group that attacked traditional Jewish practices, said that brit milah
Brit milah
The brit milah is a Jewish religious circumcision ceremony performed on 8-day old male infants by a mohel. The brit milah is followed by a celebratory meal .-Biblical references:...
was not a mitzvah
Mitzvah
The primary meaning of the Hebrew word refers to precepts and commandments as commanded by God...
but an outworn legacy from Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
's earlier phases, an obsolete throwback to primitive religion. With the expanding role of medicine came further opposition; certain aspects of Jewish circumcision such as periah and metzitzah (drawing the blood from the circumcision wound through sucking or a cloth) were deemed unhygienic. Later evidence that syphilis and tuberculosis
Tuberculosis
Tuberculosis, MTB, or TB is a common, and in many cases lethal, infectious disease caused by various strains of mycobacteria, usually Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis usually attacks the lungs but can also affect other parts of the body...
– two of the most feared infectious diseases in the 19th century – were spread by mohels, caused various rabbis to advocate metzitzah to be done using a sponge or a tube. (Today, the Rabbinical Council of America
Rabbinical Council of America
The Rabbinical Council of America is one of the world's largest organizations of Orthodox rabbis; it is affiliated with The Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America, more commonly known as the Orthodox Union, or OU...
, the largest group of Modern Orthodox rabbis, endorses using a glass tube)
Ephron reports that Gentiles and also some Jewish reformers in early 19th century Germany had criticized ritual circumcision as "barbaric" and that Jewish doctors responded to these criticisms with defences of the ritual or proposals for modification or reform. By the late 19th century some German Jewish doctors defended circumcision by claiming it had health advantages.
Modern debates
Medical advocacy and opposition
Circumcision spread in several English-speaking nations from the late nineteenth century, with the introduction of anesthesia and antisepsis rapidly expanding surgical practice. Doctors such as Sir Jonathan HutchinsonJonathan Hutchinson
Sir Jonathan Hutchinson , was an English surgeon, ophthalmologist, dermatologist, venereologist and pathologist.-Life:He was born in Selby, Yorkshire, England of Quaker parents and educated in the local school...
in England wrote articles in favour of the procedure. Peter Charles Remondino, a San Diego physician, wrote a History of Circumcision from the Earliest Times to the Present: Moral and Physical Reasons for Its Performance (1891), to promote circumcision. Lewis Sayre, a prominent orthopedic surgeon at the time, was another early American advocate. However, the theories on which many early claims were made, such as the reflex theory of disease and the alleged harmful effects of masturbation, have long since been abandoned by the medical profession.
Dr. John Harvey Kellogg
John Harvey Kellogg
John Harvey Kellogg was an American medical doctor in Battle Creek, Michigan, who ran a sanitarium using holistic methods, with a particular focus on nutrition, enemas and exercise. Kellogg was an advocate of vegetarianism and is best known for the invention of the corn flakes breakfast cereal...
recommended circumcision of boys caught masturbating, writing: "A remedy for masturbation which is almost always successful in small boys is circumcision, especially when there is any degree of phimosis. The operation should be performed by a surgeon without administering anaesthetic, as the pain attending the operation will have a salutary effect upon the mind, especially if it be connected with the idea of punishment." (page 295) But he was opposed to routine circumcision of infants: "It is doubtful, however, whether as much harm as good does not result from circumcision, since it has been shown by extensive observation among the Jews that very great contraction of the meatus, or external orifice of the urethra, is exceedingly common among them, being undoubtedly the result of the prolonged irritation and subsequent cicatricial contraction resulting from circumcision in infancy." (page 107)
An early British opponent of circumcision was Herbert Snow, who wrote a short book called The barbarity of circumcision as a remedy for congenital abnormality in 1890. But as late as 1936, L. E. Holt, an author of pediatric textbooks, advocated male and female circumcision as a treatment for masturbation.
The first serious questioning of the practice did not occur until late 1949 when Gairdner published The Fate of the Foreskin in the British Medical Journal
British Medical Journal
BMJ is a partially open-access peer-reviewed medical journal. Originally called the British Medical Journal, the title was officially shortened to BMJ in 1988. The journal is published by the BMJ Group, a wholly owned subsidiary of the British Medical Association...
; according to Wallerstein this began to affect the practice of circumcision in Britain
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
.
According to Darby and Cox, the persistence of circumcision in the USA has led to more vigorous protest movements. A 1980 protest march at the California State Capitol
California State Capitol
The California State Capitol is home to the government of California. The building houses the bicameral state legislature and the office of the governor....
was reported in an Associated Press
Associated Press
The Associated Press is an American news agency. The AP is a cooperative owned by its contributing newspapers, radio and television stations in the United States, which both contribute stories to the AP and use material written by its staff journalists...
article. The National Organization of Circumcision Information Resource Centers (NOCIRC), was formed by Marilyn Milos
Marilyn Milos
Marilyn Fayre Milos is the founder and director of the National Organization of Circumcision Information Resource Centers , a genital integrity organization which opposes the genital modification of children.-Early life:...
, R.N., in 1985. The organization's stated objective is to secure the birthright of male, female, and intersex children and babies to keep their sex organs intact. Protest rallies have been held in the USA and other areas. NOCIRC have consistently criticised the American medical community's circumcision guidelines. According to Milos and Donna Macris, "The need to defend the baby's right to a peaceful beginning was brought to light by Dr. Frederick Leboyer in his landmark work, Birth Without Violence".
This period also saw the formation of anti-circumcision organizations in Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom and South Africa. Activists began creating websites in the mid-1990s, and this process has continued. One such organization distributed questionnaires to circumcised men. The complaints included prominent scarring
Circumcision scar
In males who have been circumcised, the circumcision scar refers to the scar after a circumcision has healed. In some cases, the scar can be darker-colored, and, in all cases, it will encircle the shaft of the penis.-Appearance:...
(33%), insufficient penile skin for comfortable erection (27%), erectile curvature from uneven skin loss (16%), and pain and bleeding upon erection/manipulation (17%). Psychological complaints included feelings of mutilation (60%), low self esteem/inferiority to intact men (50%), genital dysmorphia (55%), rage (52%), resentment/depression (59%), violation (46%), or parental betrayal (30%). Many respondents reported that their physical/emotional suffering impeded emotional intimacy with their partner(s), resulting in sexual dysfunction
Sexual dysfunction
Sexual dysfunction or sexual malfunction refers to a difficulty experienced by an individual or a couple during any stage of a normal sexual activity, including desire, arousal or orgasm....
. Prominent men known to be unhappy about being circumcised include A E Houseman, W.H. Auden, Geoffrey Keynes
Geoffrey Keynes
Sir Geoffrey Langdon Keynes was an English biographer, surgeon, physician, scholar and bibliophile...
and his brother John Maynard Keynes
John Maynard Keynes
John Maynard Keynes, Baron Keynes of Tilton, CB FBA , was a British economist whose ideas have profoundly affected the theory and practice of modern macroeconomics, as well as the economic policies of governments...
, the famous economist. In 1996 the British Medical Journal published a letter by 20 men saying that "we have been harmed by circumcision in childhood"; they argued that "it cannot be ethical for a doctor to amputate normal tissue from a normal child". Dr. Benjamin Spock
Benjamin Spock
Benjamin McLane Spock was an American pediatrician whose book Baby and Child Care, published in 1946, is one of the biggest best-sellers of all time. Its message to mothers is that "you know more than you think you do."Spock was the first pediatrician to study psychoanalysis to try to understand...
(d. 1998), whose Baby and Child Care is the biggest selling American single-author book in history, originally supported circumcision but changed his mind near the end of his life.
Prominent American advocates for infant circumcision include Dr. Thomas Wiswell, who began publishing research on the relative incidence of urinary tract infections in the mid 1980s; Dr. Edgar Schoen, (b. 1925) former chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics' Task Force on Circumcision, who maintains a web site promoting circumcision and claims physical benefits in sexual performance in addition to medical arguments; and Aaron J. Fink, M.D. (d. 1990), who self-published Circumcision: A Parent's Decision for Life to promote his ideas.
In Australia, Professor Brian Morris
Brian Morris
Brian Morris is a professor of molecular medical sciences at the University of Sydney, Australia. He is a molecular biologist, and has published about 250 research papers...
, author of In Favour of Circumcision, asserts that circumcision confers many medical benefits including reduced risk of UTIs, penile cancer, HIV, balanitis, posthitis, phimosis, and prostate cancer and argues that circumcision has sexual benefits. Morris also claims that circumcision prevents "physical problems" such as "Bathroom splatter" and "Zipper injury". However, Morris's views have been strongly criticised by Professor Basil Donovan who argues that the protection from HIV argued by Morris is not an accurate depiction of the HIV research. David Forbes, chair of the pediatrics and child health policy and advocacy committee of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians has stated that Morris has not been asked to review the college's circumcision policy and is not a member of the college.
The American Academy of Pediatrics
American Academy of Pediatrics
The American Academy of Pediatrics is the major professional association of pediatricians in the United States. The AAP was founded in 1930 by 35 pediatricians to address pediatric healthcare standards. It currently has 60,000 members in primary care and sub-specialist areas...
(AAP) circumcision policy has been criticised, both by those who believe that it is too negative about the practice, and those who believe that it is too positive. Hill has also criticised the Academy's circumcision information brochure for parents, arguing that the brochure is inadequate to persuade parents to avoid circumcision.
The WHO and UNAIDS recommend male circumcision as a means of reducing the rate of HIV infection, but this has also proved controversial, with doubts raised about the efficacy of mass circumcision campaigns in sub-Saharan Africa. Critics have themselves been the subject of criticism; Kalichman writes: "Anticircumcision groups have long existed and are increasingly vocal as MC programs for HIV prevention are promoted. Anticircumcision groups resemble other antiscience and antimedicine extremists including AIDS denialists who refute public health realities to maintain entrenched belief systems"
Another area of continuing dispute is the effect of circumcision on penile sensitivity. In April 2007, the British Journal of Urology
British Journal of Urology
BJUI was established in 1929. The editor in chief is John M. Fitzpatrick and the journal is published by Wiley-Blackwell...
published a study (Sorrells et al., 2007) that stated it "conclusively shows that circumcised males have a significant penile sensory deficit as compared with non-circumcised intact men" and that "the most sensitive regions in the uncircumcised penis are those removed by circumcision." But in June 2007, the BJU published a letter in response by Waskett and Morris, which concluded that "despite a poorly representative sample and a methodology prone to exaggerating the sensitivity of the prepuce, NOCIRC's claims remain unproven. When the authors' data are analysed properly, no significant differences exist. Thus the claim that circumcision adversely affects penile sensitivity is poorly supported, and this study provides no evidence for the belief that circumcision adversely affects sexual pleasure." Hugh Young, a critic of circumcision, responded to this, stating that Waskett and Morris "critique the finding of Sorrells et al. that 'circumcision ablates [removes] the most sensitive part of the penis' by excluding that part from consideration... That the foreskin itself has a sexual function was well-known for centuries before secular circumcision became widespread. What would need to be proved rigorously is that cutting a significant part of the distal penis off does not diminish sexual pleasure." Payne et al. reported that direct measurement of penile sensation in the shaft and glans during sexual arousal
Sexual arousal
Sexual arousal, or sexual excitement, is the arousal of sexual desire, during or in anticipation of sexual activity. Things that precipitate human sexual arousal are called erotic stimuli, or colloquially known as turn-ons. There are many potential stimuli, both physical or mental, which can cause...
failed to support the hypothesised sensory differences associated with circumcision status.
Genital integrity
Many opponents of circumcision see infant circumcision as unnecessary, harmful and unethical; some want the procedures prohibited. Boyle et al. suggest that "As we enter the 21st century, appropriate legal action must be taken to safeguard the physical genital integrity of male children."Hammond asserts that every person has a right to a whole and intact body and that, where minors are concerned, "the unnecessary removal of a functioning body organ in the name of tradition, custom or any other non-disease related cause should never be acceptable to the health profession." He says that such interventions are violations of individual bodily rights and "a breach of fundamental medical ethics principles". Others also see the genital cutting of children as a human rights issue, opposing the genital modification and mutilation
Genital modification and mutilation
The terms genital modification and genital mutilation can refer to permanent or temporary changes to human sex organs. Some forms of genital alteration are performed at the behest of an adult, with their informed consent. Others are performed on infants or children...
of children, including circumcision
Circumcision
Male circumcision is the surgical removal of some or all of the foreskin from the penis. The word "circumcision" comes from Latin and ....
and female genital mutilation. Several anti-circumcision organizations also oppose the sexual-reassignment surgery
Sex reassignment surgery
Sex reassignment surgery is a term for the surgical procedures by which a person's physical appearance and function of their existing sexual characteristics are altered to resemble...
of infants with ambiguous genitalia.
Current laws in many countries, and United States Federal Law as well as laws in several U.S. states, prohibit the genital modification and mutilation of female minors, with some exceptions based on medical need. Opponents of male circumcision assert that laws against genital modification and mutilation of minors should apply equally to males and females. Many anti-circumcision groups have joined the International Coalition for Genital Integrity and endorsed its declaration, which was adopted by the First International Symposium on Circumcision, on March 3, 1989, at Anaheim, California. (There have been nine such further symposia held since, with the proceedings of several subsequently published in book form.)
However, linking male circumcision to female genital mutilation (FGM) is itself highly controversial. Organizations actually involved in combating FGM have been at considerable pains to distinguish the two, as this UNICEF document explains: "When the practice first came to be known beyond the societies in which it was traditionally carried out, it was generally referred to as "female circumcision". This term, however, draws a direct parallel with male circumcision and, as a result, creates confusion between these two distinct practices."
This stance has been largely echoed by Western medical and political authorities. The Australian Medical Association states: "The AMA rejects the euphemism "female circumcision", sometimes used to describe the various forms of female genital mutilation, because the use of this phrase trivialises the severe and often irreparable physical and psychological damage occasioned to girls and women by these practices." In the United States, the organization MGMbill.org sent a proposed bill to the US Congress and 15 state legislatures between 2004 and 2007 to extend the prohibition on genital modification and mutilation
Genital modification and mutilation
The terms genital modification and genital mutilation can refer to permanent or temporary changes to human sex organs. Some forms of genital alteration are performed at the behest of an adult, with their informed consent. Others are performed on infants or children...
of minors to include male
Male
Male refers to the biological sex of an organism, or part of an organism, which produces small mobile gametes, called spermatozoa. Each spermatozoon can fuse with a larger female gamete or ovum, in the process of fertilization...
and intersex
Intersex
Intersex, in humans and other animals, is the presence of intermediate or atypical combinations of physical features that usually distinguish female from male...
children. But the proposed bill has not been endorsed by any member of Congress.
Other contemporary controversies
While circumcision debates are often dominated by the concerns of Anglophone countries, very different controversies over the procedure regularly erupt in other cultural contexts. In South Asia, Pakistan has long used circumcision status as a definitive marker of Indian covert involvement in its internal affairs. But this assumption was thrown into confusion when it was discovered that large segments of its own Muslim male population, specifically from western tribal areas, were themselves uncircumcised.Opposition to circumcision exists among Jews in Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
. Even though there is often pressure from family to circumcise their sons, a small but growing number of Jews are choosing to forgo the procedure. Islamic anti-circumcision groups, such as Qur'an Alone, have also emerged, arguing among other things that routine circumcision is an insult to Allah since it tries to improve on his perfect creation.
Northern Europe, which has no tradition of routine circumcision, has been struggling with the challenges of its Jewish and Muslim minorities. Finland is considering legislation to legalise male circumcision. Sweden in 2001 passed a law requiring traditional circumcisers to be certified and for the infants to be given a medically administered anaesthetic. The World Jewish Congress said that "[t]his is the first legal restriction placed on a Jewish rite in Europe since the Nazi era."
In the Xhosa areas of South Africa, the large death toll from traditional circumcision provide a constant source of friction between traditional leaders, who oppose medicalised procedures, and health authorities. In 2009 in Eastern Cape Province alone, 80 boys died and hundreds were hospitalised after attending initiation schools. The controversy looks set to spread to the Zulu, whose present-day king Goodwill Zwelithini has called for the reintroduction of customary circumcision after it was banned by Zulu king Shaka
Shaka
Shaka kaSenzangakhona , also known as Shaka Zulu , was the most influential leader of the Zulu Kingdom....
in the 19th century. Similar issues, though on a smaller scale, have arisen with traditional circumcision of Aborigines in remote areas of central Australia.
See also
- History of circumcision
- Ethics of circumcision
- Human rightsHuman rightsHuman rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...
- Reproductive rightsReproductive rightsReproductive rights are legal rights and freedoms relating to reproduction and reproductive health. The World Health Organization defines reproductive rights as follows:...
- Ridged bandRidged bandThe term ridged band is a description of an area/band of wrinkly skin toward the end of the foreskin. The term ridged is used to describe the area instead of the more commonly used term "wrinkled". More particularly it refers to the "transitional area from the external to the internal surface ofthe...
- Gliding action
- ForeskinForeskinIn male human anatomy, the foreskin is a generally retractable double-layered fold of skin and mucous membrane that covers the glans penis and protects the urinary meatus when the penis is not erect...
- Foreskin restorationForeskin restorationForeskin restoration is the process of expanding the residual skin on the penis, via surgical or non-surgical methods. It can be performed for several reasons, among them being a desire to create the appearance of a natural foreskin covering the glans penis, or to increase sexual sensitivity of...
- Medical analysis of circumcisionMedical analysis of circumcisionNumerous medical studies have examined the effects of male circumcision with mixed opinions regarding the benefits and risks of the procedure. Opponents of circumcision say it is medically unnecessary, is unethical when performed on newborns, is painful even when performed with anesthetic,...
- PenisPenisThe penis is a biological feature of male animals including both vertebrates and invertebrates...
Opposition to circumcision
- The Circumcision Information and Resource Pages
- Intact America
- National Organization of Circumcision Information Resource Centers (NOCIRC)
- MGMbill.org
- Doctors Opposing Circumcision
Criticism of opposition to circumcision
Circumcision advocates
- The Benefits of Male Circumcision by Dr David Hawker, General Practitioner, UK
- Medical Benefits of Circumcision by Professor Brian Morris, Australia
- Circumcision: a lifetime of medical benefits by Dr. Edgar J. Schoen, USA
- Operation Abraham
- Clearinghouse on Male Circumcision for HIV Prevention