About four thousand years ago, the original Jewish circumcision consisted of cutting off only the tip of the foreskin--the floppy part that extends past the glans in the normal male infant. Called "milah," the procedure left most of the foreskin alone.
Two thousand years ago, Jewish hellenists, wanting to assimilate characteristics of the Greek way of life, obliterated the sign of their "tip" circumcisions. Most of their foreskins were still intact, so they found ways to lengthen them, to make it look as if they had not been circumcised at all. This practice was unacceptable to ancient rabbis, who decided to begin cutting all of the foreskin off in infancy. Babies circumcised in this manner could not possibly later hide the fact that they had been circumcised. Significantly, most rabbis today erroneously refer to total foreskin amputation as milah.
Myths and Facts:
Myth: Unmyelinated nerves do not transmit pain.
Fact: Not only do unmyelinated nerves transmit pain, they transmit the most excruciating kind of pain.
M: Babies don't feel pain because some of their nerves have not become myelinated.
F: Babies do feel pain, especially since they have more unmyelinated nerves than adults.
M: Local anesthetic makes the circumcision painless.
F: Injecting the anesthetic into the genital area is painful for the baby. Because the anesthetic wears off soon, the postoperative pain that lasts for days is just as bad for a baby who had anesthetic than for one who had none.
M: The baby's intact penis is harder to keep clean and take care of than a circumcised penis.
F: Because of the extra care that one must take in caring for and bathing a circumcision wound that is in the process of healing, and because of the frequent complications such as meatal ulcers that occur in circumcised penises, the intact infant penis is actually much easier to care for. It basically needs no care, no retraction, no nothing.
M: There are sound studies proving that circumcisions prevent urinary tract infections (UTI).
F: The highly publicized studies "proving" that circumcisions prevent UTIs have many flaws. No major scientific body has accepted these studies as proof that circumcisions prevent UTIs. In addition, contradictory studies also exist, showing no correlation between UTIs and circumcisions.
M: By age five the foreskin should retract on its own.
F: Normal, spontaneous, and sometimes gradual full retraction may take up to 17 years to complete. Under no circumstances should the infant foreskin be retracted, even in a gentle manner. It is simply not necessary.
M: It is difficult to teach a boy to keep his intact penis clean.
F: A girl's genitals are more difficult to keep clean than a boy's intact penis. Boys, like girls, can easily figure out for themselves the details on how to clean their own genitals.
M: Male family members will have psychological problems if some have circumcised penises and others have intact penises.
F: When the English abruptly stopped circumcising most of its population, there were no psychological problems reported about the circumcised fathers and intact sons.
-Julia Bertschinger, CCE, in Midwifery Today Issue 17
Reprinted from Midwifery Today E-News (Vol 1 Issue 37, Sep 10, 1999)
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