Alef: The NEXT Conversation
The First Cut is Always the Deepest
By Emily Kapit
First comes love (one hopes), then comes marriage (one’s parents hope), then comes “your-name-here” in the baby carriage (it’s shocking how soon the pressure for this starts after the wedding; you know, like at the post-wedding brunch). However, the second you announce the impending arrival of a baby, you might as well simultaneously open an umbrella to fend off the deluge of advice, expectations, and opinions.
“You’re gonna get a nanny, right? You can’t expect to raise a baby on your own can you?”
“In my day, you put a sleeping baby on its back, then it was to be on stomach, now it’s back to the back. I don’t get why they ever changed!”
“Here’s the name of my mohel; he’s the BEST. Why, he did my little David and…”
Now, I know that people usually mean well when dispensing tidbits of “helpful” information and I’m all for taking in some suggestions on pregnancy and child-rearing when the time comes, but there is one Jewish tradition (or is it a rite of passage?) that I’ve found myself questioning over the last few years.
It all started with Elisa Albert’s collection of short stories How This Night is Different. The first story, “The Mother is Always Upset,” depicts a new father trying to handle the early morning brit milah going on in his home eight days after the birth of his baby boy. The sleep-deprived character is simultaneously trying to deal with the hoards of people gathered in his house (all of whom have been waiting around for the short service to begin) while also attempting to track down his wife and newborn son. As the story goes on, you come to find out that the mother and other characters question the necessity of a bris and deem it a “barbaric ritual” that has no true “medical reason” and is “painful and invasive.”
Truth be told, I’d never thought about a bris that way; isn’t this just something we, as Jews, do? Apparently, yes. G-d said to Abraham, patriarch of the Jews, “This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your offspring after you: Every male among you shall be circumcised. You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you (Genesis 17: 9-11).” And if you don’t do this? Well, there’s a punishment ready and waiting just a few verses down: “Any uncircumcised male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin shall be cut off from his people; he has broken my covenant (Genesis 17:14).”
Yikes.
I should go ahead and make two points clear before continuing: I am a) not pregnant nor expecting to be anytime soon; and b) not necessarily saying that I would never do a bris should I be blessed to have a baby boy years down the road. What I am saying, though, is that I am simply questioning the tradition and its place in our modern world.
The first order of business is to state that though I consider myself Jewish from both a religious and (decidedly moreso) cultural perspective, my biggest beef with the religious side is this persistent feeling of “Well, G-d said we should do this so that’s why it’s done.” While I absolutely, undoubtedly, and unfailingly support other people’s decisions to be religious and follow more of the traditions passed down through countless generations, I personally feel strongly about needing some hard evidence supporting the need for a tradition before agreeing to do the same on my end (especially when knives and blood are involved).
Bar and bat mitzvahs to symbolize the age at which young Jews enter adulthood and are responsible for their actions? Sure, it’s a great rite of passage for kids and I love the idea so long as it does not turn into a competition of whose parents can throw the best shindig. The groom veiling his bride before the wedding to ensure that the woman he intends to marry is really under there? Absolutely—badekens are a sweet throwback to the Biblical story of Jacob planning to marry Rebecca but “accidentally” marrying Leah when their father substituted her at the last moment. Taking a knife to a defenseless baby days after its birth? Just because G-d said so? I think I need some additional convincing on that one. Also, will my child be cast out of the Jewish people if he’s not circumcised? I ate shrimp for lunch two days ago—should I be cast out as well?
Medically speaking, the jury is still out on the necessity for a circumcision. As this early 2010 Washington Post article shows, the practice of circumcision is a hotly debated topic in both medical and religious circles (which I imagine overlaps with some regularity). Some supporters of the minor surgery say that it does, indeed, cut back on the risk of STDs and penile cancer. In 2005, however, the American Academy of Pediatrics reconfirmed its 1999 policy on the matter, which is that they do not believe the evidence supporting circumcision was strong enough to endorse it as a regular surgical routine. Given that I am looking for facts to help me decide my stance on the matter, turning to the medical world does not seem to be overly helpful at this time.
Honestly, and unless the medical community comes up with overwhelming proof of a circumcision’s necessity, the one point that would push me toward honoring the ritual (other than obviously discussing the matter with my husband and coming to a decision with him), is not wanting my child to be “different.” Well, that and not wanting to upset the masses of family members who may attack me with a mohel’s scalpel should I decide against a bris. Either way, perhaps hoping for girls is my best bet for avoiding the topic altogether?
Photo by Arria Belli, licensed under Creative Commons.
UPDATE: Since we first posted this piece in January, the circumcision debate has once again come into the spotlight (or maybe it never left?). Tablet Magazine reports on a San Francisco ballot measure prohibiting circumcision and it has started quite a conversation.
The Foreskin, and the Man Behind It
By Sadie Caruth
This past summer, as the latest circumcision debate brought forth discussion, controversy, and judgment from all sides, I remained silent. Until a few years ago, circumcision was an everyday part of Jewish life that I had always taken for granted. Why on earth would I need to ever sit and ponder the pros and cons (health-wise or sexually) of foreskin? I suppose I was a little naive, but I always assumed that this act, with its roots steeped in biblical Jewish tradition, was so commonplace that running into an uncircumcised penis was about as likely as getting hit by lightning — certainly not unheard-of, but not something that happens every day. Perhaps it was this sort of naivete that contributed to my status as a late-bloomer.
It was the stuff of good chick flicks that my first real boyfriend, the person to whom I lost my virginity, was (and still is as far as I know) uncircumcised. Having had very few sexual experiences prior to my official “first time,” I didn’t have a whole lot to compare it to. Now that I have slept with other men, the distinction is pretty evident. My current preference for one or the other has absolutely nothing to do with the actual size and shape of the organ itself. I care much more about the background and upbringing of the man attached to it. What I came to learn through my first experience is that the foreskin (or lack thereof) may tell you more about the background and upbringing of the man attached to it than it will about how good he is in bed.
See, this first boyfriend, my first sexual partner, was a gentile (gasp!). He came from a part of the world where circumcision is strictly a Jewish tradition; if you are not Jewish, you are not circumcised. His foreskin was a sign of what he culturally was and was not, and he was not shy about telling me that none of his sons would ever be circumcised either. Period. Sure, we were 22 years old, and not anywhere near thinking about marriage or children, but I was shocked by his blatant disregard of my culture in favor of his own. What struck me was that we weren’t just having sex, we were in love too, and this was not the kind of quick judgment that I expected from someone who loved me.
As it turned out, our sex life did affect the rest of our relationship in ways that I never could have predicted. Was it his refusal to circumcise any of our potential male offspring that broke us? Certainly not — I like to consider myself nontraditional and open-minded. The foreskin issue was more of a symptom than a cause; what did eventually lead to our break-up were the negative associations he made with Judaism as a result of his upbringing.
What have I learned from all of this? When it comes to choosing sexual partners and boyfriends, what a guy brings to bed with him is not as important as why he brings it.
Photo by James Bowe, licensed under Creative Commons.
Read more articles from Issue 08: “The Sex Issue.”
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