by whereami 6 Replies latest watchtower bible
Here we go again.
"If circumcision was such a good idea, why did Gawd create man with a foreskin in the first place? Could it simply be that superstitious desert tribes in the Middle East had this crazy idea that masturbation was somehow evil and that circumcision was merely intended to reduce the sexual pleasure"?
Tell me the truth. Have you been listening to Howard Stern??? It was a topic of discussion last week on Sirius, just curious.
Well yeah, i mean part of the reason so many people won't read the bible from start to finish is because it's hard work trudging through all the equations & diagrams.
Tell me the truth. Have you been listening to Howard Stern??? It was a topic of discussion last week on Sirius, just curious.
Really??? Do you have the clip? I'd love to hear what good old Howard had to say. I haven't listen to him since he moved to Sirius.
Personally I've been doing just fine without a foreskin. I would have been upset if I had sensitivity loss because of being circumcised, but it doesn't seem to mean anything of significance...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_effects_of_circumcision
Results of studies of the effect on penile sensitivity have been mixed. In a British study of 150 men circumcised as adults for penile problems, Masood et al. found that 38% reported improved penile sensation (p=0.01), 18% reported worse penile sensation, while the remainder (44%) reported no change. [ 4 ] In a survey of men circumcised as adults for medical (93%) or elective (7%) reasons, Fink et al. found an association between adult circumcision and decreased penile sensitivity that "bordered on statistical significance" (p=0.08). [ 5 ]
This is a hot-button issue for me. The fact that this supposed "god" created something so perfect and then decided it needed to be modified completely baffles me. It has nothing to do with science... maybe, just maybe, these nomadic desert people saw that it was difficult to keep an intact penis clean, what with the sand and sweat, etc. Maybe they saw the nations around them were NOT circumsized, so they did it in order to separate themselves further. In my way of seeing all this "separation" from the surrounding cultures (along with other factors like following one man who claims to be the mediator or spokesperson for god himself, etc) , it's my opinion that Judaism was the very first true cult.
I decided not to have my sons circumcised because I didn't feel it was my right to hack off a piece of their body *shrug*. Body modification is a personal choice. It's not MY body, so it's not MY right to choose to modify it. Same reason I didn't have my daughter's ears pierced as a baby. Not my choice. I did lots of research, looked at both sides of the arguement, and concluded that it just wasn't necessary and wasn't worth causing them pain over. In SOME cases it is a medical necessity, but that's rare. For the most part, as long as it's kept clean, there are no issues. Quite a few insurance companies in the US have stopped paying for routine circumcision because it is considered cosmetic and not medically necessary. If, for example, a boy was born with hypospadias, then the foreskin would be most likely to be used to correct it, and therefore, it's medically necessary. Having a boy and wanting him to "look like his father" is not lol. It becomes out of pocket to have it done. For the record, neither of my boys look like their father (in ANY way, but particularly in that area) and it's not something they've noted or even care about.
I could be wrong, but I am completely unaware of any single reference in the Bible about circumcision that makes the slightest claim that is was a health issue.
In every case, it was done as required religious ritual.
The witnesses, and other groups which practice rituals, often apologize for themselves by claiming health benefits: Pigs could somehow have more bacteria than Lamb, blood transfusions hold medical dangers, the circumcision is necessary for cleanness, etc.
But nothing of such medical nature actually appears in the scriptures - it is all purely religious ritual; unexplained in any way except that "God ordered it to be so".
