The strange history of surgery's oldest enigma and most persistent ritual.

How has a medical practice that carries substantial risk to the patient and offers very little actual benefit become so widely accepted by parents and fiercely advocated by the medical community? Historian of medicine David Gollaher tells the strange history of medicine's oldest enigma and most persistent ritual in Circumcision. From the extraordinarily painful initiation rite of the ancient Egyptians, through the Hebrew purification ritual, through circumcision's use by the rising medical community in the nineteenth century as prevention for ailments ranging from bedwetting to paralysis, the great mystery has been the persistence of the practice through vastly different social contexts.

This worldwide history of circumcision, from ancient times to the present, looks at the procedure as initiation, religious and social ritual, and indicator of ethnic and social status

In the eighteenth century, the Western world viewed circumcision as an embarrassing disfigurement peculiar to Jews. A century later, British doctors urged parents to circumcise their sons as a routine precaution against every imaginable sexual dysfunction, from syphilis and phimosis to masturbation and bed-wetting. Thirty years later the procedu...

From the author of "Abraham's Heirs" comes a history of Jewish and Christian beliefs about circumcision from its ancient origins to modern day.

Nearly 60 percent of all male newborns are routinely circumcised in the U.S. In this book, the founder of the men's group, The Victims Speak, debunks the medical reasons for infant male circumcision and places them in a cultural and historical context. Boyd also explores male and female circumcision in a range of cultures. Illustrations.

"This book represents engaged scholarship at its very best. Cohen presents the vast range of texts at his command with brevity and wit. Elegantly written, this is a very stimulating book that is sure to provoke admiration, discussion, and controversy."—David Biale, author of Cultures of the Jews "A distinguished and wide-ranging work of scholarship. Cohen’s definitive discussion of the covenant of circumcision enhances our understanding of Jewish identity formation, women’s status in Judaism, Jewish-Christian polemic, and the impact of diverse cultural environments on the evolution of Jewish tradition."—Judith R. Baskin, author of Midrashic Women