Haredim Fear Dangerous Circumcision Rite Could Be Banned In Israel

Shmarya Rosenberg • FailedMessiah.com



Haredim are worried that the Yesh Atid Party will be moving to ban or limit metzitzah b’peh (MBP), the direct mouth-to-bloody-penis sucking done (primarily by haredi and religiously right wing Zionist Orthodox) mohels after cutting off the baby’s foreskin, Yeshiva World reported.



Currently, a voluntary committee, made up primarily of representatives of the haredi-controlled Chief Rabbinate of Israel, oversees and certifies mohels. A minority of the committee’s members are drawn from the Ministry of Health, which was in haredi control in the past few governments but no longer is now.



Once a mohel receives certification from that committee, the mohel receives a license from both the Chief Rabbinate and the ministry.



That same committee also oversees other aspects of circumcision, as well.



But now, a new bill sponsored by Yesh Atid would change the composition of that committee so the majority would be held by the Ministry of Health.



“The concerns are obvious,” Yeshiva World reports, “especially today with the health minister being very secular and a member of Yesh Atid, Minister Yael German. There are fears that if chas v’sholom [God forbid] such a committee assumes control of monitoring bris milah [Jewish religious circumcision] in Israel, metzitzah b’peh and other issues will be outlawed by a secularist medical panel that lacks understanding of a bris milah [Jewish religious circumcision] in halacha [Jewish law].”



Metzitzah b’peh has caused hundreds (if not thousands or tens of thousands) of deaths and serious illnesses in the past 200 years alone by transmitting various illnesses, including Syphilis and Herpes Simplex Virus 1 to neonates, and was banned by many Orthodox communities in Western and Central Europe beginning in about 1800.



However, hasidic groups often refused to ban metzitzah b’peh, choosing instead to view it for kabbalistic reasons as an integral part of the circumcision rite – even though halakha (Jewish law) shows clearly that it is not.



Instead, metzitzah b’peh was instituted as a ancient health measure based on the ancient Greek medicine current 1,800 years ago – 1,600 years before the discovery of germ theory and the mechanisms of disease transmission.

Related Posts:

History Of Disease Transmission Through Metzitzah B'Peh.

A Graphic History Of Metzitzah B’Peh.