Originally Posted by Jagtstein
There are no arguments for circumcision without a medical indication.
1 and 2 With appropriate hygiene, these claims can not be upheld.
Hygiene means washing the penis in the morning, in the evening and after use with the foreskin retracted.
3 There’s no arguing about looks. I like uncircumcised penises much better. In addition, the foreskin is intended to protect the sensitive glans. This is so provided by nature and therefore certainly not wrong. A long foreskin has the advantage that it is great for masturbating. Because you always have a vulva, so to speak. The circumcision in different religions was ultimately made for hygienic reasons and then religiously transfigured over the years. The religions prescribing this are all originated in areas where water shortage was. Religions that have arisen in other areas without water shortage require no circumcision. The prudish US Americans originally introduced circumcision to curb masturbation. This does not work as we know. But out of ignorance, the circumcision was continued. Luckily, this calamity also subsides in the USA.
What is the purpose of circumcision? The best way to say it is this. We learn by object lessons, okay? Especially in a more primitive time in the unfolding of God’s revelation in the Old Testament, God gave His people many, many object lessons, didn’t He? I mean just - just their whole religion was a series of object lessons. Life was filled with ceremonies and ceremonies and ceremonies and ceremonies, ritual upon ritual upon ritual upon ritual.
There was this thing to do and that thing to do and the other thing to do, and this was symbolic in so many, many cases. Every animal that was ever sacrificed was a symbol of the ultimate sacrifice of Christ, right? Every cleansing, every washing of a pot, washing of a pan, washing of the hands, washing of the feet, every ceremonial washing they went through was a symbol of the inward washing of the heart. In the Old Testament economy, God was always giving out outward symbols to identify what He wanted to say about inward responses and inward attitudes.
Now, circumcision is one of those very same things. And circumcision was a symbol of cleansing. And when a child, a baby was born, the eighth day, the foreskin was removed, and it was, in a way, a symbol of the removal of sin from the life. In other words, God was saying to them - and you do it all the time, all the time - it’s painful, it’s bloody, and so forth and so on - and the picture was that what God is doing here is giving you a symbol of what He wants to do in your heart.
And that’s why the Bible says circumcise your hearts, you know, cut off that which contributes to your uncleanness, cut that off so that the outward symbol is only a sign or an indication of what God wanted done in the heart. And He makes that very clear throughout the Old Testament. Circumcise your heart - circumcise your hearts, comes the cry of the Old Testament. And so, circumcision was just another one of God’s symbols. And it was a very dominant one. Every child that was born went through that, and it was a way to constantly remind the people that there was an inner reality of cleansing that God was after.