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"The difficult is done at once, the impossible takes a little longer." -- Arabian Proverb
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How can you use herbs to improve your
experience with Foreskin Restoration as well as the end result?
Circumcision: An Ancient Ritual Gone Wrong by Chris Lewis, MH, CMT This Article is from Chapter 1 of the above E-Book. NOTE: This article is about a subject that involves some graphic descriptions of adverse effects from a medical procedure. Though it is strictly educational information, with NO vulgarity, profanity, or indecent or pornographic material of any kind, I advise young children to have their parents either read the article with them, or have them read it first to decide if it is appropriate for their age level. This is information that I feel is very important to make known as there seem to be a lot of mistaken ideas on this subject floating around out there. Contents: What is Circumcision Foreskin Restoration info. (takes you to another page) Reprint
Permission For those of you who may not know, circumcision is the amputation of the foreskin of the penis, often done shortly after birth... in America, that is. Very few civilized countries, besides America, still practice it. Circumcision started in the Old Testament when God made His covenant with Abraham (Genesis 17:9-14). The purpose for that circumcision was not medical, but symbolic, to remind the Jewish people that they belonged to God, and the circumcision they performed was very different from the modern medical method used today. NOTE: It is this modern medical procedure (not the ancient religious ritual), that this article addresses. Also, please note that this article is not intended as a criticism of the Jewish people or traditions or any other ancient or modern religious traditions, but rather as a criticism of modern medicine's perversion and misapplication of this ancient custom. This article is a statement of proven medical facts about the modern circumcision procedure which has very little in common with the Jewish bris ceremony as it was practiced in Old Testament biblical times. (SEE "Circumcision - Then and Now:") Circumcision is NOT Medically Necessary: Today, many people mistakenly think that there are health benefits from circumcision. There are not. In fact, there are many risks and harmful side effects associated with it. Researchers are now finding that circumcision does not necessarily decrease a man's risk of getting urinary tract infections or penile cancer, as was previously thought. Many medical authorities that once endorsed routine infant circumcision have now stopped recommending it and many insurance companies are now refusing to cover it. All a man has to do to keep his foreskin clean is to rinse it gently when he takes a shower. It is easier than taking care of one's finger nails! Circumcision is not more sanitary than uncircumcision! It is not an appropriate treatment for phimosis, either. Phimosis, a fancy word for having a foreskin that is too tight, is usually treated by simply chopping off the troubled body part instead of making an effort to heal it! This seems to be the medical profession's way of looking at everything, "If it gives you trouble, cut it off." Talk about barbaric! We're supposed to be a civilized nation, not savages, but we often behave like savages. Phimosis can be easily remedied by the man himself, simply by manually stretching his foreskin out to the sides. To do this, just put your index fingers (of both hands) inside your foreskin and gently pull outward for several minutes. This is most easily done when your penis is flaccid (not erect). Repeat this procedure every day. Your skin will soon grow to accommodate the pressure you are putting on it, thus giving you a wider foreskin that can be easily retracted without pain. That's all there is to it. NOTE: If you are a young boy concerned that your foreskin doesn't retract (pull back), you should know that the foreskin starts out physically attached to the glans (head) of the penis and it sometimes doesn't separate and become retractable until puberty. Everyone has their own unique timetable, so don't worry about it too much unless it becomes painful, in which case, just apply the above procedure... no problem, no painful expensive surgery, no long term side-effects or after-effects! Let's take a look at what circumcision was for the Old Testament Jews, and what it is today. In Old Testament times, they performed the operation on the eighth day of life, when blood platelets are more plentiful and the infant is less likely to have bleeding problems; the procedure was performed by a man specially trained to do it (called a "Mohel"); several other men stood by to make sure he did it right; they poured a little wine in the infant's mouth as an anesthetic to ease the pain; they used a knife to cut the foreskin; they did it for spiritual reasons; and, many historians believe that their circumcision removed only a very tiny piece of the tip of the foreskin (remember, it was symbolic for them, not medical), so most of it would have been left intact to do the job that God put it there to do, to protect the glans from friction, supply a dense cluster of nerve endings and who knows how many other functions (although sensation would have been reduced somewhat, it would have left a lot more than is left today). This is supposedly why paintings and sculptures of Jewish people from that time appear uncircumcised to us (e.g., Michelangelo's David)... it was probably a very minor change for them. Bravo! This is by far the best and least damaging way to do a circumcision, if you believe that you must do it for spiritual reasons. This procedure was referred to as "milah" and nothing else was added to the ritual circumcision until probably about A.D. 140, well after the time of Christ, when, for those who accept Christ as the Messiah, it should have stopped altogether! Conversely, in modern America, the operation is performed on the first or second day of life, when there is a much greater danger of severe bleeding, in fact, a number of infants have bled to death as a result of this foolishness; the procedure may be performed by a doctor, a nurse, an intern, or a medical student (any of whom may or may not have done it before) and is rarely, if ever, supervised; the infant is strapped naked to a small, cold table and given absolutely no anesthetic, therefore it feels all the excruciating pain of having a huge section of skin ripped from its penis. Yes, it definitely does hurt the baby, despite what you may have heard from those who have never witnessed the procedure. (To approximate this feeling, imagine how it would feel to have someone violently rip or pinch off all 4 of your eyelids without any anesthetic or even a sharp knife, then having to go through life blind from dry, shriveled, hardened eyeballs. This is what modern circumcision does to the glans.) The foreskin is sometimes cut with a scalpel, but more often is put in a device that literally crushes it off, or cauterization (burning) is used, in which case, it is not uncommon to slip and do damage elsewhere, a few poor babies have had their entire penis burned off with this method; and most people who do it now do it, not for spiritual reasons, but entirely as a (cosmetic) medical procedure. This is NEVER necessary, there are ALWAYS better ways to deal with such extremely rare problems like phimosis and infection (why is it that medicine's answer to everything is simply "cut it off" instead of trying to help it heal?), and it conveys no realistic health benefits whatsoever. It is purely a cruel medical farce. If you tell the doctor or nurse that it has no proven medical benefits, chances are they will say, "I know, but you don't want him to look different from the other boys in the locker room, do you?" Many parents have been told this in the hospital, but now they can't use that argument anymore because millions of baby boys born in the last few years have not been circumcised (in 2002, only 61% were circumcised), so it is the ones who have been that will be embarrassed in the locker room; and besides, if a boy had several friends who were crippled from birth or from injuries, would his parents deliberately break both his legs just to make him feel more comfortable around them? Of course not! So why deliberately injure an infant in a dubious attempt to make him comfortable around his friends? And finally, we don't do the minor procedure that the ancient Hebrews probably did, their's was most likely closer to a piercing, but ours is a total amputation. What Really Happens in a Circumcision? Lest anyone should think, as I used to in my childhood, that circumcision is nothing but a "simple little snip," it actually removes an average of 51% (more than half!) of the skin on the penis, what would have grown to be 10-15 square inches of skin in adulthood! This is anything but a "minor" procedure. As far as I am concerned, it is one of the most barbaric and inhuman procedures of modern medicine (and they have plenty to choose from). Here is a link to a page with diagrams to illustrate how much skin is removed. Here is what I used to think circumcision was: I had this picture in my mind of a foreskin that was sort of a thin translucent film, with no nerves or blood supply, covering the glans completely like a bubble and making urination impossible. I thought that circumcision was just a "painless little snip," as some doctors actually call it, that removed this thin film and that it couldn't even be felt by the infant, like getting a hair cut. This is what I thought because this is the way the medical industry (the ones who make money from doing these procedures) vaguely described it. They say things like, "The foreskin is just a loose flap of superfluous skin and all we do is remove the excess to make the penis easier to deal with; and the infant doesn't feel a thing, or if it does, it won't remember it." Let me be blunt here, THEY ARE LIARS! Greedy unscrupulous liars! Their own research proclaims it! First of all, as any man or boy with an intact foreskin can tell you, the foreskin is regular skin of the same thickness and appearance as the rest of the penile skin with a blood supply, arteries, veins, extremely sensitive nerve endings, sweat and oil glands, a smooth mucus membrane on the inner portion, and an opening at the tip to allow for urination and ejaculation, that snugly wraps around the glans to protect it, and easily retracts (rolls back) when moved by its owner - it is not a "loose flap." The penis is perfect, complete, and fully functional as it is after a normal birth and NOTHING needs to be done to it. Second, anyone who has ever witnessed a circumcision knows that the blood-curdling screams coming from the poor baby and the fact that it often passes out from exhaustion and pain by the time the whole ordeal is over, are definitely not the results of a "painless little snip." Why do they lie to us like this? Remember that they are making money off of this procedure. When is the last time you had a salesman come to your front door and say, "I just wanted to let you know that our products are not only worthless but also very risky and you would be far better off buying from our competitor?" Really?! You've never had this happen? Then why would you expect a doctor to discourage you from supporting his meal ticket? Now, there are some honest doctors and other medical professionals who are speaking out against this inhuman procedure. They aren't all bad. But a lot of them are. Another reason many of them try to cover it up is that any decent human being would not want to believe that he is responsible for making another suffer so, rather than admit that they made a mistake and "got their hand caught in the cookie jar," they simply deny that they ever did anything wrong. They don't want to think that they would hurt an innocent baby, who would? This principle is called "cognitive dissonance." We all have a psychological need to behave in a manner that is consistent with how we see ourselves, and if we discover that we have done something that is inconsistent with this vision of ourselves, we can either admit it or cover it up and it is a lot easier to just cover it up and try to ignore it. I was recently looking through an educational book on sexuality for preteens and was very disturbed to read, "the foreskin is a loose flap of skin... it is easier to keep the penis clean when the foreskin is gone." This book was written by a woman (how can she claim to speak authoritatively on the subject?) who has obviously never witnessed an actual circumcision and has probably never seen an intact penis -- if she had, she would know better. First of all, the foreskin is NOT a "loose flap;" it is just like the rest of the skin on the penis; it is actual SKIN with a rich supply of blood vessels and nerves and includes such complex structures as the frenar band and frenulum which serve to hold the foreskin forward over the glans (similar to the frenulum under your tongue that prevents you from swallowing it). It is also more sensitive than the rest of the penile skin, and it is physically ATTACHED to the glans (head) of the penis at birth. It normally does not separate and become retractable for several years, sometimes not until adolescence. When a baby boy is circumcised, the doctor has to insert an instrument to rip the foreskin away from the glans before cutting, burning, or pinching it off. Risks and Side Effects of Circumcision: Many risks are involved in modern circumcision, such as excessive bleeding and penile infection (both occasionally fatal), and all the other risks involved with any surgery. Is it worth the risk, however small, of killing your child for a purely cosmetic procedure? Psychologists have also discovered a link between routine infant circumcision and violent adult behavior; emotional problems with one's parents; a failure to bond with parents; distrust of and trouble relating to adults, particularly women as it is often a woman who performs the circumcision; poor self esteem; and other psychological and emotional problems. If the doctor, nurse, or whoever cuts too much of the foreskin off, or cuts it unevenly, it might cause the boy to have an oddly shaped (e.g., curved) penis or to have extreme pain whenever he has an erection. Other adverse effects include, but are certainly not limited to: scarring, skin tags, skin bridges (which trap dead skin cells and other waste, contributing to infection), adhesions (a piece of skin sticking permanently to another piece where it normally would not), pain in the glans (head) of the penis from being exposed to friction that it was never meant to bear, irritation and infection from urine and fecal matter in the diaper which the foreskin would protect against, and, in adult life, many men report things like painful intercourse (from too much friction), skin being stretched too tight (painful), premature ejaculation, impotence (inability to have an erection), shrunken urethral orifice (making for painful urination), decreased sensitivity, pain during athletic activities (from friction on the glans), inability to have orgasm, and other very unpleasant things. Of course, these don't all occur on every circumcised man, but they suffer far more from them than do their uncircumcised counterparts. Many women also report that intercourse is much better and less often painful with uncircumcised men. Many have said that their sex lives with their husbands went from great to poor when they were circumcised as adults, and others report that they went from poor or mediocre to terrific when their husband restored his foreskin (there are both surgical and non-surgical ways to do this and I recommend the non-surgical ones, for many reasons). Here are a few of the reasons that many men choose to restore their foreskins: 1) It looks better, just like a natural hand looks better than one that has been mutilated, either accidentally or deliberately. 2) It is more natural. Many people are realizing that the way God made us is the best way to be. He made us whole and complete and removing ANY part of our bodies makes them function less efficiently over all. 3) A foreskin significantly adds to the sensitivity of the glans and to sexual pleasure. I don't think this motivation needs any further explanation. 4) The penis simply functions better and has fewer problems when it hasn't been mutilated. To think that any part of the body or the body as a whole is better off after having some piece of it removed is like saying that a TV is better off without a color tube or that a car is better off without fuel injectors or filters, or brakes. They are all there because they are needed and there is NEVER a good reason to remove ANY part of the body (except in the most extreme of life-threatening emergencies). 5) A man feels more whole and complete with an intact (or restored) foreskin, simply because he IS more whole and complete. This has helped many men to increase their confidence and self esteem. 6) By restoring his foreskin, a man is taking back control of his own body and has less of a feeling of helplessness in that regard. 7) Restoring can help to alleviate the harmful psychological effects of circumcision, like low self esteem, anger, and frustration over having one's body violated in such a personal way. 8) It also helps to alleviate the harmful physical effects of circumcision, many of which are simply caused by the absence of the foreskin rather than by the operation itself (e.g., lowered sensitivity, painful erections, impotence, etc.). The Bible tells in Genesis 1:26-31 of when God created mankind. When He had made them (in His own image), He looked and saw that everything He had made was "very good." He would not have said this if He thought it wasn't perfect the way it was, with foreskin and all. God gave us foreskins, and tonsils, and appendices, and adenoids, and spleens, and gall bladders for the same reason He gave us the other organs of our body... because we need them! There are NO useless, surplus, or vestigial organs; though we may be able to live without them, this does not mean that we don't need them. You can live without your right arm too, but you would never want to cut it off. The foreskin was meant to protect the glans which is normally a mucus membrane like the eyes, urethra, mouth, vagina, etc. When the foreskin is removed, the glans becomes keratinized (hardened) to protect it from irritation or injury. This leads to a loss of sensitivity and all sorts of sexual problems later in life. In Acts 15:5-11, the apostle Peter speaks very clearly on the needlessness of circumcision under the New Covenant established by Jesus Christ when he permanently atoned for our sin and fulfilled mosaic law. He says, "Now therefore why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bare?" In Galatians 6:12-15, Paul gave this rebuke to those who were saying that it was necessary to be circumcised, "As many as desire to make a fair show in the flesh, they constrain you to be circumcised; only lest they should suffer persecution for the cross of Christ. For neither they themselves who are circumcised keep the law, but desire to have you circumcised, that they may glory in your flesh. But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature." Galatians 5: 1-6 also speaks well on this topic, and Galatians 5:6 says, "For in Jesus Christ neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but faith which worketh by love." So clearly, since Christ came and did His redeeming work for us on the cross, there is no longer any need for circumcision in the Christian Faith. Even many Jewish parents are now choosing not to circumcise
their baby boys because of the trauma modern circumcision causes, even
though circumcision is part of their tradition. But the modern medical way of
doing it was never a part of that tradition, so I urge those who feel they must
circumcise for religious reasons to do it the traditional way, with a Mohel, on
the eighth day, with anesthetic, and taking only a tiny piece of the foreskin,
not the entire thing. The baby will be much better off in the long run. I urge everyone reading this article
to pass it on to your friends and family. And please do your part to end this
violent abuse of innocent children by refusing to have your own sons circumcised
(at least in the modern medical way); believe me, they will thank you one
day! The decision is, of course, up to you, but I hope the information I’ve
presented herein will show you what a harmful and unnecessary procedure this is
and cause you to think twice before putting your children through such a trauma,
which, of course, no loving parent wants to do. Author's Note: For those interested in non-surgical foreskin restoration, I offer a great E-book on using herbs to speed up the process and heal damage done by circumcision. Click here to claim YOUR very own copy. If you found the information on this site useful and would like to send a "Thank You" donation to help keep this site free, just click on my tip jar below.
======================================== Copyright © 2002 - 2004 by Chris Lewis, MH and Heal Thyself Educational Services: Permission is hereby granted to copy and publish this article in its entirety (including author's name and contact information) in emails, web pages, e-zines, message boards, discussion groups, newsletters, bulletins, and other forms of literature available to the public and/or with non-paid subscriptions as long as the entire article, including this resource box remains unchanged. If the article is to be included in a medium with a paid subscription or to be sold for money, please contact the author for permission first. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Please take a moment to look at my other Articles and Commentaries.
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Disclaimer: I provide education for anyone who wants it; I don't advise particular sick people on what to do for their condition, I just provide information on what has been done historically for certain conditions, and on other general topics. In no way does the purchase of any of my products constitute the formation of anything resembling a professional/client relationship. I do not practice medicine, natural or otherwise, I am strictly a teacher. If you are sick, the medical establishment advises that you go to them... but we all know why that is: $$$$$$$ I also am not responsible for what anyone does or doesn't do with any information obtained from me. This is your responsibility. This is the core of all natural healing principles - taking responsibility for yourself. Use common sense and if you have any doubts or questions about anything, get the answers before trying it. Please understand that I cannot guarantee what will happen to you after you purchase any of my products or services because I have no way of knowing whether you will adhere faithfully to the healing program. For full length disclaimers, disclosures, policies, agreements, guarantee, and terms and conditions of use, CLICK HERE. |