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→Questioning the Abrahamic Covenant: Add Lisa Braver Moss article.
Many have wondered why God would create men with a [[foreskin]] with documented protective, immunological, sensory, and sexual [[Foreskin#Physiological_functions| physiological functions]] only to require that it be cut off after eight days of life.
Lisa Braver Moss (1991) wrote:
<blockquote>
I am a Jew and I question circumcision. I have been questioning circumcision ever since I learned of the rite as a girl. At that time I questioned circumcision because it seemed wrong to cause pain to infants and because it seemed strange to surgically alter a healthy God-given part of the body. As I grew into adulthood I added questions. I continue to add them. I question circumcision because of its risks. I question it because it is seen by many as a perfunctory act rather than a spiritual one. I question it because it seems to require parents to take advantage of their infant's dependence and weakness. I also question it because of the paradox that those who support infant circumcision often cringe at the idea of circumcision of an older child as a puberty rite. I am sure all of these concerns are familiar to health professionals, who also question circumcision.
…
Finally, there is a slightly more esoteric concern. I question infant circumcision because it seems to me that a person's age should not affect our attitude towards his suffering. In other words, if we find the circumcision of older children offensive, we should find infant circumcision equally offensive. The most significant reason we as a society continue to practice infant circumcision, both medically and ritually, is that we do not respond to the suffering of infants in the same way we respond to the suffering of older children and adults. As parents our connection with our newborns is a very tenuous one, however strong it may feel when we first hold our little one and look into his or her eyes. The tenuousness of the bond only becomes apparent when we compare it to our bond with our older children. I personally could not subject my five-year old, or my two-year-old, to circumcision now for any reason other than absolute life or death necessity. This is not to say that it was easy for me to do at their birth, only that it would be impossible now. It is precisely this phenomenon that the advocates of routine neonatal circumcision are articulating when they advise parents to get it over with now because if one were to wait until the baby were older one would never do it. There is a way in which our infants are strangers to us as compared to our older children.<ref name="moss1991">{{REFweb
|url=http://gaamerica.org/symposia/second/moss.html
|archived=
|title=The Jewish Roots of Anti-Circumcision Arguments
|trans-title=
|language=
|last=Moss
|first=Lisa
|author-link=Lisa Braver Moss
|publisher=
|website=gaamerica
|date=1991-04
|accessdate=2020-04-27
|format=PDF
|quote=
}}</ref>
</blockquote>
Some contemporary Jewish parents feel that [[circumcision]] is a painful amputation that inflicts pain, physical, [[Sexual effects of circumcision| sexual]], and [[Psychological issues of male circumcision| psychological]] harm to a child. They wish to protect a son from such harm and so have adopted a peaceful, non-cutting naming ceremony usually called [[Brit Shalom]] instead of the traditional [[Brit Milah]]. Goodman (1999) has called for an end to ritual cutting.<ref name="goodman1999">{{REFjournal