Encyclopedia of Islam

circumcision

 

(Arabic: 

khitan for males; 

khafd for females; tahara for both males 

and females)

Male circumcision is a surgical procedure that 

involves removing the foreskin of the penis. It 

has been widely practiced among indigenous 

tribal peoples of Africa and a

Ustralia

 and among 

members of specific religious communities, espe-

cially Jews, Christians, and Muslims. Today many 

people think it is done for purposes of hygiene, 

but this explanation is disputed, and it does not 

withstand empirical scrutiny in most instances. 

Ethnographic evidence suggests that, in fact, it 

is performed for various reasons, depending on 

context. In many tribal societies, it is done at 

puberty as a male rite of passage into adulthood. 

In biblical tradition, circumcision is the sign of 

a 

covenant

 (contract) between God, a

braham

,

and his descendants, the Hebrews. In Islam, male 

circumcision is almost universally practiced as a 

form of bodily purification. Only in some Mus-

lim cultures is it a rite of passage to adulthood. 

Also, in contrast to the Judaic form, it is never 

mentioned in the Muslim 

holy

 

book

, the q

Uran

,

nor is it considered to be the sign of a covenantal 

relationship between God and Muslims.

Scholars have found evidence that Arabs prac-

ticed circumcision before Islam’s appearance and 

think that it later continued as an accepted practice 

in the early Muslim community. This explanation 

by itself does not account for the persistence of the 

custom nor its acceptance by non-Arab Muslims, 

who now constitute perhaps 80 percent of the 

world’s Muslim population. Although circumcision 

is not mentioned in the Quran, it is mentioned in 

the 

hadith

, oral reports about what m

Uhammad

 and 

his companions said and did that were transmitted, 

collected, and studied by pious Muslims in order 

help regulate Muslim affairs in the newly emerg-

ing Islamic empire. What the hadith do is establish 

male circumcision as an acceptable Muslim prac-

tice. According to one hadith, circumcision is one 

of five acts (along with trimming the mustache, 

shaving pubic hair, plucking hair from the arm 

pits, and clipping fingernails) for which humans 

have a natural predisposition (fitra). Other hadiths 

report that Abraham, the sacred ancestor of Jews, 

Christians, and Muslims, had circumcised him-

self. In the context of the 

sharia

, Muslim jurists 

have ruled that it is either a required (wajib) or a 

recommended practice (

sUnna

). In legal manuals, 

it is treated as a form of ritual purification, called 

tahara, that puts the body of the individual into the 

proper condition for worship.

Circumcision is performed by doctors at birth 

in hospitals and clinics today, but in many Mus-

lim cultures a barber traditionally performs it at 

some time between the seventh day after birth and 

puberty, depending on local practice. In t

Urkey

,

there are clinics where circumcisers are trained 

in the appropriate surgical techniques, and boys 

are circumcised at the age of six or seven. Large 

family celebrations with feasting, 

mUsic

, Quran 

recitation, and visits to nearby saint shrines often 

accompany the event. In cases in which the family 

has a limited income, the circumcision celebration 

may be combined with a marriage ceremony so 

as to minimize expenses. The circumcision may