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HarveyKlinger ago

Nope. VERY common. Not fringe at all.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brit_milah

Metzitzah

The guard (top center) is slid over the foreskin as close to the glans as possible to allow for maximum removal of the former without any injury to the latter. The scalpel is used to detach the foreskin, and the underlying blue bag is a sterilization pouch for the metal tools. The tube (center left) was used for metzitzah In addition to milah (the actual circumcision) and p'riah, mentioned above, the Talmud (Mishnah Shabbat 19:2) mentions a third step, metzitzah, translated as suction, as one of the steps involved in the circumcision rite. The Talmud writes that a "Mohel (Circumciser) who does not suck, creates a danger and should be dismissed from practice".[33][34] Rashi on that Talmudic passage explains that this step is in order to draw some blood from deep inside the wound to prevent danger to the baby.[35] There are other modern antiseptic and antibiotic techniques—all used as part of the brit milah today—which many say accomplish the intended purpose of metzitzah, however, since metzitzah is one of the four steps to fulfill Mitzvah, it continues to be practiced by many Orthodox and Hassidic Jews.[36]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dzs-09Of99I

Blacksmith21 ago

Approximately 9% of the Jews in the US are considered Orthodox or Hassidic. Given the US Jewish population is about 8M, you are talking about 560k adherents overall, a percentage of those would fall into the ultra-Orthodox group - about 20%. So you have 112k adherents that could/would practice this religious covenant. That is NOT very common. How many bris have you attended?

HarveyKlinger ago

I attended ONE and left the room.

I consider a FRINGE as in Timothy McVeigh was Christian with very extreme beliefs. He was FRINGE and not recognized as normal by any group. There are specific groups among the Jewish faith where this is a thing and within that group, 100% find it normal and expected behavior. They have documentation on why it is required and fought the courts successfully to continue it's practice.

Blacksmith21 ago

If you do enough research, you realize that there is a reason it is called "Judeo-Christian values". The two religions are inextricably intertwined. And that far out 5%, 2%, 1% (?) who knows?

I've seen enough people rolling with snakes, speaking in tongues, etc. for one lifetime. It's a strange ritual from the outermost limit of a religion just as SRA is to Wiccan practices.

I'm not condoning just saying it's weird, creepy and pre-medivial IMO. The difference is intent. One is based on a single-scope belief that can be directly attributed to a sacrament with some medical basis and the other (SRA) ends in death.

You decide.

Edit1: [punctuation] Edit2: [formatting]