User:Flynnjed/Sandbox: Difference between revisions

{{Quote|[https://unfpa.org/sites/default/files/pub-pdf/De-linking%20FGM%20from%20Islam%20final%20report.pdf 'Delinking Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting from Islam'] by Ibrahim Lethome Asmani & Maryam Sheikh Abdi (2008)|'Shafi’i view it as wajib (obligatory) for both females and males'}}

===Hanbali Madhab===

===Non-Islamic sources===

'''There are reports''' that some Egyptian mummies show signs of FGC. However this appears to be disputed.  

'''A spell or prayer''' found on an Egyptian coffin dating from sometime between 1991–1786 BC appears to refer to an uncircumcised girl.  

{{Quote||“But if a man wants to know how to live, he should recite it [a magical spell] every day, after his flesh has been rubbed with the b3d [unknown substance] of an uncircumcised girl [‘m’t] and the flakes of skin of an uncircumcised bald man.”}}

{{Quote|1=[https://www.jstor.org/stable/3080631?seq=1 Mary Knight - 'Curing Cut or Ritual Mutilation?: Some remarks on the Practice of Female and Male Circumcision in Graeco-Roman Egypt' (2001)]|2='The Lydians arrived at such a state of delicacy that they were even the first to “castrate” their women … Thus Xanthos says in his second book on the Lydians that Adramytes, the king of the Lydians, castrating the women, used them instead of male eunuchs…. In the second book, he reports that Gyges, the king of the Lydians, was the first who “castrated” women, so that he might use them while they would remain forever youthful.'}}

'''A papyrus dated''' from 163 BC refers to the operation being performed on girls in Memphis, Egypt, to coincide with the time when they received their dowries.

'''Strabo (64 or 63 BC – c. AD 24)''', a Turkish-born Greek geographer, observed the practice whilst travelling up the Nile.

{{Quote|'Geographica' - Strabo|‘This is one of the procedures most enthusiastically performed by [the Egyptians]: to raise every child that is born and to circumcise the males and cut the females… as is also the custom among the Jews, who are also Egyptians in origin. And then to the Harbour of Antiphilus [Naucratis in Egypt], and, above this, to the Creophagi [meat-eaters], of whom the males have their penises circumcised and the women and cut in the Jewish fashion'}}

'''The Jewish philosopher Philo of Alexandria''' (c. 20 BC – 50 AD) reports in his ''‘Questions on Genesis’''<ref>[https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674994188 Questions on Genesis - Philo]</ref>:

{{Quote||‘Why orders he the males only to be circumcised? (Genesis 17:11). For in the first place, Egyptians, in accordance with the national customs of the country, in the fourteenth year of their age, when the male begins to have the power of propagating his species, and when the female arrives at the age of puberty, circumcise both bride and bridegroom. But the divine legislator appoints circumcision to take place in the case of the male alone for many reasons: the first of which is, that the male creature feels venereal pleasures and desires matrimonial connexions more than the female, on which account the female is properly omitted here, while he checks the superfluous impetuosity of the male by the sign of circumcision.’}}

{{Quote|Projected Cultural Histories of the Cutting of Female Genitalia: A Poor Reflection as in a Mirror Sara Johnsdotter,  

Malmö University|'On the excessively large clitoris, which the Greeks call the “masculinized” [reading “yos” as a Latinized Yril/Ya;, the god of fertilizing moisture] nymphe [clitoris]. The presenting feature […] of the deformity is a large masculinized clitoris. Indeed, some assert that its flesh becomes erect just as in men and as if in search of frequent sexual intercourse. You will remedy it in the following way: With the woman in a supine position, spreading the closed legs, it is necessary to hold [the clitoris] with a forceps turned to the outside so that the excess can be seen, and to cut off the tip with a scalpel, and finally, with appropriate diligence, to care for the resulting wound.'}}'''Caelius Aurelianus, a fifth-century AD physician''' from Sicca Veneria (modern el-Kef in Tunisia), synthesised much of Soranus’s work. In a chapter entitled ‘On an excessively large clitoris’, he wrote:

After the surgery, it is recommended to treat the wound with wine or cold water, and wiping it clean with a sponge to sprinkle frankincense powder on it. Absorbent linen bandages dipped in vinegar should be secured in place, and a sponge in turn dipped in vinegar placed above. After the seventh day, spread the finest calamine on it. With it, either rose petals or a genital powder made from baked clay can be applied. This [prescription] is especially good: Roast and grind date pits and spread the powder on [the wound]; [this compound] also works against sores on the genitals'}}

{{Quote|Paulus of Aegina “De Re Medica” book 7|'In certain women the nympha is excessively large and presents a shameful deformity, insomuch that, as has been related, some women have had erections of this part like men, and also venereal desires of a like kind. Wherefore, having placed the woman in a supine posture, and seizing the redundant portion of the nympha in a forceps we cut it out with a scalpel, taking care not to cut too deep lest we occasion the complaint called rhoeas'}}

==The Causes of FGM==

There are two broad categories of causes for FGM: doctrinal causes and social causes. Doctrinal causes operate when people practice FGM because they believe their god or religion requires them to do so (see the sections on [[#hadith|FGM in the Hadith]], [[#quran|FGM in the Qur'an]] and [[#law|FGM in Islamic law]]). However, as the previous section makes clear, FGM existed long before Islam, which suggests that Doctrine is unlikely to completely explain its existence.

==Islamic Doctrine that creates social conditions favourable to FGM==

As we have seen FGM has its origins in the centers of empires, where rich powerful men could engage in extreme polygyny.