But read the end of the sentence, where Rav Moshe writes that Metzitza “is ONLY for purposes of Refuah.” (Emphasis added – see above, comment #62).

Thank you for providing a copy of the Kol Koreh. I must note that the statement that if there is a concern that the infant will become ill, a Sheilah should be asked, seems difficult to reconcile with the ruling of Shulchan Aruch (Orach Chaim 328:2) that one who asks a Sheilah in cases of Pikuach Nefesh is [tantamount to] a murderer. This may be why Rav Shlomo Zalman Auerbach appended the following disclaimer to his signature: “In circumstances where there is no concern [of danger] WHATSOEVER, G-d forbid, it is PROPER [literally "good"] not to refrain from performing Metzitza b’Peh.” (Emphasis added). Clearly, Rav Shlomo Zalman would not require asking a Sheilah, let alone performing Metzitza b’Peh, where there is ANY concern of danger to the baby. Furthermore, even without any danger at all, Rav Shlomo Zalman does not say that Metzitza b’Peh is required, only that it is “proper.”

Reb Moshe says it not l”‘ikuva”. That doesn’t mean that it’s not part of the mitzvah lichtchilah. There are however sources that write, mol uporaya vilo motzetz k’ilu lo
mol. Try the harachamon after bentching for starters “ovodoso pisulah, im shlosh aileh lo ya’aseh lah.”
_________________________
#63,
Unlike you, I actually did my research, when a group of modern orthodox doctors with a very specific agenda attacks a 3000 year old Jewish practice based on lies and deception, violates every editorial policy there is, including but not limited to obfuscation, fabrication, falsification, and authorship requirements in order to sneak their papers into legitimate medical journals, I’ll admit I get a little bent out of shape. In regards to your assertions, what is the purpose of this article written in a modern orthodox newspaper? It is clearly to: 1) further discourage klal Yisroel from doing metzitzah by insinuating that there is a serious disease risk, 2) It is to insinuate that chareidi mohelim that haven’t been to med school do not practice asceptic techniques even though these were printed in Chareidi seferim that I listed, over 100 years ago.

2) Unlike you, I didn’t have a computer with a search engine at my disposal. I thought I remembered it from the yaivetz. The Bnei Yisroel were mal twice. The medresh is in Bamidbar Raba 11 and in several places in Shir Hashirim Raba at times with a different order Moshe mal, or yehoshua mal. The correct source for my quote is the Rambam in ma’amar Kiddush Hashem. Referring to this medresh, the Rambam writes, “Moshe hiya mal, Yehoshua Poraya, v’Aharon motzetz”. As the Rambam, the later Yaivetz and Chasam Sofer darshan the word mashka, because without the drasha what does the word mashka have to do with milah? In regards to the medresh that says the Bnai Yisroel were afraid that they would die like the bechorai mitzrayim, if they weren’t mal and didn’t eat the Pesach, therefore they came running to Moshe to be mal, it is obviously referring to the first Pesach in mitzrayim and the drashas of the of the Yaivetz and Chasam soifer concerning the dust of aygel cannot be applied.

I hope that “uncalls” everything I wrote out of question. You could actually look it up. In the future, please ask politely, I would be more than happy to provide sources.
_______________________
#52
Your citation of “Pediatrics, Volume XXXIV, Page 186-190, March 1917, “Tuberculosis Following ritual Circumcision” by Mark S. Reuben” seems to be incorrect.

Pediatrics was first printed in 1948, and the Archives of Pediatrics volume number would be out of sequence for 1917, Please check your source. I have the same paper listed as the “Transactions of the NY Academy of Medicine, Dec 15, 1916 p. 333-4″ please note that the author says: “He had been circumcised on the eighth day by a mohel who aspirated the wound by means of a glass tube.” In several of the other cases metzitzah was clearly NOT DONE, umi yodayaa….? In several of the other cases, the results of autopsies are discussed, so we can assume the parents were not chareidim, and who knows who the mohel was? I will again state, the advent of the reform movement, the incidence of disease after metzitzah, and attacks on MBP all ocurred simultaneously.

חתם סופר מסכת שבת קלה. ד”ה ראה זה מצאתי
והיה משה מל ואהרן פורע ויהושע משקה מים המעורבים עם זהב העגל והיתה אותה ההשקאה והמילה למיתה

That you lied about the midrash calls everything you write into question.
Have a nice day

MZ

Once it has been established that Metzitza is only because of Refuah, then it would certainly seem logical to take into account what is known today about avoiding transmission of infection. So, by all means, we should continue to do Metzitza, but in the safest possible way – i.e. with a sterile tube, or whatever modern (excuse the word) medicine dictates. Anyone who has a problem with this should ask themselves what kind of medical care they would want for themselves and their family: the best care available today, or the remedies discussed in the Gemara? If the former, you’re being inconsistent; if the latter, you’re being reckless with your health.

#16,
Mitzvas hametzitzah (Shiffer) Says Rabbi Chaim Halevi Soleveitschik signed not to change metzitza.
#23,
So when Rav Dovid Feinstein signed the kol korei not to changed metzitzah because of AIDS in 1989
and added below his signature that Reb Moshe z”l said on this Shomer mitzva Lo Yodaya Davar Ra, he lied? I don’t think so. Show me where R’Moshe says it was a slip of the pen.
#28,
Someone who prints an article in Pediatrics and writes that the Chasam Sofer who died in 1839, having been influenced by Ignacz Semmelweis’ 1847 discovery of disease transmission after a baby got tuberculosis from a mohel (first case in the literature 1883) was matir the tube that was invented in 1887, and bases his other arguments regarding Israeli and Canadian babies on 1980 United States HSV statistics ignoring Israeli (Samra Z 2003) and Canadian (Kropp R 2006) HSV stats that tell a completely different story in order to get jews to stop performing MBP as dictated by Chazal and by 3000 years of Minhag is an Apikorus.
#31,
Try looking up the references in his article and reconcile them with what he writes. He learned from colleague at Einstein, Dr Lorry Rubin, cite sources, than write whatever you want. nobody looks up sources. I did. He lied. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE sue me for libel. I would relish the opportunity to demonstrate in an public forum such as courtroom that your talmid chochom fabricated every aspect the story, including fabricating two cases shelo hiya velo nivra, and altering the information in his paper after an unsuccessful meeting with the Israeli Ministry of Health on March 13, 2003, in an effort to get them to ban MBP.
#36,
Correct. I often describe MO as Judaism without G-d.
#37
Tell me, in the few hundred years between the mishnah and the gemara, where did it say that MBP is really not part of milah, being that the mishnah includes it as part of milah? If MBP is only because of sakanah, why isn’t the mohel who doesn’t use Aspalanis and Kumin removed because of sakanah? Why is the mohel himself required to do MBP when there are theoretically another 10 people there? Why is it OK for someone else to place the Aspalanis and Kumin? Being that the achronim discuss but don’t conclude exactly what the sakanah is, an immediate sakanah? a later sakanah? a spiritual sakana? We can’t say the sakanah is not there and chamira sakanta misurah , so we can’t eliminate MBP according to halachah, even according to the opinions that it’s not halacha limoshe misinai. How do we know rav Pupa’s statement is the ONLY reason? chamira sakanta misurah, he gave the biggest reason not the only reason.
And by the way, a search of pubmed with the term “medicinal leeches” yields 441 papers on the current use of medinical leeches. So I guess Chazal were smarter than you thought they were.
#44,
I read`more than you did see the comments to #28, and #31. Read the articles, and their sources. Tell me where it shtims. In his 2000 PIDJ paper, Dr Lorry Rubin cites a 54 year old 1946 paper by Evan L Lewis on Tuberculosis of the aiver in an effort to demonstrate the great threat that MBP poses to society. The latest case due to MBP cited by Lewis in 1932 68 years and probably 150,000+ brissim in the NYC area prior to his paper. can you think of any othe surgical procedures with 68 year spans between infections. (That assuming Rubin is right, which he isn’t.)
#47,
as stated in the Binyan Tzion and repeated by his talmid Reb Shamshon Raphael Hirsch z”l, “when klal yisroel was concentrated in eretz Yisroel before the exile and millions of jews were living in one place, chazal had more clinical material to make these decision than any doctor today will have in a lifetime. The decided on a technique that was available in the field and anywhere else needed, and in 1600 years from the mishnah to the advent of the reform movement there is not one recorded instance of a baby getting a disease from MBP.
#52
I actually have those medical journals (and hundreds more) and if doctors today would perform some of the medical “procedures” listed, they would be sent to jail. Dr Yitzchok Price, a frum doctor from Berlin wrote to the Sdei Chemed in 1901 (Kuntres Hamiluim) stating people got sick because they didn’t follow Shulchan Oruch which says a person should seek out the best sandek and Mohel, a tzaddik, (cited from the Or zarua, who cites Reb Sharira Gaon and the Medresh) Dr. price writes If you take a mohel, a tzaddik, you’re not going to get syphilis. Like wise a tzaddik will not do milah when he’s sick and coughing up blood. A mohel who does it for his 5 reichstellar, will not pass up the 5 reichstellar. Hence the advent of the reform movement, illness attached to metzitzah, and objections to MBP, all occurred simultaneously.
There is a medresh that says brought by the Yaivetz which says Moshe mol Aharon Poraya, viyehoshua mashka zuhi MBP.
#54,
The Maharm Schick z”l testified on himself that he was a mohel for 40 years and never had a problem, he writes “you can ask any (chareidi) mohel of this generation or the last and you won’t find one that had a problem. As for Moitzy shem ra, I did the research, the 3 papers are built on lies beginning to end. These doctors slandered ehrliche mohelim to push their own MO agenda. Buy the papers and their references, read them, and you’ll find a vast gap between them.
#58
Ditto

VIN, If you want any documentation ask. I have di vihoser.

The three papers attacking MBP are:

Rubin LG, Lanzkowsky P. Cutaneous neonatal herpes simplex infection associated with ritual circumcision.
Pediatr Infect Dis J. 2000, 19(3): 266-8; availalbe for purchase through the web
—–
Distel R, Hofer V, Bogger-Goren S, Shalit I, Garty BZ.
Primary genital herpes simplex infection associated with Jewish ritual circumcision.
Isr Med Assoc J. 2003, 5: 893–894: available on the web.
—–
Gesundheit B, Grisaru-Soen G, Greenberg D, Levtzion-Korach O, Malkin D, Petric M, Koren G, Tendler MD, Ben-Zeev B, Vardi A, Dagan R, Engelhard D.
Neonatal Genital Herpes Simplex Virus Type 1 Infection After Jewish Ritual Circumcision: Modern Medicine and Religious Tradition.
Pediatrics. 2004, 114(2):e259-e263 availalble on the web.
——
The paper cited by 2005 NYC health alert #46 but only for Acyclovir antiviral treatment is listed below. Compare what a NHSV expert writes to the papers above.
Kimberlin DW.
Neonatal herpes simplex infection.
Clin Microbiol Rev. 2004 Jan, 17(1): 1-13 availalble on the web

Note to Editor: I can document every statement made here. Ask