Aposthia

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Aposthia

Aposthia is a rare congenital

Congenital disorder

Congenital disorder involves defects in or damage to a developing fetus. It may be the result of Genetics abnormalities, the intrauterine environment, errors of morphogenesis, or a chromosomal abnormality....
condition in humans, in which the foreskin

Foreskin

In male human anatomy, the foreskin or prepuce is a retractable double-layered fold of skin and mucous membrane that covers the glans penis and protects the urinary meatus when the penis is not erection....
of the penis is missing.

Toward the end of the 19th century, E. S. Talbot claimed in Medicine that aposthia among Jew

Jew

A Jew is a member of the Jewish people, an ethnoreligious group that traces its ancestry to the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East....
s was evidence for the now-discredited Lamarckian

Lamarckism

Lamarckism is the once widely accepted idea that an organism can pass on characteristics that it acquired during its lifetime to its offspring ....
theory of evolution

Evolution

In biology, evolution is change in the heritability trait of a population of organisms from one generation to the next. These changes are caused by a combination of three main processes: variation, reproduction, and selection....
. It is likely that the cases he described were actually hypospadias

Hypospadias

Hypospadias is a birth defect of the urethra in the male that involves an abnormally placed urinary meatus . Instead of opening at the tip of the glans penis of the penis, a hypospadic urethra opens anywhere along a line running from the tip along the underside of the shaft to the junction of the penis and scrotum or perineum....
, a condition in which the urinary meatus

Urinary meatus

The urinary meatus is the external orifice of the urethra, from which urine is ejected during urination and semen is ejected during ejaculation....
is on the underside of the penis. Neither condition has a particularly high incidence among Jews.

rding to legend, the prophet Mohammed was born without a foreskin.

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Aposthia in Islam

According to legend, the prophet Mohammed was born without a foreskin. However, Arabs had been practising circumcision

Circumcision in the Bible

Male circumcision, when practiced as a rite, has its foundations in the Bible, in the Covenant #Abrahamic Covenant, such as , and is therefore practiced by Jews and Muslims and some Christians, those who constitute the Abrahamic religions....
long before this, and this legend is not the reason that Muslim

Muslim

:A Muslim , , is an adherent of the religion of Islam. The feminine form is Muslimah . Literally, the word means "one who submits "....
s circumcise.

Aposthia in Judaism

The Midrash

Midrash

Midrash is a Hebrew language term referring to the not exact, but comparative method of exegesis of Biblical texts, which is one of four methods cumulatively called Pardes ....
of Ki-Tetze [?? ???] notes that Moses

Moses

Moses is a Hebrew Bible Hebrews religious leader, lawgiver, prophet, to whom the Mosaic authorship of the Torah is traditionally attributed. Also called Moshe Rabbeinu in Hebrew , he is the most important prophet in Judaism, and also an important prophet of Christianity, Islam, the Bah?'? Faith, Rastafari movement, Chrislam and many ot...
was born aposthic. Other sources tell us that Jacob

Jacob

According to the Hebrew Bible, Jacob , also known as Israel , was the third Biblical patriarchs and the ancestor of the twelve Israelites....
and David

David

David , was the second king of the united Kingdom of Israel according to the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament. He is depicted as a righteous king, although not without fault, as well as an acclaimed warrior, musician and poet ....
were also born aposthic. Jewish law

Halakha

Halakha ? also Hebrew transliteration Halocho and Halacha ? is the collective body of Judaism religious law, including biblical law and later talmudic and rabbinic law, as well as customs and traditions....
requires males born without a foreskin or who lost their foreskin through means other than a formal circumcision

Circumcision

Male circumcision is the removal of some or all of the foreskin from the penis. The word "circumcision" comes from Latin ' and ' .Early depictions of circumcision are found in cave drawings and Ancient Egyptian tombs, though some pictures may be open to interpretation....
ceremony (brit milah
Brit milah

Brit milah , also berit milah , bris milah or bris is a religious ceremony within Judaism to welcome infant Jewish boys into a covenant between Names of God in Judaism and the Children of Israel through ritual circumcision performed by a mohel , on the eighth day of the child's life unless health reasons or certain spe...
???? ????) to have a drop of blood (hatafat-dam, ???? ??) let from the penis

Penis

The penis is an external sex organ of certain biologically male organisms, in both vertebrates and invertebrates.The penis is a reproductive organ, technically an intromittent organ, and for Eutheria, additionally serves as the external organ of urination....
at the point where the foreskin would have been (or was) attached. The Talmud

Talmud

The Talmud is a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Halakha, Jewish ethics, customs, and history. It is a central text of mainstream Judaism....
(Shabbat 135A) records a discussion of whether the importance of this letting of blood supersedes Shabbat

Shabbat

Shabbat or Shabbos , is the weekly day of rest in Judaism, symbolizing the seventh day in Genesis, after the six days of creation. Though it is commonly said to be the Saturday of each week, it is observed from sundown on Friday until the appearance of three stars in the sky on Saturday night....
, on which only a child who was born the previous Shabbat can be circumcised. If a regular circumcision is delayed, there is no disagreement that this may not be performed on Shabbat. However, in the case of aposthia, there are two schools of thought.

R. Elazar Hakappar said that the school of Shamai and Hillel
Hillel

Hillel is a Hebrew language name of several prominent historical men and modern organizations....
do not differ as to a child that is born without a foreskin. Both agree that the blood of the covenant must be drawn from the glans. The school of Shamai, however, contends that this may be done on the Sabbath, while the other holds that the Sabbath must not be desecrated on that account.

David Levy

David Levy (Israeli politician)

David Levy is an Israeli politician.Levi was born in Morocco and made Aliyah to Israel in 1957. A construction worker originally, his background as a leader of Beit Shean's working-class population composed of many fellow Jews of North African descent earned Levy a huge advantage in his early career as a union activist when he began to cam...
, former Israeli

Israel

Israel officially the State of Israel , is a country in the Middle East located on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. It borders Lebanon in the north, Syria in the northeast, Jordan in the east, and Egypt on the southwest, and contains geographically diverse features within its relatively small area....
Foreign Minister and member of Knesset

Knesset

The Knesset is the legislature of Israel, located in Givat Ram, Jerusalem....
, was born aposthic. Arye Avneri's authorized 1983 biography of Levy notes this:

"When David Levy was born on 1937 21 December, in Rabat
Rabat

Rabat , population 2 million , is the Capital of the Morocco. It is also the capital of the Rabat-Sal?-Zemmour-Zaer region.The city is located on the Atlantic Ocean at the mouth of the river Bou Regreg....
, the capital of Morocco
Morocco

Morocco , officially the Kingdom of Morocco , is a country located in North Africa with a population of nearly 34 million and an area just under 447,000 km2....
, his mother Sima noticed at once that he was different from other baby boys. He had been born already circumcised, for the foreskin was entirely missing."

The rabbis in Rabat proclaimed that this foretold that Levy would grow up to be a "leader of Israel", even though the State was not founded until Levy was 11, in 1948. It should be noted, however, that this proclamation was not necessarily prophetic of the founding of the country Israel, for "Israel" is a term occasionally used to mean "the Jewish people."

Sources

in Dorland's Medical Dictionary
E. S. Talbot, "Inheritance of circumcision effects", Medicine 1898.
Shulchan Aruch, Code of Jewish Law, Yoreh Deah § 263 Law 4 (?"? ?"? ?' ??"? ??' ?).

External links

Amin-Ud-Din M, Salam A, Rafiq MA, Khaliq I, Ansar M, Ahmad W. East Mediterr Health J. 2007 Mar-Apr;13(2):280-6.