by Laura Levitt

Correcting Men

In Why aren’t Jewish Women Circumcised? Gender and Covenant in Judaism (University of California Press, $39.95), Shaye Cohen offers an academic study of the historical debates around circumcision and the meaning of this ritual for the Jewish people. He offers a powerful argument for seeing the question of why women are not circumcised (it’s not because a female lacks a penis) as a part of the historical polemics between Christians and Jews.

Continue reading this article…

Already a subscriber? Log in above to keep reading. Or subscribe now for immediate access to the complete digital and print editions, plus exclusive online access to Lilith's back issues.