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Summary
- Circumcision is not an Amish religious rite; the Young Center names baptism and communion as the two important Amish rituals.
- The Dordrecht Confession of 1632, which the Amish affirm, does not mention circumcision.
- Menno Simons rejected Heinrich Bullinger’s appeal to circumcision as grounds for infant baptism.
- A 1968 study in Holmes County, Ohio, reported local physicians’ view that “few Amish were circumcised until recently.”
- No published study has measured how many Amish men are circumcised; the choice rests with each family.
Bibliography (Click to show)
- Scripture quotations from the King James Version (Genesis 17:12; Acts 15:1, 19; 1 Corinthians 7:19; Galatians 5:6).
- Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies, Elizabethtown College, “Religious Rituals,” Amish Studies. https://groups.etown.edu/amishstudies/religion/religious-rituals/
- Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies, “Beliefs,” Amish Studies. https://groups.etown.edu/amishstudies/religion/beliefs/
- Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies, “Mennonites,” Amish Studies. https://groups.etown.edu/amishstudies/religion/mennonites/
- Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies, “Frequently Asked Questions,” Amish Studies. https://groups.etown.edu/amishstudies/frequently-asked-questions/
- The Dordrecht Confession of Faith (1632). https://www.nobts.edu/baptist-center-theology/confessions/Dordrecht_Confession_of_Faith.pdf
- Mennonite Church USA, Confession of Faith in a Mennonite Perspective, articles 1–24. https://www.mennoniteusa.org/who-are-mennonites/what-we-believe/confession-of-faith/
- John Horsch, Menno Simons: His Life, Labors, and Teachings (Scottdale, PA: Mennonite Publishing House, 1916), p. 23.
- H. E. Cross, E. E. Kennel and A. M. Lilienfeld, “Cancer of the cervix in an Amish population,” Cancer 21, no. 1 (1968): 102–108. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/5634840/
- Natalie Jolly, “Midwives, Amish, and the Politics of Power,” PhD dissertation, Pennsylvania State University, 2007. https://etda.libraries.psu.edu/files/final_submissions/4670
- Natalie Jolly, “Birthing New Kinships: The Cross-Pollinating Potential of Amish Health Research,” Journal of Amish and Plain Anabaptist Studies 5, no. 2 (2017). https://ideaexchange.uakron.edu/amishstudies/vol5/iss2/2/
