Female-genital-mutilation
Short answer: Female genital mutilation is the partial or total removal of external female genitalia, or other injury to the female genital organs, for reasons that are not medically necessary. Scripture does not name the practice, but it addresses it at the root. Genesis 1:27 states that God created humanity in his own image, male and female alike, which means a woman's body is never raw material for someone else's control. Psalm 139:13-14 describes God forming and knitting a person in the womb, so the female body is God's handiwork, not a defect to be corrected. 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 calls the body a temple of the Holy Spirit. These texts do not leave the church free to treat this practice as a private cultural matter. They name it as a wrong done to a person God made, and they call the church to protect, not perform, such harm.
What Genesis 1:26-27 actually claims about women
The creation account grounds human worth in something other than usefulness, family honor, or social role. Genesis 1:26 says, "Let's make man in our image, after our likeness." The Hebrew word for man here, adam, is the collective term for humanity, and the very next verse makes the point explicit: God created them male and female, and both bear the image. The image of God is not a possession men hold on behalf of women. It is given directly to both.
This matters for female genital mutilation because the practice assumes a woman's body needs to be altered in order to make her acceptable, marriageable, or honorable. Genesis says the opposite. The woman already bears God's likeness before any human being touches her. Nothing a community does to her body adds to or completes that image. If the image is already given, then cutting is not a service to her. It is an assault on what God made.
The dominion language in Genesis 1:26 is also relevant. Humanity is given charge over fish, birds, livestock, and creeping things, not over one another's bodies. The verse grants stewardship of the created order, never ownership of another person. Female genital mutilation takes dominion where God never gave it, over a girl who cannot consent and often cannot object.
Psalm 139 and the woman God knit together
Psalm 139:13-14 says, "For you formed my inmost being. You knit me together in my mother's womb." The psalmist speaks as a creature addressing his Creator, and he treats his own body as deliberate work rather than accident. If God knits a person together in the womb, then the female body as it exists is not a mistake, a liability, or a rough draft needing correction. It is the product of divine intention.
Read that alongside female genital mutilation and the practice looks very different from how its defenders sometimes describe it. It is not a completion of what nature left unfinished. Scripture says there is nothing unfinished for a human hand to complete. The body God knit is the body God intended. To cut it in the name of purity, tradition, or family honor is to set human judgment above God's workmanship.
The psalm does not argue this as a general principle only. It is personal and grateful. That is the tone the church should carry when speaking about girls at risk: not disgust at the practice, but grief for the person, and a settled conviction that her body belongs to the God who formed it.
Does the Bible condemn female genital mutilation by name?
No. Scripture never names female genital mutilation, and honesty requires saying so plainly. The Bible addresses the practice indirectly, through creation, embodiment, and the worth of every person. That is not a weakness in the biblical case. It is the normal way Scripture works: it gives foundations that apply to situations and technologies its first readers never encountered.
Some readers point to Old Testament circumcision and ask whether it provides a precedent. It does not. Male circumcision in Scripture is a covenant sign given by God's command to a specific people, performed on infants, and never extended to women. Using it to justify cutting girls mistakes a commanded sign for a general permission to alter bodies. The New Testament itself relativizes the sign, and Colossians 3:11 lists circumcision and uncircumcision among the distinctions that no longer define a person in Christ.
So the church should not claim a proof text that does not exist. It should claim the texts that do exist, and they are strong. Creation in God's image, divine formation in the womb, the body as the Spirit's temple, and the equal standing of male and female in Christ together establish that this practice is a serious wrong.
What 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 says about bodies
1 Corinthians 6:19-20 asks, "Or don't you know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God? You are not your own." Paul is addressing sexual sin in Corinth, but his reasoning reaches further. The body is not morally neutral equipment. It is where the Spirit lives, and it belongs to God rather than to the person or to the community.
That single line, you are not your own, dismantles the logic behind female genital mutilation. If a girl's body belongs to God, then it does not belong to her father, her husband, her clan, or her community, and none of them may cut it to secure their own reputation. The practice treats the body as family property. Paul treats it as God's dwelling place.
Paul's argument is also a warning against harming the body in the name of religion. Corinthian religion assumed the body was irrelevant and could be used however one pleased. Paul refuses both the license and the contempt. The body matters because God has claimed it. Cutting a girl to make her spiritually acceptable inverts that: it damages the very temple God chose.
Male and female in Christ: Galatians 3:28 and the dignity of girls
Galatians 3:28 says, "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus." Paul is not erasing created distinctions. He is saying that access to God, standing before God, and inheritance in Christ do not depend on ethnicity, social status, or sex. A girl and a boy stand on exactly the same footing before their Maker.
Female genital mutilation rests on an assumption Paul rejects: that a female body is a lesser body, that girls need ritual correction to become acceptable, that their honor is a fragile thing a community must secure by force. Galatians 3:28 speaks a flat no to that assumption. If male and female are one in Christ, then no child is born into a lesser class of humanity.
Ephesians 2:10 adds that we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works. A girl is not a problem to be solved by a blade. She is a work of God, made for good that God prepared in advance. The church should see her that way, and act like it.
How the church should respond in practice
The first responsibility is not to be silent. Where female genital mutilation is practiced, families often face intense social pressure, and the practice is frequently justified as religious duty. Churches that never address it leave their members to assume God approves, or at least does not object. Pastors and teachers should name it for what it is and remove any suggestion that Scripture supports it.
The second responsibility is protection. That may mean supporting girls at risk, working with parents who want to refuse the practice but fear community consequences, and helping families find alternatives that do not expose them to harm. It also means supporting survivors with medical and pastoral care rather than shame. Many women carry both physical complications and deep spiritual wounds, and they need churches that receive them gently.
The third responsibility is patience with those who come from these communities. This is not a culture to be despised but people to be loved, including parents who were themselves cut and who genuinely believe they were acting rightly. Change happens through teaching, relationship, and courage, not through contempt. Where believers differ on strategy, they should not differ on the wrongness of the practice itself.
Why this is a gospel issue, not only a social one
The gospel announces that God became a human being and took a body. That makes contempt for the body a serious matter. If the Son of God did not regard flesh as beneath him, then no Christian may treat a girl's body as disposable for the sake of custom. The incarnation dignifies what female genital mutilation damages.
The gospel also announces forgiveness. Some who read this have participated in the practice, arranged it, or consented to it under pressure. Scripture's word to them is not only judgment. It is the same word given to every sinner: repentance, and cleansing in Christ. The church must hold both truths, naming the wrong clearly and offering the mercy that Christ gives freely to those who turn.
Finally, the gospel creates a new community in which this practice has no place. Colossians 3:11 describes a body where old status markers no longer define who belongs. In that community, the strongest protect the weakest, and no child is cut to preserve the honor of adults. That community is what the church is called to be.
Biblical fidelity check
What these passages establish is a foundation, not a proof text. Genesis 1:26-27 establishes that male and female alike bear God's image. Psalm 139 establishes that God forms each person in the womb. 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 establishes that the body belongs to God and is the Spirit's temple. Galatians 3:28 establishes equal standing in Christ. None of these verses mentions female genital mutilation, and the article should not pretend otherwise. What they do is deny the assumptions the practice depends on.
A common misreading runs like this: since God commanded circumcision in the Old Testament, cutting the genitals of a child is a legitimate religious act, so female genital mutilation is simply another form of the same thing. That is wrong on several levels. The command was given by God, to a specific covenant people, for males, and it came with no license to extend it by analogy to females or to substitute human tradition for divine instruction. If anything, the New Testament moves away from treating the outward mark as decisive, as Colossians 3:11 makes clear.
Other passages that speak to Genesis 1:26-27
The themes in this article connect to larger biblical arguments about human dignity and the unity of the church. For a study of how division among believers contradicts the gospel, see What Does 1 Corinthians 1:10 Mean? Context, Theology, and Application. The foundation of God's faithfulness to his people is treated in What Does 1 Corinthians 1:9 Mean? Context, Theology, and Application. For the wider setting of these verses, read 1 Corinthians 1: Called, United, and Boasting in the Lord. And on bodily conduct and Christian freedom, see 1 Corinthians 10: Warnings and Freedom.
Frequently asked questions
Does the Bible explicitly condemn female genital mutilation?
No. Scripture never names the practice, and that should be stated honestly. What Scripture does give is the foundation that makes the practice indefensible: every human being bears God's image, both male and female, as Genesis 1:26-27 declares. God forms each person in the womb, according to Psalm 139:13-14, and the body belongs to God as the Spirit's temple, according to 1 Corinthians 6:19-20. These truths apply directly, even though the practice is not mentioned by name.
Isn't this similar to Old Testament circumcision?
No. Old Testament circumcision was a covenant sign commanded by God for a specific people and applied to males. It was never extended to women, and Scripture never treats it as a general permission to alter bodies for social or religious approval. The New Testament even relativizes the sign, listing circumcision and uncircumcision among distinctions that no longer define a person in Christ, as Colossians 3:11 says. Female genital mutilation is a human tradition, not a divine command.
How should a church help survivors and families at risk?
Churches should speak clearly against the practice, protect girls who are at risk, and support families who want to refuse it but fear community pressure. Survivors need compassionate medical and pastoral care, not shame, since many carry lasting physical and spiritual wounds. Parents who participated under cultural pressure need patient teaching and genuine love, not contempt. Where believers disagree on strategies, they should still agree that the practice is wrong and that girls are made in God's image.
