Circumcision in the Bible
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Circumcision, when practiced as a rite, has its foundations in the Bible and is therefore practiced by Jews and Muslims.
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Introduction
The practice of circumcision has a long history, and is mentioned frequently in the Bible. However, it should be noted that the Bible means different things to different religious groups.
- For Jews, the Bible consists of the 39 books from Hebrew that are often known as the Old Testament.
- For Protestant Christians, the Bible consists of these books plus the 27 books of the New Testament.
- For Catholic and Orthodox Christians, the Bible includes several other books known as the Apocrypha or the Deuterocanonical books, the list being slightly different for each group.
As the Bible means different things to different groups and individuals, what the Bible says would obviously vary from group to group. It also can make a difference if a person is interpreting the Bible in the light of Jewish or Christian traditions or academic and scholarly research.
In the Hebrew Bible
According to the Hebrew Bible, circumcision was enjoined upon the biblical patriarch Abraham, his descendants and their slaves as "a token of the covenant" concluded with him by God for all generations.
The penalty of non-observance was karet, excision from the people (Gen. 17:10-14, 21:4; Lev. 12:3). Non-Israelites had to undergo circumcision before they could be allowed to take part in the feast of Passover (Ex. 12:48), or marry into a Jewish family (Gen. 34:14-16).
It was "a reproach" for an Israelite to be uncircumcised (Josh. 5:9.) The name arelim (uncircumcised) became an opprobrious term, denoting the Philistines and other non-Israelites (I Sam. 14:6, 31:4; II Sam. i. 20) and used synonymously with tame (unclean) for heathen (Isa. 52:1). The word 'arel' (uncircumcised) is also employed for "unclean" (Lev. 26:41, "their uncircumcised hearts"; compare Jer. 9:25; Ezek. xliv. 7, 9); it is even applied to the first three years' fruit of a tree, which is forbidden (Lev. 19:23).
However, the Israelites born in the wilderness after the exodus from Egypt apparently did not carry out the practice of circumcision. According to Josh. 5:2-9, "all the people that came out" of Egypt were circumcised, but those "born in the wilderness" were not. In any case, we are told that Joshua, before the celebration of the Passover, had them circumcised at Gilgal.
Deut. 10:16 says, "Circumcise the foreskin of your heart," thus giving the rite a spiritual meaning; circumcision as a physical act being enjoined nowhere in the book. Jer. 9:25, 26 says that circumcised and uncircumcised will be punished alike by the Lord; for "all the nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in heart." Non-Jewish tribes that practiced circumcision were described as being "circumcised in uncircumcision."
The Bible contains several narratives in which circumcision is mentioned. There is the circumcision and massacre of the Shechemites (Genesis 34:1-35:5), the hundred foreskin dowry (1 Samuel 18:25-27) and the story of the LORD threatening to kill Moses, and being placated by Zipporah's circumcision of their son (Exodus 4: 24-26).
In Judaism
Judaism teaches that the Bible was transmitted in parallel with an oral tradition, known as the oral law. Jewish practices and beliefs, thus, are based on reading the Bible through the perspective of the oral law; see the entries on the Mishnah, Talmud and rabbinic literature.
According to Jewish law, ritual circumcision of male children is a commandment from God that Jews are obligated to follow; Jews do not believe that non-Jews are obligated to follow this commandment. Many Christians have the same understanding of this issue (i.e., that it is a law intended for Jews, but not for Christians).
In rabbinic literature
During the Babylonian exile the Sabbath and circumcision became the characteristic symbols of Judaism. This seems to be the underlying idea of Isa. lvi. 4: "The eunuchs that keep my Sabbath" still "hold fast by my covenant," though not having "the sign of the covenant" (Gen. xvii. 11.) upon their flesh.
Contact with Greek polytheistic culture, especially at the games of the arena, made this distinction obnoxious to Jewish-Hellenists seeking to assimilate into Greek culture. The consequence was their attempt to appear like the Greeks by epispasm ("making themselves foreskins"; I Macc. i. 15; Josephus, "Ant." xii. 5, § 1; Assumptio Mosis, viii.; I Cor. vii. 18;, Tosef.; Talmud tractes Shabbat xv. 9; Yevamot 72a, b; Yerushalmi Peah i. 16b; Yevamot viii. 9a). Also, some Jews at this time stopped circumcising their children. Maccabees 2:46 records that the Maccabean zealots forcibly circumcised all the uncircumcised boys they found within the borders of Israel.
The Rabbis also took action to ensure that the practice of circumcision did not die out. In order to prevent the obliteration of the "seal of the covenant" on the flesh, as circumcision was henceforth called, the Rabbis, probably after the war of Bar Kokba, instituted the "peri'ah" (the laying bare of the glans), without which circumcision was declared to be of no value (Shab. xxx. 6).
To be born circumcised was regarded as the privilege of the most saintly of people, from Adam, "who was made in the image of God," and Moses to Zerubbabel (see Midrash Ab. R. N., ed. Schechter, p. 153; and Talmud, Sotah 12a).
Uncircumcision being considered a blemish, circumcision was to remove it, and to render Abraham and his descendants "perfect" (Talmud Ned. 31b; Midrash Genesis Rabbah xlvi.)
Rabbinic literature holds that one who removes his circumcision has no portion in the world to come (Mishnah Ab. iii. 17; Midrash Sifre, Num. xv. 31; Talmud Sanhedrin 99).
According to the Midrash Pirke R. El. xxix., it was Shem who circumcised Abraham and Ishmael on the Day of Atonement; and the blood of the covenant then shed is ever before God on that day to serve as an atoning power. According to the same midrash, Pharaoh prevented the Hebrew slaves from performing the rite, but when the Passover time came and brought them deliverance, they underwent circumcision, and mingled the blood of the paschal lamb with that of the Abrahamic covenant, wherefore (Ezek. xvi. 6) God repeats the words: "In thy blood live!"
Necessary or not?
The issue between the Zealot and Liberal parties regarding the circumcision of proselytes remained an open one in the first century of the common era, a time before the Mishnah was edited.
R. Joshua asserting that along with accepting Jewish beliefs and laws, immersion in a mikveh (ritual bath) was enough for someone to convert to Judaism. In contrast, R. Eliezer makes circumcision a condition for the admission of a proselyte. A similar controversy between the Shammaites and the Hillelites is given (Shab. 137a) regarding a proselyte born circumcised: the former demanding the spilling of a drop of blood of the covenant; the latter declaring it to be unnecessary
The rigorous view is echoed in the Midrash: "If thy sons accept My Godhead [by undergoing circumcision] I shall be their God and bring them into the land; but if they do not observe My covenant in regard either to circumcision or to the Sabbath, they shall not enter the land of promise" (Midrash Genesis Rabbah xlvi.). "The Sabbath-keepers who are not circumcised are intruders, and deserve punishment," (Midrash Deut. Rabbah i.)
It appears that while the Palestinian Jews accepted the uncircumcised proselytes only as "Proselytes of the Gate", non-Palestinian Judaism did not make such a distinction until the Roman wars, when the more rigorous view became prevalent everywhere. Thus Flavius Clemens, a nephew of the emperors Titus and Domitian, when with his wife Domitilla he embraced the Jewish faith, underwent circumcision, for which he suffered the penalty of death (see Grätz, "Gesch." iv. 403 et seq., 702).
It was chiefly this rigorous feature of Jewish proselytism which provoked the hostile measures of the emperor Hadrian. And, furthermore, it was the discussion of this same question among the Jews—whether the seal of circumcision might not find its substitute in "the seal of baptism" — which led Paul to urge the latter in opposition to the former (Rom. ii. 25 et seq., iv. 11, and elsewhere), just as he was led to adopt the antinomistic or antinational view, which had its exponents in Alexandria.
Necessity
The consensus that became accepted in all segments of the Jewish community was that circumcision was an absolute requirement (barring, of course, medical conditions; Jewish law prohibits parents to have their son circumcised if medical doctors hold that the procedure may unduly threaten the child's health; e.g. hemophilia.)
Unlike Christian baptism, circumcision, however important it may be, is not a sacrament. Circumcision does not give a Jew his religious character as a Jew. An uncircumcised Jew is a full Jew by birth (Talmud Hul. 4b; Avodah Zarah 27a; Shulkhan Arukh, Yoreh De'ah, 264, 1).
A non-Jewish physician may, according to R. Meïr, in the absence of a Jewish expert, perform the ceremony, as may women, slaves, and children (Talmud Avodah Zarah 26b; Menachot 42a; Maimonides' Mishneh Torah, Milah, ii. 1; Shulkhan Arukh, Yoreh De'ah, l.c.).
Circumcision must, whenever possible, take place on the eighth day, even when this falls upon the Sabbath (Shab. xix. 1); Samaritans and the Karaites dissent from this rule. However, if by reason of the child's debility or sickness the ceremony is postponed, it can not take place on the Sabbath (Talmud Shabbat 137a). It is the duty of the father to have his child circumcised; and if he fails in this, the bet din of the city must see that the rite is performed (Talmud Kid. 29a).
In the Apocrypha
In the Apocrypha, circumcision was seen as the mark of Jewish loyalty. Jews hewing to observance of Jewish law defied the edict of Antiochus Epiphanes prohibiting circumcision (I Macc. i. 48, 60; ii. 46). Jewish women showed their loyalty to the Law, even at the risk of their lives, by themselves circumcising their sons. At the same time, the Zealots forcibly circumcised the uncircumcised boys within the borders of Israel (l Macc. ii. 46).
The Book of Jubilees (xv. 26-27), written in the time of John Hyrcanus, has the following: "Whosoever is uncircumcised belongs to 'the sons of Belial,' to 'the children of doom and eternal perdition'; for all the angels of the Presence and of the Glorification have been so from the day of their creation, and God's anger will be kindled against the children of the covenant if they make the members of their body appear like those of the Gentiles, and they will be expelled and exterminated from the earth"
The Apocrypha reports that many Jewish men chose to undergo epispasm, foreskin restoration by stretching of the residual skin, due to pressure to conform to Gentile society. (1 Maccabees 1:11-15).[1] (http://www.cirp.org/library/restoration/hall1/)
In Christianity
According to the account given in the Book of Acts, the leaders of the Christian Church at the Council of Jerusalem rejected circumcision as a required practice for Christians (Acts 15). The Apostle Paul, who was responsible for the circumcision of Timothy - who had a Jewish mother (Acts 16:1-3) - rejected and condemned those who promoted circumcision to Gentile Christians. He accused the Galatian Christians who advocated circumcision of turning from the Spirit to the flesh (Gal. 3:3) and accusing circumcision advocates of wanting to make a good showing in the flesh (Gal. 6:12) and of glorying or boasting of the flesh (Gal 3:13). In a late letter he warned Christians to "beware of the mutilation", saying that Christians were the true circumcision because they worshipped in the Spirit of God. (Philippians 3:2).
Peter, who later became the first Pope, condemned circumcision.(Acts 15:7-10) Paul, the Apostle to the Gentiles, warned that the advocates of circumcision were "false brothers". (Gal. 2:4) When the various passages from the Greek Bible regarding circumcision are gathered together, a strongly negative view of circumcision emerges.[2] (http://www.cirp.org/pages/cultural/glass1/) Some Biblical scholars think that the Epistle of Titus, generally attributed to Paul, may state that circumcision should be discouraged among Christians (Titus 1:10-16), though others believe this is merely a reference to Jews.
The Roman Catholic Church condemned the practice of circumcision for its members in 1442,[3] (http://www.cirp.org/library/cultural/councilflorence/) which should be read in conjunction with the Catholic Timeline of Antisemitism (http://www.sullivan-county.com/news/mine/timeline.htm). Fr. John J. Dietzen, a retired priest and columnist, reports based on the [Catholic Catechism (http://www.christusrex.org/www1/CDHN/fifth.html#PERSONS)] paragraph #2297 (respect for bodily integrity) that circumcision is immoral if it can be defined as an amputation or mutilation.[4] (http://www.cirp.org/library/cultural/dietzen1/)