This is my covenant which ye shall keep, between me and you and thy seed after thee -- that every male among you be circumcised.
God speaks this word to a man of ninety‑nine who had already tried to get a son his own way. The command sounds strange today — a mark cut into the body of every male in the household — so what is it for, and what does it mean now?
The timing matters, and so does what came just before it.
The first mention of circumcision in the Bible is in Genesis 17:10-14. God was silent for thirteen years. Then He breaks in and makes a covenant with Abram, when His servant is ninety-nine years old. Thirteen years earlier Abram had listened to Sarai his wife, and they tried to have a child through Hagar the slave woman. That led to the birth of Ishmael, with all the disaster that followed. It was offspring according to the flesh, not according to promise.
Earlier, God's sign to Abraham lay in dead animals. Now the sign is cut into the man himself.
Abraham no longer asks for a sign to show him that he will inherit the land. Not a word of the kind is said. Instead God speaks of the seal of circumcision. It is not now something outside him, as we saw in the dead animals of chapter 15, but "every male among you shall be circumcised." What does it mean? Flesh put to death before God, the sentence of death placed on man in His sight — in Abram's own person and in his offspring after him. Circumcision here is not introduced in a legal way. It is really the answer in man to the grace of God. Every child of Abraham takes the place of death by this sign, which pictures our death with Christ.
The sign came after faith, not before it.
Circumcision was the mark of being a Jew, the sign of God's covenant with His earthly people Israel (Gen. 17:10). But when was Abraham counted righteous? Before he was circumcised at all. So righteousness by faith was never limited to Israel alone. It is for all who believe, though they are not circumcised. To a Jew who gloried in circumcision as the distinguishing mark of God's people, this argument is unanswerable: when Abraham was counted righteous, he was uncircumcised.
The words "every male among you" swept in the whole household, whatever a man's origin.
The covenant of circumcision is now introduced. Every member of the household of faith must bear in his body the seal of that covenant. There must be no exception. "Both he who is born in your house and he who is bought with your money shall surely be circumcised. So shall My covenant be in your flesh an everlasting covenant."
The penalty for refusing it was severe.
If an Israelite was not circumcised he was to be cut off from his own nation. Why? Because he had broken God's covenant. He had no part in the blessing God had promised. God's promise is not given to man as alive in the flesh, but to those in whom the flesh stands under the sentence of death. The sign of circumcision was necessary for Israel. Today we should learn the spiritual reality of it, as seen in Philippians 3:3. Yet even in Christianity the outward sign of baptism has its serious place.
The appointed day carries its own weight.
It becomes clear that circumcision means the flesh must be kept in the place of death. The flesh can add nothing to the doing of God's will. "He who is eight days old" was to be circumcised, and the eighth day points to a completely new start. Only a new life within can produce anything for the pleasure of God.
Christians are not asked to keep the rite. What it stood for still holds.
If God covenants to bless by His Almighty power, then on our side there must be no confidence in the flesh and no allowance of its activity. For the believer today, circumcision is "of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter. His praise is not from man but from God" (Rom. 2:29). Refusing the flesh is not merely an outward neglect of the body that the world can see. It means refusing the flesh in all its inward workings in the heart — its self-confidence, self-righteousness, vanity and lusts — as something the cross has condemned (Col. 2:11).
- Flesh fails. Ishmael came from human arrangement. God waits thirteen years, then speaks when Abraham is ninety-nine and man can produce nothing.
- Flesh sentenced. The sign is no longer outside Abraham but cut into his own body — the sentence of death on man in God's sight.
- Flesh not trusted. Abraham was counted righteous before he was circumcised. The sign sealed a righteousness faith already had, and that blessing reaches people without the mark.
- Flesh universal. No one in the household was exempt, born there or bought. To refuse the sign was to break the covenant and be cut off.
- Flesh replaced. The eighth day points to a completely new start. For believers the reality is inward: refusing self-confidence and self-righteousness, which the cross has condemned.
And ye shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin; and [that] shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you.
God gives this command to Abraham after a long wait, when his own attempt to secure the promised family had already failed. The mark is not a price for the promise but the sign of an agreement God had already made — so why did God set that sign in the flesh?
God did not negotiate this agreement. One reference work sets it beside God's promise to Noah, where the rainbow was the token:
The covenants made by God are of a different order. He makes His covenants from Himself, without consulting man. With Noah God made a covenant that He would not again destroy the world by a flood. As a token of that covenant, He set the rainbow in the cloud (Gen. 9:8-17). A covenant like this takes the form of an unconditional promise. Such was God's covenant with Abraham... He also gave him the covenant of circumcision (Gen. 17:10-14; Acts 7:8).
The law of Moses later took up this rite, so it is easy to read it as pure law-keeping. One commentator answers that:
No one should think circumcision must be a legal thing. In the setting it is put in here it goes together with grace — the sign that the flesh is put to death. The law did take it up when that system was later imposed. But in itself, as our Lord Himself shows, it was not of Moses, but of the fathers... It means flesh judged, and that is the true spiritual meaning of what God then instituted.
So why a mark in the body, and not another sign in the sky? The mark speaks about the flesh it is cut into:
What does the sign mean? Clearly, it is a symbolic witness that faith, not flesh, is the principle of relationship with God. In giving Abraham circumcision, God says, "You must carry in your body the sign that your flesh is profitless. You must have in yourself the sign that the sentence of judgment is on the flesh. You must accept a mark that means this: faith is the principle on which you are in relationship with Me."
The command came when Abraham had nothing left to give. The long wait was part of the lesson:
The flesh had already failed him, yet he later took the slave woman to himself, and had a child who was only the "wild man," not the child of promise. Nature was still strong in Abraham, so God went on for fourteen years as if the promise slept in His own mind — unfulfilled. But "when he was about a hundred years old," and Abraham's body "was now dead," God could come in again... "I am the Almighty God, walk before Me, and be perfect." For a dead Abraham an Almighty God alone would do, for Abraham could not help God to raise the dead. There He gives him the covenant of circumcision.
Circumcision did not make Abraham righteous. It stamped what was already true:
Romans 4 teaches that circumcision was "a seal of the righteousness of faith." "Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness." God counted him righteous, and then set His "seal" upon him.
The sign also marked out a people. It showed that Israel belonged to God:
Circumcision is a sign in God's people that they are indeed His, set apart to Himself according to His purpose. To the father of the faithful it was a token of the covenant God had made with him (Gen. 17:11)... It showed that God had set Israel apart to Himself from the nations around them.
How much did Abraham understand? Commentators differ. One writer holds that the full meaning waited for Christ:
As far as Abraham was concerned, circumcision was just a rite to keep. Nothing shows that anyone taught him its spiritual meaning... It looks as if its full meaning did not come to light until "the circumcision of Christ" (Col. 2:11) had actually taken place.
The reality the sign pointed to is a cutting off that no surgeon performs:
Circumcision was God's token of the covenant with the Jews, and of the putting off of the flesh, which was required to be part of God's people. It had its reality in Him... This is the true circumcision of Christ made without hands. Circumcision made by hands was only the sign of this putting off of the body of the flesh.
- Covenant — God made this agreement alone, without consulting Abraham. The sign in the flesh points to a promise, not a bargain.
- Sign — the mark says the flesh is profitless and under sentence. Faith, not flesh, is the basis of relationship with God.
- Timing — God gave it when Abraham's body was as good as dead, so the Almighty alone would keep the promise.
- Seal — faith came first. Circumcision only stamped God's seal on a righteousness Abraham already had.
- Reality — the outward rite pointed to "the circumcision of Christ": a putting off of the flesh made without hands.