Two Covenants – Heart of the Matter

The heart is used figuratively in the Bible as man’s moral, emotional and sometimes intellectual center.  Jesus said emphatically in Mt.22:37, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind”.  Jesus was quoting De.6:5 of the Old Covenant (OC).  In this topic, we’ll look at the Old Covenant and the New Covenant (NC), in relation to the heart.

Our Bible forms an integrated whole, a standard for the church.  2Ti.3:16 all scripture is given by the inspiration of God.  Yet Christians and others overlook some of God’s (enduring) principles, because they were cited in the OC.  Many speak of the OC with disdain, not considering that moral principles therein were evident in Genesis for gentiles…and that was before there ever was a nation of Israel or an OC!  see the topics, “Added in the Old Covenant” and “Genesis Principles Predate Moses”.

Most of ancient Israel didn’t like the laws of God.  Neither do some NC Christians.  In that regard, it seems these Christians somewhat resemble the mindset of OC Israelites/Jews!  They dislike, or ignore, or may even be hostile towards some of God’s written laws (purposed for the good of society)!

There is only One true Lawgiver.  Ja.4:12 “There is one Lawgiver who is able to save and to destroy.”  God the Lawgiver had His morality and justice recorded for humanity and the Kingdom of God!

But from the beginning, man opted to establish his own laws and ways, thinking that man of himself innately knows right from wrong.  But a just determination of good & evil is a prerogative solely of God the Lawgiver, not man.  If man tries to ascertain what’s good vs evil on his own, he does so from the wrong tree of the knowledge of good & evil.  ref Ge.3:3-6.  (see “Tree Symbolism in Scripture”.)

God’s theocracy of ancient Israel was given His just laws.  Moses asked the rhetorical question in De.4:7. “What great nation is there that has a god so near to it as the Lord our God?”  None.  No other nation on the face of the earth!  Old Testament (OT) Israel was given God’s very own principles of morality and His commandments.  Le.22:31 “You shall keep My commandments and do them; I Am the Lord.”  God isn’t unfair.  He didn’t require the ancient nation He loved to do that which wasn’t doable!  God’s commandments are doable!  But their heart wasn’t in it.

Who specifically gave God’s divine laws to Moses/Israel?  Jesus said that no human in OT times had heard Father God’s voice or seen His form.  ref Jn.1:1, 14, 18, 5:37, 6:46.  John indicated it was Jesus the Word of God who the Jewish prophet Isaiah had seen in vision on the Throne! (cf. Is.6:1-ff with Jn.12:41-44.)  De.32:3-4 “Ascribe greatness to our God! The Rock! His work is perfect.”  The Rock of Israel, who went with them in the wilderness…“That Rock was Christ”, according to Paul (1Co.10:4)!  It was Christ who’d personally visited Abraham (Gen.18).  It was Christ who spoke to Moses, gave Israel the Decalogue (Ex.20), and then established the OC (ref Ex.24:1-8).  Moses and the elders of Israel saw the preincarnate Christ (Ex.24:9-12)!  also ref the topic “Jesus Was The Old Testament God”.

Orthodox Study Bible, p.652, quotes church historian Eusebius writing about OT saints. “It is obvious that they knew God’s Christ Himself, since He appeared to Abraham, instructed Isaac, spoke to Jacob, conversed freely with Moses and the Prophets who came later.”  Christ/the Word was the God who spoke with mankind in the OT!  And He.13:8…“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.”

During their OT history, Israel rebelled against Christ the Lord and His laws, and later corrupted God’s precepts with their own man-made religious traditions.  Je.17:9 “The heart of man is deceitful above all, and corrupt.”  The human heart is deceitful.  Most of ancient Israel didn’t have the Holy Spirit (HS).  So under the OC, the HS wasn’t impressing God’s principles on their hearts.  The last verse of the book of Judges sums it up.  Jg.21:25 “Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.”  Apart from God’s laws, man does what seems right in their own conscience or circumstances…an ancient form of humanism.

(Some Christians seem to do this too, yet may attribute their actions to the HS leading them…as if Christ or the HS isn’t consistent, and contradicts God’s written word or moral principles from the OT!)

As a result, God sent disobedient Israel and Judah into captivity…for bloodshed, idolatry, incest, usury, sabbath-breaking, oppressing the weak, etc. (ref Ezk.22:1-16).  The law of God wasn’t in their heart.

Some from the southern kingdom of Judah later returned to the Holy Land.  These Jews wrote selected OT verses in small boxes or phylácteries.  They literally strapped them to the arm & forehead.  De.6:4-9 “Hear O Israel! You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul and mind. These words shall be on your heart. And you shall bind them on your hand.”  But their literal practice became a pretense; they did it mostly to impress others.  Jesus said in Mt.23:2-5, “The scribes and Pharisees…do all their deeds to be noticed by men, for they broaden their phylacteries and lengthen their tassels.”  (De.6:8 a literal physical binding of scriptures in phylactery or téfillin boxes wasn’t the meaning of the verses anyway.  For example, Pr.3:3 & 7:2-3, “binding” God’s commandments on necks, fingers and hearts…was metaphorical only, not to be taken literally.  They weren’t to tie them onto the fingers!)

Jesus called them hypocrites (or stage actors) in Mk.7:6. “This people honors Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me.”  Most Jews who returned from captivity didn’t “write” upon their hearts the principles of God, which Christ and the HS had given Moses.  Jesus accused Jews who opposed Him in Jn.7:19. “None of you carries out the Law.”  They disliked Christ’s OT laws.  Those Jews considered God’s written commandments a burden.  But 1Jn.5:3 “This is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not burdensome.”  According to John, real love involves keeping God’s commandments…and they’re not a burden!  (see “Love – Godly Love”.)

However, there was a minority of OC Israelites who honored and even loved God’s written principles, and desired to obey them.  King David was such a man.  Ac.13:22 (quoting 1Sm.13:14) David is called “a man after God’s own heart”!  1Ki.11:34 “David observed My commandments and My statutes.”  Only in the matter of Bathsheba/Uriah did David turn aside from what God commanded him.  1Ki.15:5 “David did what was right in the sight of the Lord.”  David made mistakes, a few very serious, but his overall intent was to obey the Lord.  [Note: Mic.5:2 is a prophecy of Bethlehem, David’s birthplace (1Sm.20:6, 17:58) and Jesus’ birthplace.  Lk.2:4 the family ancestry was there.  Mt.9:27 Jesus is the son of David!]

David’s name appears over 1,100 times in the Bible.  Interestingly, both the first and the final name mentioned in the New Testament (NT), except for “Jesus”…is “David” (in Mt.1:1 and Re.22:16)!

In some respects, David was a forerunner of real NC Christians!  1Sm.16:13 the HS was mightily on David from that day when Samuel anointed him!  Jesus said in Mk.12:35-36, “David himself said in the Holy Spirit….”  The following two verses, written by David, reflect how he viewed Christ’s principles and laws: Ps.19:7-8 “The law of the Lord is perfect”.  Ps.40:8 “Thy law [toráh Strongs h8451, Hebrew] is within my heart.”  The HS figuratively wrote God’s laws on David’s heart.

Therefore we might call David a prototype of He.8:8-11 (prophesied in Je.31:33-34). “This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel’, says the Lord. ‘I will put My laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. All shall know Me.”  In the NC, God writes His laws upon human hearts.

God made the NC with Israel and Judah…other Christians are grafted-in, according to Paul.  ref Ro.11:13, 17, 23-27 all of ‘spiritual’ Israel will be saved, via the NC (not via Judaism).  As God’s laws are being written on our hearts in the inner man, we shouldn’t habitually sin.  We should be able to say with David, “Thy law is in my heart” (Ps.40:8).

Similar to Je.31:33 (Je.38:33 LXX), is Ezk.36:26-27. “I will give you a new heart…I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes and observe My ordinances.”  Real Spirit-filled Christians allow God to write His laws and principles on their hearts & minds!  The apostle Paul said in Ro.3:31 e.g., “Do we nullify the Law through faith? God forbid! We establish the Law”.

David wrote of the righteous man in Ps.37:31. “The law of God is in his heart; his steps do not slide.”  David, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Paul essentially are saying the same thing in the verses quoted.  Paul wrote in Ro.7:12-14, “The law is holy, and the commandment is holy, just and good. We know that the law is spiritual.”  Yes, the Holy Spirit had given it to Moses.  Paul goes on in v.22-25, “I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man….I myself with my mind am serving the law of God.”  According to the NC (He.8:10), God was writing His laws upon the apostles’ minds and hearts too.  2Co.3:3 Christ’s moral laws are no longer written on tablets of stone, but on tablets of human hearts.

Other ways of describing the heart on which God can write His laws are…a new heart (Ezk.36:26), an exchanged heart, a circumcised heart.  These are interchangeable terms for that heart which is willing to obey the Lord.  De.30:6 was Moses’ prophecy of a future (non-physical) heart circumcision which God would do (to the hearts of both men and women).  Paul wrote in Ro.2:29, “Circumcision is that which is of the heart, by the Spirit”.  Not the physical circumcision operation of the foreskin done by men.  Col.2:11 “In Him you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands.”  God does it (this fulfills De.30:6).  These persons will allow God’s principles to be written on their heart by the HS.  (see the topics “Circumcision in the Bible” and “Holy Spirit-Filled”.)

Ten years ago I had the opportunity to hear a Christian speaker from Mozambique.  This man had reportedly resurrected a dozen people from the dead in the name of Jesus!  He related to us a vision he’d received.  In the vision, he was shown people with trees growing out of their heads!  He said the Lord told him the vision represented modern society (including the church) partaking of the tree of the knowledge of good & evil (Gen.3:6)!  Even the church appears humanistic, many churchgoers attaching Jesus’ Name to that wrong tree, not desiring God the Lawgiver’s definition of good & evil on His terms.

On another occasion, a pastor from Uganda was invited to speak at a church in my city.  He told of closing himself off for three days in his room to seek the Lord for the topic.  He said God told him to address Ezk.22:26. “Her priests have violated My law, they make no distinction between the holy and the profane, or between the unclean and the clean; and they hide their eyes from My sabbaths.”  That visiting pastor spoke courageously!  But his sermon was hard for some to hear.

Is.8:20 “To the law and to the testimony [the Decalogue, Ex.31:18]! If they don’t speak according to this word, it is because they have no light.”  Too many Christians (perhaps unknowingly) are attaching Christ’s Name to man’s laws and justice system from the wrong tree of humanism…as if man is God.

It can feel more comfortable to be religious or follow denominational traditions which may not honor God’s written word.  That’s what the majority of OC Israel/Judah did, and the Pharisees did in Jesus’ day.  Paul wrote of them in Ga.6:13. “Those who are circumcised [physically] don’t even keep the law.”  Those Jewish religious leaders who contended with Jesus weren’t keeping God’s written laws.  Mt.15:18 “The things that proceed out of the mouth come from the heart.”  The scribes & Pharisees who spoke against Jesus…God’s written principles weren’t on their hearts.  (Jesus was law-abiding).

Let’s us not be pharisaic NC Christians by resembling OC Israelites/Jews that disrespected God’s laws.  Sectarian church traditions or the views of so-called church ‘fathers’ (e.g. some Roman Catholic Church tradition) shouldn’t be placed above the written word of God.  That practice can also be a cause of division in the Body of Christ.  (also see “Doctrinal Disunity Impacts Evangelism”.)

The Lord exclaimed in De.5:29, “Oh, that they had such a heart in them, that they would fear Me and keep My commandments always, that it may be well with them and with their sons forever”!  But such a heart wasn’t in most of those OC Israelites, and they failed to be a right example to the nations.

In conclusion…God saves the upright in heart (Ps.7:10).  We too can be real NC (grafted-in) Christians, having God’s righteous moral principles written on our hearts and minds!  And they’re not burdensome (1Jn.5:3).  And as the gospel spreads, obedient NC Christians will reflect the righteousness and true heartfelt love of God to the world!  To God be the glory!!

Circumcision in the Bible

Approximately 55–60% of males in the USA are physically circumcised, 25-30% worldwide.  Most in Africa and Moslem nations are.  Few are in Europe, China, Russia, India, South America.  My two sons were circumcised as a health precaution when they were one week old.  They have no recollection of it.  Anesthetics reduce discomfort.  Yet hearing my little sons’ pitiful screams in the adjoining room was hard to bear!  It can be painful when something is cut out – physically, emotionally, or spiritually.

Circumcision is the procedure to remove the male foreskin from the penis.  That quick surgery can protect against urinary tract infections and STDs, decrease the risk of HIV and even some cancers.

Among the reasons people practice circumcision are: to aid hygiene/health (boys may not clean their foreskin well), to mark the transition to manhood, to afflict enemies, as a religious or status symbol.

Wikipedia: History of Circumcision “The origin of circumcision is not known with certainty. It likely has roots among ethnic groups in sub-equatorial Africa, Egypt [2300 BC], and Arabia. Heródotus, writing in the 5^th century BCE, lists Egyptians being the oldest people practicing circumcision, then Colchians [Black Sea area], Ethiopians, Phoenicians, and Syrians. He wrote disparagingly that ‘the Egyptians practice circumcision [at puberty] for the sake of cleanliness’. Josephus seems to suggest that the Edomites were uncircumcised until being forcefully converted to Judaism by John Hyṙcanus [120 BC]. Ancient Greeks considered circumcision a mutilation. Europeans, with the exception of Jews, didn’t practice circumcision.”  (I’m uncircumcised and not Jewish.)

Eve Feinstein Bathing in the Hebrew Bible “In biblical Israel, where water was scarce, bathing was often a momentous event, fraught with religious significance.”  Circumcision aided personal hygiene.

Of the peoples who’ve practiced circumcision, of note are the Jewish people.  Jews today don’t promote the religious circumcising of gentiles.  However, in antiquity Jews were more a próselytízing people.

Although circumcision aids cleanliness, there’s no evidence man was created circumcised!  Creation was good without circumcision (Ge.1:31)!  No scripture states that Noah or Enoch or anyone else before the Flood was circumcised.  Dr. Ralph F. Wilson The Covenant of Circumcision With Abraham “The earliest evidence we have for circumcision is from a number of bronze statuettes found at Tell Judéideh in northern Syria, dating to about 2800 BC. Circumcision was rather common in Abraham’s world.”

Biblical circumcision is for the lineage of Abraham-Isaac-Jacob (A-I-J), primarily living in the Holy Land (of Canáan).  Physical circumcision involves a male reproductive organ.

First, let’s look at the Abrahamic Covenant in Genesis 15.  v.1-7 the Lord promised Abrám that he will come to have numerous descendants (v.5) and they will possess the Land of Canaan (v.7).  Ge.15:6 LXX “Abram believed God.”  That is a key text; the apostle Paul will tie it to circumcision in Romans 4.

Biblical circumcision begins in Genesis 17, where God confirms His covenant with Abram.  Ge.17:1-2 “I Am God Almighty. Walk before Me and be blameless, and I will establish My covenant with you.”

It is conditional.  Dr. Ralph Wilson op. cit. “To reaffirm the covenant, He introduces a performance requirement, a definite ethical emphasis. God expects Abraham to live a righteous life.”  Ronald W. Pierce Covenant Conditionality and a Future for Israel “The Abrahamic Covenant is seen to have emphasized a response on the part of the patriarch from the initial encounter in Harrán [Ge.12:1-3] to the climactic events on Mt Moriah [Ge.22:1-18]. An element of conditionality is sometimes explicitly stated, at other times implied, but always understood.”  And Abram was faithful & obedient to God. Ge.26:5 “Abraham obeyed Me, My charge, My commandments, My statues, and My laws.”

Ge.17:4-6 the gentile/non-Jew Abram’s name is changed to Abraham, as his line will reproduce many nations of descendants.  Kings will come forth from A-I-J.  v.7-13 the physical sign of the Lord’s conditional covenantal Land promise is physical circumcision!  v.14 any uncircumcised descendant in the Land would be cut off by God (other than via circumcision)!

Ge.17:15-27 Abraham’s household, with his son Ishmaél, living in the Land, becomes circumcised.  v.18-21 but the Land promise isn’t through Ishmael; not his lineage.  It will follow to Abraham’s son Isaac, 21:3-4…then to Isaac’s son Jacob/Israel, 28:13-15 (but not to Isaac’s son Esau, Jacob’s twin).

Physical circumcision didn’t apply to females.  (Wives shared in the status of their husbands.)  De.21:16-17 inheritance in God’s Holy Land went to the circumcised sons, not to (uncircumcised) daughters.  Daughters were usually allowed to inherit only if her father has no son, and even then she usually must marry a man belonging to the Israelite tribe of her father (ref Nu.27:8-10, 36:8-9).

Abrahamic Covenant promises: #1 Abraham (and grandson Jacob, Ge.35:11-12) to be the father of many nations; #2 the Land of Canaan (Ge.17:8-9); #3 the earth to be blessed through the Seed (Christ, according to Paul, Ge.22:18 & Ga.3:16) of the A (Ge.12:3), I (Ge.26:4), J (Ge.28:14) line.

Again Ge.17:21, this covenant is for the A-I-J line of descent.  ref Ex.2:24, Ps.105:8-11.  The covenant, with its sign of circumcision, doesn’t apply to descendants living elsewhere of: Ishmael, Abraham’s servants and other sons (except Isaac), Esau.  Though circumcised…Ishmael, Abraham’s other sons by his wife Keturáh, and Esau all moved elsewhere (Ge.25:6, 17-18, 36:8-9).  If their descendants living elsewhere choose to be circumcised traditionally or for whatever reason, they’re still not included in the Land promise.  Ac.7:7-8 reiterates this “covenant of circumcision” was for the A-I-J line.

Ge.21:4 Abraham circumcised Isaac.  When?  Green’s Literal Translation “A son of 8 days.”  LXX “On the 8^th day.”  Inclusive counting is used.  On the 8^th day of life, an infant is actually one week/7 days old.  cf. Jn.20:19, 26 “After eight days”; the margin reads “A week later”.  Evidence For The Bible “The 8^th is the optimum day for circumcision because of the highest presence of the clotting factor vitamin K.”

Ge.34:15-16 verifies that Jacob’s sons were circumcised (the 12 sons/tribes are of the A-I-J line).

Elsewhere 8^th day circumcision wasn’t universal.  Ex.4:24-26 later Moses, the leader of Jacob’s seed to re-enter the Land, must obey their covenant God…his son Gershóm becomes circumcised before entry.

Le.12:3 physical circumcision on the 8^th day was understandably a very important rite to Jews too…that is, descendants of Judah, Benjamin, Levi (3 of Jacob’s sons).  Jn.7:22-23 circumcision being treated with such importance perhaps was due in part to Moses’ experience of Ex.4:24.

Jsh.5:3, 6-10 physical circumcision and the Passover are linked in the Land of Canaan; here at Gilgál where the central sanctuary was then.  They must be circumcised.  Jsh.21:43 the Israelites took possession of the Land, as God had promised their patriarchs.

Ex.12:43-49 uncircumcised sojourners/tosháb (Strongs h8453, Hebrew) in the Land weren’t allowed to eat the Passover.  v.48 “No uncircumcised man may eat of it.”  But circumcised aliens/proselytes/ger h1616 could eat it in Canaan/Israel.  e.g. If any descendant of Ishmael or Esau coming back into the Land is circumcised, he too may eat the Passover.  De.16:5-6 Israel was forbidden from killing the Passover in any towns other than at the sole sanctuary location where God’s Name was (cf. 2Sm.6:2)!

Physical circumcision of the foreskin was a type of symbolic spiritual circumcision.  De.10:15-16 exhorts that the heart be circumcised figuratively, to enable Israel to keep God’s Law of Moses.  Ex.6:30 circumcised lips too.  Je.6:10 ears too.  But it was impossible for Israelites to (figuratively) circumcise their own hearts.  De.30:6 is Moses’ prophecy of a future non-physical heart circumcision which God would do…to the hearts of both men and women!  Je.9:25-26 the Lord to punish peoples outwardly (physically) circumcised but inwardly uncircumcised.  In the New Testament (NT), inward circumcision of the heart is a key concept.  (see the topic “Two Covenants – Heart of the Matter”.)

Fast forwarding…1Sm.18:25 Philistines were uncircumcised gentiles/non-Israelites, circa 1050 BC.

But the 12 tribes of Israel…they disobeyed God (unlike righteous Abraham, Ge.26:5).  So God expelled them from the Land, in 721 BC and 586 BC.  De.30:1-10 Moses had said the Lord would bring them back and bless them…if…they obeyed Him (v.10).  Again, retaining the Land promise was conditional.

Est.8:17 LXX/Septúagint in the 400s BC, many Persians became Jewish converts out of fear.  Samaritans living in the Land area of old northern Israel also were a physically circumcised people.  In the NT….

Lk.1:59, 2:21 both John the Baptizer and Jesus were circumcised on the 8^th day.  Both were Jews descended from Jacob and born in the Holy Land.  (Jewish boys were named at their circumcision.)

However…the scriptures don’t say that gentiles dwelling in their own nations are to be circumcised (made proselytes) by Israelites/Jews outside the Land!  The Israelites were instructed in De.12:32, don’t add to or lessen God’s written commands!  (It is understood that Rome reduced rights in the Land that circumcised residents held earlier as God’s theocracy, and enforced empirical laws.)

Mt.23:15 Jesus castigated the Jewish scribes & Pharisees for their man-made tradition of physically circumcising non-descendants of Jacob/Israel outside the Land.  Jews were adding to God’s written Law!  Jewish Hasmónean leaders had forcibly circumcised Iduméans (Edomites descended from Esau) in 125 BC and Ituríans (an Arabian or Araméan people) in Galilee in 103 BC!

What about the physical circumcision of Christian gentiles, grafted into ‘spiritual Israel’ (Ro.11:24)?  This was a huge issue in the early church!  Again, physical circumcision was required for physical descendants of A-I-J, as it related to the Land promise.

Ga.5:6 the (Jewish) apostle Paul said physical circumcision was essentially meaningless in Galatia, where there was no land promised or central sanctuary (for Passover).  1Co.7:18-19 physical circumcision was of no consequence in Corinth.  Non-Holy Land territory is ‘circumcision neutral’.

God’s Land promise didn’t pertain to gentile lands.  The gentile/non-Israelite adults in the early church outside the Land weren’t required to be circumcised or keep Passover at the Jerusalem temple/central sanctuary (soon to be destroyed).

Ac.15:1-10 the Jewish Christian apostles at the Jerusalem council of 50 AD ruled gentile converts to Jesus needn’t become physically circumcised to be saved.  It isn’t necessary to first convert to Judaism!  The Holy Spirit said circumcision was an unnecessary bondage for the church at large.

Adults in gentile lands could attend church without having to undergo any mandatory physical circumcision!  The Jewish apostles in the NT didn’t abrogate God’s written laws!  But many of His requirements involved rituals which were to be done only in the Land or at the temple.

Christians needn’t try to live by rituals applicable solely to the temple environment, or by the outward circumcision sign of the Land promise to A-I-J.  Ro.2:28-29 (Je.9:25) the heart is what matters…not the ceremonial work of physical circumcision.

Ro.4:2-3 Paul quotes the initial key verse of Ge.15:6. “Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.”  (cf. Ge.26:5.)  Ro.4:9 the “circumcised” were Jews, the “uncircumcised” were gentiles (probably including by that time the so-called ‘lost tribes’ of Israel elsewhere).  v.10-12 the gentile Abram’s physical circumcision signified his prior faith while he was still uncircumcised!  Physical circumcision had been the covenantal sign and the type of spiritual circumcision.

Paul taught that the practice wasn’t necessary even for Jews/Israelites who lived outside the Land!  Ac.21:21 “You are teaching all the Jews who are among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children.”  The Abrahamic Covenant sign pertained to the Land, not elsewhere.

{Sidelight: Ac.16:1-4 Timothy didn’t have a Jewish father, but had a Jewish mother and he knew their customs.  Timothy too had faith while uncircumcised, as did Abram.  After Timothy was circumcised, disbelieving Jews in synagogues customarily would allow him to mingle with them (ref Ac.10:28).  Thereby he could better evangelize the truth, that Jesus is Lord.  Ga.2:3-5 but the gentile Titus wasn’t sent to evangelize Jews and didn’t become circumcised…Christian liberty was at stake here!}

Ga.5:11-12 Paul caustically says circumcision compellers in gentile lands should…mutilate themselves!  v.1-2 the Jews oral law requirement of physical circumcision elsewhere was a bondage of no Christian benefit in Galatia.  (Though 8^th day circumcision can still have health/hygiene benefits.)

Foreskin removal remains a personal/family choice.  Wikipedia op.cit. “By the 2^nd century [AD], the only circumcising groups in the Roman Empire were Jews, Samaritans, Jewish Christians, Egyptian priests, and Nabatean Arabs. The Catholic Church condemned the observance of circumcision as a moral sin and ordered against its practice at the Council of Florence in 1442 [What!?]. The tradition of circumcision is said to have been practiced within the British Royal Family. The practice is customary [today] among Coptic, Ethiopian, and Eritréan Orthodox Churches, and some other African churches.”

Ga.6:13-15 those with circumcised hearts are figuratively a new creation.  Col.2:11 fulfills De.30:6.  It’s not a physical circumcision.  Col.3:11 it’s no longer an antagonism of gentiles vs Jews, with racial implications.  Now the two believing sectors are progressing toward unity, in the love of Christ!

And that unified man is a global creation, becoming so in all nations!  The conditions required to maintain the Land promise to A-I-J were broken by the ancient Israelites/Jews.  ref Le.26:14, 38-43.  Ezk.33:27-29 God sent them into captivity and the Land became desolate.  Even though God did allow them to return later (538–400s BC), Jesus said their house would again become desolate, Mt.23:38.

Solomon had at one time sat on the throne of the kingdom of YHVH over Israel (1Ch.28:5).  Mt.21:43 but Jesus said the kingdom would be taken from those Jewish leaders in the Land, and given to another “nation” bearing fruit.  Ro.10:19 Israel would be made jealous by this seemingly foolish nation.  1Pe.1:1, 2:9 Peter wrote to believers who comprise that holy “nation”…the “Christians”, 1Pe.4:16!

Since the covenant of physical circumcision applied to the Land of Canaan, what about the Land today?  Now, even some Jews say that circumcision is unnecessary.  (cf. Paul’s teaching, Ac.21:21.)  Furthermore, after 3,500 years of intermarriage & proselytizing, today it’s difficult to ascertain who’s truly (biologically) of the A-I-J line!

When the Land allotments were originally assigned to the tribes of Israel, much of the West Bank area inheritance went to Ephráim, not to Judah or Benjamin (who, with Levites, became the Jews).  And in the NE, the area of the Golan Heights within Israel went to the tribe of Manasseh (and a fringe area to Naphtalí and perhaps Dan), not to Judah or Benjamin.  This is Bible history and geography from the book of Joshua (ref Jsh.15–19); it isn’t anti-Semitism.  see the topic “Israelites Identification“.

So it seems the explosive state of affairs in the Middle East & modern Israel is complicated by brothers possibly (unknowingly) expropriating for themselves some inheritances anciently belonging to other brothers!  (In the USA, the #1 cause of sibling estrangement is estate issues!)  Yet if the descendants of other Israelite tribes who intermarried with Jews over the centuries have returned to the Land in modern times, then they in Israel today perhaps do represent the A-I-J line.  Again, eventually the Land will be inhabited by a “holy nation” of Christians (with Jewish Christians)…a spiritually grafted-in Israel!

Ezk.36:26-27 is a prophecy of spiritual Israel with circumcised hearts able to obey God’s written moral precepts.  A circumcised or new or exchanged heart…all are interchangeable terms for a heart which now desires the things of God and is willing to obey the Lord (unlike most of ancient Israel & Judah).

The pain of physical circumcision (especially for Abraham at age 99!) was a type of the pain of self-denial involved in heart circumcision.  A circumcised heart/ears/lips will obey/listen for/speak the principles of the written word of God and inner promptings of the Holy Spirit.  (Ac.7:51 Stephen said those opposing Jewish leaders had uncircumcised hearts & ears.)

Christians put to death, remove, or cut out their own agendas and those things in our lives which aren’t God’s will for us.  Snip!  Females do too.  The mental pain involving the human will may be worse than physical pain.  God softens it by bringing us to surrender.  The Lord may cause us to (gradually) experience burnout or reduced interest in our selfish pursuits which aren’t of God’s choosing.  Sanctification/holiness/consecration is a process.  A tearing out, if you will, may involve submitting to some turmoil.

We’re bought with a price (1Co.6:20)…Jesus’ precious blood!  We’re God’s possession.  He owns us 24/7!  He changes/circumcises hearts.  God is good…so as we submit to God’s will in our lives, we can believe all things will work together for our eternal good (Ro.8:28)!