God directed Abram in Genesis 17: 11 to perform circumcision on all males as "a sign of the covenant between me and you," God and Israel. Christ's new message was that this physicality, this outward display, had to change. His religion could not be expressed with a flag or a scar or a tattoo. There are no milestones here. Christ is advocating a life of the spirit, in distinction and superior to the life of the world.
Regarding the spiritual satisfaction of circumcision, Paul says in today's reading that God forbids such "glory in ....flesh." The spiritual was the spiritual and allowed no substitutions. This was a particularly difficult problem at the time for Christians and extended wider than circumcision, it included the preeminence of Israel, their Old Testament and the change Christ was preaching. Christ was truly bringing a new testament of different values. These values separated the spiritual from the physical, the world from the spirit. Paul says later that Christ is "whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world."
The cross is a nexus where our nature comes together and a crucible where our nature is distilled and separated into its parts.
Regarding the spiritual satisfaction of circumcision, Paul says in today's reading that God forbids such "glory in ....flesh." The spiritual was the spiritual and allowed no substitutions. This was a particularly difficult problem at the time for Christians and extended wider than circumcision, it included the preeminence of Israel, their Old Testament and the change Christ was preaching. Christ was truly bringing a new testament of different values. These values separated the spiritual from the physical, the world from the spirit. Paul says later that Christ is "whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world."
The cross is a nexus where our nature comes together and a crucible where our nature is distilled and separated into its parts.
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