Circumcision (Lat., 'a cutting round'), the cutting off the foreskin, a rite widely diffused among ancient and modern nations. Three thousand years before Christ it was familiar to the Egyptians, who circumcised boys between the sixth and fourteenth year, though it is not certain whether it was extended to all males, or confined to the priestly caste and others who were connected in some special way with the religious mysteries. The ceremony is clearly portrayed on a temple at Karnak, in a drawing copied by Ebers, who adds that most of the male mummies which have been examined are found to have been circumcised. Sayce (Hibbert Lectures, p. 83) affirms on pre-earious grounds that circumcision was known to the Babylonians. In any case it was not generally practised by them. It was known to the Colchians, to some at least of the Phoenicians (compare Ezek. xxviii. 10 with Herodot. ii. 104), and apparently also to the Edomites, Ammonites, and Moabites (see Jerem. ix. 25, 26). Further, it appears among Kaffirs, among many negro tribes, among Mexicans, Indians of South America, and among the islanders of the Pacific Ocean. Its original significance is uncertain, and possibly it may have arisen from different motives in different places. Sanitary reasons, considering the primitive nature of the nations in which it is found, are out of the question, and of other theories which have been advanced two only are plausible. It may have served like the tattoo to mark and stamp the circumcised person as a member of the tribe, and qualified to take part in its sacred rites, or, which is much more likely, it may have had a sacrificial character, the object being to propitiate the god or spirit by blood, and induce him to spare the life. The former theory is illustrated and defended by Stade (Gesch. des Volkes Israel, i. p. 423), the latter by Réville (Relig. des Peuples non-civilisés, ii. p. 253). Stade's view finds some support in Ezek. xxviii. 10, xxxi. 18, when he who dies uncircumcised is excluded from communion with the dead who have received this token of initiation. But, in fact, as Réville points out, primitive nations constantly substitute some partial mutilation for the sacrifice of the whole person. See the instructive story, Exod. iv. 24-26. We may add that in some parts of Africa an analogous operation is inflicted upon young females.
The Scripture account of the origin of circumcision amongst the Israelites is given in Gen. xvii. 7-14; but it is plain from what has just been said that circumcision could not have been in itself a sign of distinction between the Israelites and the neighbouring nations; and hence in the books of Judges and Samuel it is the Philistines, and the Philistines only, who are taunted with being uncircumcised; while in Joshua, v. 9, it is implied that the uncircumcised state of the Israelites who had grown up in the desert was 'a reproach' to them in the eyes of the Egyptians. But after the exile circumcision assumed a new prominence, because the nations under whose sway Israel then lived—the Babylonians and Persians—practised no such rite. A deep religious meaning was given to it. It became the sign of the covenant between God and his chosen people, and their devotion to it grew in proportion to the contempt which it excited in their Greek and Roman oppressors.
According to the Levitical law every Jewish male must be circumcised on the eighth day under penalty of being cut off from the congregation of Israel. The same law applied to foreign slaves bought by a Jew or born in his house. Strangers also must circumcise their males if they wished to partake of the Passover (Exod. xii. 48). The rite was performed by the father of the house or by some other Israelite, in case of necessity even by women (1 Macc. i. 60). Modern Jews employ a mohel or official who has the requisite surgical skill. The child is brought to the door of the room and handed to the mohel, who after prayer circumcises the child, and having drunk a glass of wine, gives it its name (Gen. xxi. 3, 4; Luke, i. 59, ii. 21), and placing his hand on its head blesses it. The Jewish ritual contains special prayers for the feast which follows. Circumcision was excluded from the Christian community after a memorable struggle, in which St Paul was the great champion of spiritual religion. Many of the Jewish converts wished to impose circumcision on the Gentile Christians, not only as a condition of equality, but as an essential to salvation. The result of the first struggle after a conference at Jerusalem was a mutual compromise: circumcision was not to be imposed on the Gentiles, who in return were asked to abstain from meats offered to idols, from blood, from things strangled, and from fornication. Much later, however, circumcision was urged on converts as a title of preference, and it was long before Jewish Christians could be brought to recognise the real supremacy of the gospel, itself a New Covenant in the place of the Old. St Paul speaks of his party (Phil. iii. 3) as the 'true circumcision,' and by a bold metaphor applies the word concision (katomē), which in the Septuagint was applied only to mutilations and incisions forbidden by the Mosaic law, to the vaunted circumcision of the Judaising Christians. The contrast of the material and spiritual circumcision occurs elsewhere in St Paul (Rom. ii. 25-29; Col. ii. 11). The use made in the Old Testament of the image of circumcision, as a metaphor for purity, had prepared the way for the apostle's application—compare the circumcision of the heart (Lev. xxvi. 41), of the ear (Jer. vi. 10), of the lips (Ex. vi. 12, 30). At the present time the Abyssinian Church alone among Christian bodies recognises it as a religious rite. It existed among the Arabs before the time of the Prophet; and though never mentioned in the Koran, circumcision is practised with much pomp and great rejoicings in all Mohammedan populations. The Arabs in the towns of Egypt have their boys circumcised at the age of five or six; among the peasants the age varies from twelve to fourteen. A vivid account of the ceremonies is given in Lane's Modern Egyptians. See a paper by Paul Lafargue in the Bulletin de la Société d'Anthropologie de Paris (tome x., 3e série, 1887).