Why Does Jeremiah Refer to Circumcising the Heart?

The Know

In Jeremiah 4:4, Jeremiah states, “Circumcise yourselves to the Lord, and take away the foreskins of your heart, ye men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem: lest my fury come forth like fire, and burn that none can quench it, because of the evil of your doings.” Using the term circumcision, or removing a foreskin, from the heart can be confusing. However, when one understands the history and purpose of circumcising male babies among the covenant people, this idiom becomes clearer.

In Genesis 17 God makes a covenant with Abram and introduces something new in relation to it: having male babies receive the token of circumcision (there is no scriptural evidence that circumcision was part of covenant making from Adam to Noah). Genesis 17:10-12 states, “This is my covenant which you must keep, between me and you and your descendants after you: Every male child among you must be circumcised. And you must circumcise the flesh of your foreskin, and it will be a token of the covenant between me and you. And he that is eight days old will be circumcised.”

Circumcision was a known practice in certain parts of the ancient Near East. However, some assumed that males were circumcised later in life as part of puberty rites or priestly purification and that infant circumcision was an unusual Jewish practice that started after the exile.1 However, the circumcision of infants also appears in ancient Near Eastern sources dating to the time of Abraham.

Outside Israel, some of the best evidence for circumcision in ancient times comes from Egypt, where evidence is preserved in both art and literature. There are some artistic depictions from ancient Egypt of men and boys being circumcised at the time of the Old Kingdom, as early as the 24^th century B.C.2 However, by the time of the Middle Kingdom (19^th century B.C.), coinciding with Abraham’s day, it appears that infants were circumcised as well. An inscription from tomb number 3 at Beni Hasan states “he ruled his city when a babe at the time of its circumcision.”3 The Egyptian term used, sedjet, clearly refers to an infant and not to an older child.4 The way it is used in this text suggests that infant circumcision was commonplace enough that it could be used as a chronological marker the author assumed his readers would understand.

Other examples of infant circumcision also exist from around this time. Scenes from the walls of temples at Deir el-Bahri, Luxor, and Karnak all connect circumcision with birth rituals, clearly implying that the act took place shortly after birth.5 A tradition in Egypt also occurring in Israel is not implausible, especially when connected to Jeremiah and Abraham, who the Bible specifically states spent time in Egypt.6  

If circumcision was used to mark transitions to adulthood (puberty) or part of purity rites for initiation into priesthood, then why did the Egyptians start circumcising infants? A boy born to a priestly family was essentially guaranteed to serve in the temple upon reaching adulthood because priesthood was an inherited office. Using a ritual to indicate the status of inherited purity as part of a priestly lineage in infancy permanently prepared him for his inevitable hereditary duties.7 In other words, the infant wasn't receiving the rite because he was entering a temple that day; he was receiving it because he was part of a people who belonged in the temple.

When such a practice was applied to the Abrahamic covenant in Genesis 17:6–13, it functioned similarly, marking the infant as already pure and an heir of a covenant lineage that would bear a royal priesthood (“kings shall come out of thee”). Interestingly, Joseph Smith’s Translation of Genesis 17 clarifies that God instituted circumcision in Abraham's day as a corrective sign to counter unauthorized rituals they were practicing to make children pure, such as washing and sprinkling blood on them similar to the priestly rites in Exodus 29. In response to this apostasy, God introduced circumcision as a reminder to Abraham's family that their children were considered pure and heirs of the covenant and priesthood from birth. They would only need to become purified from sin through “the burial, or baptism” when they became accountable at eight years old and needed to repent (JST Genesis 17:4–6, 10–11). This token of inherent purity and lineal right to priesthood explains John the Baptist’s angelic “ordination” to priesthood when eight days old—the age he would have been circumcised (see Doctrine & Covenants 84:28). A female equivalent of circumcision would not be required due to the nature of inheritance in a patriarchal order.

Notwithstanding modern understanding of physiology, the ancients appear to have understood the excess skin surrounding the glans of male anatomy as covering or blocking full function or sensitivity. Thus, it became a metaphor for being covered from or insensitive to spiritual things generally (see, for example, Jeremiah 6:10, Exodus 6:12, 30).

The Why

As Jeremiah later points out, the Israelites in his day may have had this physical mark of purity and of a priestly class, but they now lacked the spiritual receptivity to match it. Jeremiah’s command to circumcise the heart can be understood on multiple levels. First, circumcising the heart suggests the general idea of removing any barrier between us and God, opening the heart to the influence of the divine. Second, as a token of the covenant, circumcising one’s heart suggests that all people should allow God’s covenant into their hearts and internalize the love of God in their lives and His law that is given as part of that covenant. Lastly, seeing circumcision as relating to infants suggests another significance for the concept of circumcising the heart. This may be a call for people to humble themselves and return to the purity they had when they were born. Thus, circumcising the heart is a call for all people to open their hearts to God, embrace God’s covenant, and to humble and purify themselves like a little child.