Meredith Kline on Circumcision and Sinai, Pt. 1 of 3

June 4, 2024 at 10:00 am (Circumcision, Covenant, Mosaic Law)

posted by R. Fowler White

What relevance, if any, does God’s administration of the circumcision covenant have for our understanding of the Sinai covenant? My answer: a great deal of relevance. To lay out how I arrived at this answer, I propose in this three-part study to walk through Meredith G. Kline’s discussions of these two covenants and their relationship to the Abrahamic covenant, focusing especially on how the principles of works and grace were compatibly applied in God’s administration of them.

A starting point. Summarizing the compatibility of divine grace and human obligation in biblical-theological perspective, Kline writes the following regarding God’s covenantal dealings with Abraham:

The promised kingdom blessings would unfailingly be realized to the full extent of the divine commitment. That was guaranteed by the sovereignty of the divine power working according to God’s sovereign purpose of grace. At the same time a conditionality of human responsibility necessarily entered into the stipulated terms of the covenant of promise. …

… It was only as Abraham responded in obedience to the command of God’s call that he could enter into the hope offered in the promises. This is not to say that the promised heavenly inheritance was to be secured by the works principle, that is, on the ground of obedience. It does mean that the divine promises of the covenant never existed apart from human obligations. (Kline, Kingdom Prologue [hereafter KP], 309)

Taking the preceding comments as a starting point for what follows, we turn next to Kline’s assessment of the relationship between “the covenant of circumcision” (Gen 17:10, 13; Acts 7:8) and the Abrahamic covenant.

The circumcision covenant and the Abrahamic covenant. Regarding circumcision, Kline argues that, though God designates it as a covenant (Heb. berith),

This [identification] should not mislead us into regarding circumcision as a separate covenant in itself alongside the Abrahamic Covenant. For the full-orbed designation of circumcision found in v. 11 is actually ’oth berith, ‘sign of the covenant.’ Clearly then circumcision is to be subsumed as a subordinate part under the previously established Abrahamic Covenant, in the course of whose administration it was promulgated. (KP, 313)

Circumcision was, therefore, not a covenant separate from the Abrahamic covenant of promise. Rather, it was one stipulation in the “general, comprehensive formulation of the law of the covenant of promise” in Gen 17:1b, Walk before Me and be blameless (KP, 310). With that in mind, Kline goes on to clarify how stipulations like circumcision functioned in the Abrahamic covenant:

A certain kind of conditionality attached to the covenant of promise, one consistent with the principle and surety of divine grace. There could not but be demands placed on God’s human partner in kingdom-covenant, creational or redemptive. … Such divine demand for godliness is therefore found in covenants of works and grace alike. The precise kind of conditionality carried by the imposed obligations differs, however, in these two types of covenant. (KP, 318)

To distinguish the two varieties of conditionality, Kline poses “the key question”: what is the function of the human party’s response of obedience in a given covenant, whether of works or of grace (KP, 318)? If the obedience is intended to show (i.e., authenticate) one’s faith in God as one’s surety, the conditionality is that of a covenant of grace. If the obedience is meant to secure benefits from God for oneself and others, the conditionality is that of a covenant of works (cf. Kline, God, Heaven and Har Magedon [hereafter GHHM], 102-03). So, what kind of conditionality was attached to the obligation of circumcision? Kline answers that obedience to the circumcision command showed one’s faith in God as one’s surety, such that the conditionality was that of a covenant of grace, specifically, the Abrahamic covenant of grace.

There is, however, more to unpack here. Kline argues that recognizing circumcision as a confirmatory sign of a covenant of grace involves also recognizing it as a confirmatory sign of judgment. He explains:

[Circumcision] conveyed the threat of being cut off from God and life for the one who, disclaiming the grace of the covenant and thus breaking it, would undergo in himself the judgment due to Adam’s fallen race. But circumcision also presented the promise of the Cross, inviting the circumcised to identify by faith with Christ, to undergo the judgment of God in him, and so find in his circumcision-judgment the way to the Father, to justification and life. (KP, 315-16)

It was, therefore, the proper purpose of circumcision to signify the promise of undergoing excision through faith in God as one’s surety, and it was that proper purpose that Paul cites in Rom 4:11. Kline goes on to observe, however, that God’s administration of the circumcision covenant could not be reduced to its proper purpose. In Rom 2:25-29 Paul insists that if the circumcised refused to die to sin and to live before God, their circumcision became uncircumcision. Exposed as transgressors, the circumcised faced a choice: either undergo excision through faith in God (i.e., “circumcise your heart,” Deut 10:16), or else undergo excision in their own persons (i.e., be cut off, removed; Jer 4:4; 9:25). In this way, Kline maintains that circumcision signified divine condemnation in its twofold potential: its proper purpose was to signify the promise of vicarious condemnation-excision in God as one’s surety, and it also signified the threat of one’s own condemnation-excision. Here we note that, as Kline sees it, God administered the circumcision covenant according to two contrasting but compatible principles. When it came to the circumcised who had faith and embraced the promise signified in circumcision (as Abraham did), God treated them, in keeping with its proper purpose, according to the principle of His grace. When it came, however, to the circumcised who lacked faith and rejected the promise signified in circumcision, God treated them according to the principle of works, that is, in keeping with His justice.

In part 2 of this three-part series, we study the connections between circumcision and Sinai.