Colossians 2:11

The reference to circumcision seems to come in abruptly. But probably it stands in close connexion with what has gone before. For the return to the principalities and powers in Colossians 2:15 shows that Paul is not passing here to a new section of his subject. Judaism, of which circumcision was the most characteristic feature, was regarded as under angelic powers, and the removal of them meant its abolition. It seems probable that the false teachers set a high value on circumcision, and urged it on the Colossians, not as indispensable to salvation, in which case Paul would have definitely attacked them on this point, but as conferring a higher sanctity. There seems to be no suggestion that it was regarded as a charm against evil spirits. The Apostle does not merely leave them with the statement that they have been made full in Christ, which rendered circumcision unnecessary, but adds that they have already received circumcision, not material but spiritual, not the removal of a fragment of the body, but the complete putting off of the body of flesh. ἐν ᾧ καὶ περιετμήθητε. A definite historical fact is referred to, as is shown by the aorist. This was their conversion, the inward circumcision of the heart, by which they entered on the blessings of the New Covenant. The outward sign of this is baptism, with which Paul connects it in the next verse. But it cannot be identified with it, for it is not made with hands. The circumcision of the heart is a prophetic idea (Deuteronomy 10:16; Deuteronomy 30:6; Jeremiah 4:4; Jeremiah 9:25; Ezekiel 44:7; Ezekiel 44:9). In Paul it occurs Romans 2:28-29; Philippians 3:3. περιτομῇ ἀχειροποιήτῳ : “with 2 circumcision not wrought by hands,” i.e., spiritual, ethical (cf. Ephesians 2:11, οἱ λεγόμενοι ἀκροβυστία ὑπὸ τῆς λεγομένης περιτομῆς ἐν σαρκὶ χειροποιήτου). ἐν τῇ ἀπεκδύσει τοῦ σώματος τῆς σαρκός : “in the stripping from you of the body of the flesh”. The expression σῶμα τ. σαρκὸς is unusual. It means the body which consists of flesh, and of flesh as the seat of sin. By the removal of the home in which sin dwelt sin itself was removed. It is one of those cases in which the sense of σῶμα approximates to that of σάρξ. This body of flesh is removed from the Christian at his conversion. ἐν τῇ περιτομῇ τοῦ Χριστοῦ. This cannot be the circumcision endured by Christ in His infancy, for that was wrought by hands, and such a reference would be most unfortunate for the polemic against ceremonies and altogether un-Pauline. Usually it is explained as the circumcision of our hearts which comes from Christ. But this has no parallel in the N.T.; further, it practically repeats ἐν ᾧ κ. περιετ.; and, coming between the removal of the body of the flesh and the burial with Christ, breaks the connexion. Accordingly Schneckenburger (followed by Kl [13], Sod., Haupt) suggested that it was really an expression for the death of Christ. (His view that ἀπεκ. τ. σ. τ. σ. was to be taken similarly has met with no acceptance.) In favour of this it may be said that in the immediate context Paul goes on to speak of burial and resurrection with Christ, and a reference to the death would naturally precede. And circumcision is a happy metaphor for Christ's death to sin (Romans 6:10). Meyer's objection that it is inappropriate since Christ endured actual circumcision is not serious, for, if sound, it should have excluded the choice of these ambiguous words altogether, which naturally suggest a circumcision suffered by Christ. But what creates a grave difficulty is that the thought does not seem to run on connectedly. There is a transition from the death of Christ on the cross to the burial of Christians with Him in their own personal experience. Perhaps this interpretation involves taking περιετμήθητε of the death of Christians with Christ on the cross (2 Corinthians 5:14), for it doubles the difficulty if Paul passes from the personal experience of the Christian to the cross, and from the cross back to personal experience. This suggests the possibility that περ. Χ. might be interpreted on the analogy of θλίψεων τ. Χριστοῦ (Colossians 1:24) as the circumcision of Christ in the believer. This would give a good connexion, and one that would suit the apparent identification of the circumcision of Christ with the putting off of the body of the flesh. The phrase, however, is so strange, and the idea that Christ dies with us so questionable (we die with Him), that it seems unsafe to adopt it. It is, therefore, best to mitigate the difficulty by the view that in these words Paul interpolates, in a concise and obscure expression, a reference to the great fact which underlay the spiritual experiences of which he is speaking. This circumcision, he would say, that is the removal of the flesh, was first experienced by Christ on the cross, and what happened to you ideally then is realised though union with Him now.

[13] Klöpper.