2039. That every male be circumcised symbolizes purity. This can be seen from the representation and so the symbolism of circumcision on an inner level. Circumcision, or cutting off the foreskin, symbolized nothing else than removing and banishing the things that block and defile heavenly love. These impediments and pollutants are the evils we crave (especially those that our love for ourselves craves) and the distortions they give rise to. The reason for this symbolism is that the genitals of both sexes represent heavenly love.

There are three categories of love that make up the heavenly aspects of the Lord's kingdom: marriage love, love for children, and fellowship (mutual love). Marriage love is the highest love of all, because it includes the most useful possible goal: propagation of the human race and so of the Lord's kingdom, for which it provides the breeding ground. Love for children is next, because it develops out of marriage love. Then comes fellowship, or mutual love. Anything that cloaks, hampers, or contaminates these three types of love is symbolized by the foreskin, and that is why its removal, or circumcision, came to have a representative meaning. The more the evils we crave are removed, along with the distortions they lead to, the more pure we grow and the more manifest heavenly love becomes in us.

Sections 760, 1307, 1308, 1321, 1594, 2045, 2057 describe and illustrate how utterly opposed to heavenly love and how unclean self-love is.

These considerations make it quite clear that circumcision on an inner level symbolizes purity.

[2] The status of circumcision as a mere sign of the pact (or of union) is clear from the fact that circumcision of the foreskin is completely worthless without circumcision of the heart. Circumcision of the heart–purification from those unclean passions–is what it symbolizes. The following passages in the Word make this very clear. In Moses:

Jehovah God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your seed, [to cause you] to love Jehovah your God with all your heart and with all your soul, so that you will live. (Deuteronomy 30:6)

These words prove that circumcising the heart means being purified of vile passions so that we can love Jehovah God, or the Lord, with all our heart and with all our soul.

[3] In Jeremiah:

Till untilled ground for yourselves, and do not sow among thorns. Circumcise yourselves to Jehovah and remove the foreskin of your heart, man of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem! (Jeremiah 4:3, 4)

Again, circumcising themselves to Jehovah and removing the foreskins of their heart actually means removing the kinds of things that block heavenly love. This passage too proves that circumcising the heart is what circumcising the foreskin means inwardly. In Moses:

You shall circumcise the foreskin of your heart, and your neck you shall no longer harden. [Jehovah] is passing judgment in favor of the orphan and widow and loves the immigrant, to give the immigrant bread and clothing. (Deuteronomy 10:16, 18)

Here too it is quite plain that circumcising the foreskin of the heart is being purified from the evil of unclean passions and from the false thinking they lead to. Heavenly deeds of love are depicted as acts of charity–passing judgment in favor of the orphan and widow, and loving immigrants, to give them bread and clothing.

[4] In Jeremiah:

Watch! The days are coming when I will inflict punishment on everyone circumcised in the foreskin"on Egypt and on Judah and on Edom and on the children of Ammon and on Moab and on all who have trimmed the corners [of their hair and beard] and live in the wilderness, because all the nations are foreskinned, and the whole house of Israel is foreskinned at heart. (Jeremiah 9:25, 26)

This passage as well makes it plain that circumcision is a symbol of purification. The people are said to have their foreskins circumcised but are still called "foreskinned nations," Judah among them, and Israel is described as being foreskinned at heart. In Moses:

. . . or then their foreskinned heart will be brought low. (Leviticus 26:41)

This is similar.

[5] A foreskin and being foreskinned symbolizes something unclean, as can be seen in Isaiah:

Wake up! Wake up! Put on your strength, Zion! Put on your finest clothes, Jerusalem, you holy city, because the foreskinned and unclean will not come into you any longer. (Isaiah 52:1)

Zion means a heavenly religion, and Jerusalem, a spiritual one, which the foreskinned–that is, anything unclean–will not enter.

[6] A very clear indication that circumcision is simply a sign of the pact, or a mark of union, is the fact that trees also had to be "circumcised" of their fruit, which had a similar representation. This is what Moses says about it:

When you come into the land and plant any food tree, you shall foreskin its foreskin, its fruit. For three years it shall be foreskinned to you–it shall not be eaten–and in the fourth year all its fruit shall be consecrated to the praises of Jehovah. (Leviticus 19:23, 24)

Fruit likewise represents and symbolizes charity, as many passages in the Word can confirm, so its foreskin symbolizes uncleanness that hinders and contaminates charity.

[7] Amazing to say, when angels in heaven think about purification from earthly uncleanness, then almost immediately something like circumcision is represented in the world of spirits. Angelic thoughts, you see, turn into representations in the world of spirits.

Some of the representative practices in the Jewish religion originated in the world of spirits, but others did not.

There were some in the world of spirits who saw this instant representation of circumcision; they had been trying to gain admittance to heaven. This representation occurred and then they were let in. This explains why Joshua was commanded to circumcise the people as they were about to cross the Jordan and enter the land of Canaan. Their entry into that land represented exactly that–the admittance of the faithful into heaven,

[8] which is why a second circumcision was commanded, as recorded in Joshua:

Jehovah said to Joshua, "Make yourself swords of flint; circumcise the children of Israel a second time." And Joshua made himself swords of flint and circumcised the children of Israel at the Hill of Foreskins. And Jehovah said to Joshua, "Today I have rolled the taunt of Egypt away from you." And he called the name of the place Gilgal [a rolling]. (Joshua 5:2, 3, 9)

Swords of flint symbolize the truth they needed to absorb in order to discipline and drive away foul passions. Without a knowledge of truth, there can never be any purification. Stone, or flint, symbolizes truth, as shown before (§§643, 1298). A sword relates to true ideas that punish evil, as the Word reveals.