Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadMatthew Poole Commentary - Genesis 17:11 - 17:11
(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)
This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
The flesh of your foreskin, i.e. by a usual hypallage, the foreskin of your flesh; and the word flesh is here put for the genital part, as it is Lev_15:2,19 Eze 16:26 23:20, and elsewhere. This part God singled out for this ordinance, because it is and was a great instrument both in the commission of actual sins, and in the propagation of original sin; and therefore it was very proper to apply to it the seal of God’s gracious covenant for the remission of sins past, and the extirpation of sin for the future.
It shall be a token of the covenant, i.e. a sign, evidence, and assurance, both of the blessing promised by that God who appointed this ordinance, and of man’s obligation to the duties required, which is signified by his acceptance of and submission to this ordinance. And here we have the nature and definition of a sacrament, viz. that it is a figure or token of God’s covenant.