Genesis 17:11 - Clarke's commentary and critical notes on the Bible

And ye shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin; and it shall be a token of the covenant betwixt me and you. And it shall be a token - לאות leoth, for a sign of spiritual things; for the circumcision made in the flesh was designed to signify the purification of the heart from all unrighteousness, as God particularly showed in the law itself. See Deuteronomy 10:16; see also Romans 2:25-29;Colossians 2:11. And it was a seal of that righteousness or justification that comes by faith, Romans 4:11. That some of the Jews had a just notion of its spiritual intention, is plain from many passages in the Chaldee paraphrases and in the Jewish writers. I borrow one passage from the book Zohar, quoted by Ainsworth: "At what time a man is sealed with this holy seal, (of circumcision), thenceforth he seeth the holy blessed God properly, and the holy soul is united to him. If he be not worthy, and keepeth not this sign, what is written? By the breath of God they perish, (Job 4:9), because this seal of the holy blessed God was not kept. But if he be worthy, and keep it, the Holy Ghost is not separated from him."