Swedenborg teaches that all parts of the human body correspond to spiritual things. That includes the sex organs of both men and women, which correspond to the true love that can exist in a marriage when both the husband and wife are seeking to do the Lord’s will and to be joined to each other internally.
Swedenborg also teaches that heaven is filled with that marriage love, and that all other loves come from it, making it the most important of all human loves.
Since the foreskin covers the male sex organ, it represents evil loves that block that marriage love – the love of self and the love of things of the world. Cutting it off represents ridding ourselves of those loves and being purified.
This concept is actually relatively clear in the Bible, which frequently mentions “circumcision of the heart” and occasionally “circumcision of the lips” — clearly metaphors for purification, not physical acts.
Passaegs from Swedenborg
Arcana Coelestia (Elliott) n. 2039
2039. ‘Every male [among you] is to be circumcised’ means purity. This is clear from the representation and consequently the meaning of ‘circumcising’ in the internal sense. Circumcision or cutting off the foreskin meant nothing else than the removal and rejection of those elements which stand in the way of and defile heavenly love, namely evil desires, especially those of self-love, and falsities resulting from those desires. The reason why this is the meaning is that the genital organs of both sexes represent heavenly love. There are three kinds of love which constitute the heavenly things of the Lord’s kingdom – conjugial love, the love of infants, and social or mutual love. Conjugial love is the chief love of all because it has within it the end of serving the greatest use, namely the propagating of the human race, and therefore of the Lord’s kingdom for which it is the seminary. Next to conjugial love, and deriving from it, comes the love of infants, and after that social or mutual love. Whatever covers over, obstructs, and defiles those loves is meant by the foreskin, the cutting away of which, or circumcision, therefore became representative. Indeed to the extent evil desires and resulting falsities are removed, a person is purified and heavenly love can show itself. How contrary self-love is to heavenly love, and how filthy, has been stated and shown in 760, 1307, 1308, 1321, 1594, 2045, 2057. From these considerations it is plain that circumcision in the internal sense means purity.
[2] That circumcision is no more than the sign of a covenant or of conjunction becomes quite clear from the fact that circumcising the foreskin counts for absolutely nothing if unaccompanied by circumcision of the heart; and that purification from those filthy loves is what circumcision of the heart means is quite evident from the following places in the Word: In Moses,
Jehovah God will circumcise your heart, and the heart of your seed, so that you will love Jehovah your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live. Deut. 30:6.
From these words it is clear that ‘circumcising the heart’ means being purified from filthy loves in order that Jehovah God or the Lord may be loved with all the heart and all the soul.
[3] In Jeremiah,
Break up your fallow ground, and do not sow among thorns. Circumcise yourselves to Jehovah, and remove the foreskin of your heart, O men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem. Jer. 4:3, 4.
‘Circumcising oneself to Jehovah and removing the foreskin of the heart’ is nothing other than removing such things as stand in the way of heavenly love. From this it is also clear that circumcision of the heart is something more interior that is meant by circumcision of the foreskin. In Moses,
You shall circumcise the foreskin of your heart, and you shall be stiff-necked no longer. [Jehovah] executes judgement for the orphan and the widow, and loves the sojourner, giving him bread and clothing. Deut. 10:16, 18.
Here also it is plain that ‘circumcising the foreskin of the heart’ means being purified from the evils that accompany filthy loves and from resulting falsities. The heavenly things of love are described as charitable works, namely ‘executing judgement for the orphan and widow’, and ‘loving the sojourner to give him bread and clothing’.
[4] In Jeremiah,
Behold, the days are coming in which I will visit every one circumcised in the foreskin – Egypt, and Judah, and Edom, and the children of Ammon, and Moab, and all that have the corners [of their hair] cut and who dwell in the wilderness, for all these nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel is uncircumcised in heart. Jer. 9:25, 26.
This too shows that circumcision was a sign meaning purification. Although they are called ‘circumcised in the foreskin’, these nations – the Jews included along with the rest – are considered to be ‘uncircumcised nations’, and Israel to be ‘uncircumcised in heart’. In Moses,
If at that time their uncircumcised heart is humbled. Lev. 26:41.
Here the meaning is similar.
[5] That the foreskin and being uncircumcised means that which is unclean is clear in Isaiah,
Awake, awake, put on your strength, O Zion, put on your beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city, for there will no more come into you the uncircumcised and the unclean. Isa. 52:1.
‘Zion’ is used to mean the celestial Church and ‘Jerusalem’ the spiritual Church into which the uncircumcised, which means the unclean, will not enter.
[6] That circumcision is ‘a sign of the covenant’ or token of conjunction is quite clear from the fact that the same was represented by the requirement to circumcise the fruits of trees also, spoken of in Moses as follows,
When you come into the land and plant any kind of tree for food you shall circumcise its foreskin, its fruit. For three years it shall be to you uncircumcised; it shall not be eaten. And in the fourth all its fruit shall be holy. to the praises of Jehovah. Lev. 19:23, 24.
‘Fruit’ similarly represents and means charity, as becomes clear from many places in the Word. Their ‘foreskin’ accordingly means the uncleanness that obstructs and pollutes charity.
[7] Here is a marvel: When angels in heaven conceive the idea of purification from natural things that are filthy, something akin to circumcision is represented very speedily in the world of spirits, for in the world of spirits angelic ideas come over as representatives. In the Jewish Church there were some representative religious ceremonies which had those same origins and there were others which did not. The spirits with whom that swift circumcision was represented in the world of spirits were people who wished to be allowed into heaven, but before they were allowed in this representation took place. This explains why Joshua was commanded to circumcise the people after they had crossed the Jordan and were about to enter the land of Canaan. The people’s entry into the land of Canaan represented nothing else than the admission into heaven of those who have had faith.
[8] This is why circumcision was commanded a second time, described in Joshua as follows,
Jehovah said to Joshua, Make swords of flint for yourself; circumcise the children of Israel a second time. And Joshua made swords of flint for himself, and circumcised the children of Israel on the hill of foreskins. And Jehovah said to Joshua, This day I have rolled away the reproach of Egypt from you. And he called the name of that place Gilgal (rolling away). Josh. 5:2, 3, 9.
‘Swords of flint’ means the truths which they were to be provided with to enable them to correct and cut back filthy loves, for without cognitions of truth no purification is possible. That ‘stone’ or ‘flirt’ means truths has been shown already, in 643, 1298, and that ‘a sword’ has reference to truths by which evils may be corrected is clear from the Word.
Arcana Coelestia (Elliott) n. 2051
2051. That ‘he must be circumcised’* means that they, namely those inside the Church meant by him ‘born in the house’ and him ‘bought with silver’, must completely remove from themselves self-love and love of the world is clear from the representation of ‘circumcision’ as purification from self-love and love of the world, dealt with above in 2039. Here the requirement for them to be circumcised is repeated in the commend ‘he must be circumcised!’ which expresses the necessity for them to be purified completely from those loves. And because it means those who are inside the Church no reference is made here to sons who are foreigners, for the latter, as shown above in 2049, mean those outside the Church.
[2] From this repetition of what has been stated in the previous verse concerning those ‘born in the house’ and those ‘bought with silver’, anyone may see that there is a Divine arcanum that is not evident from the sense of the letter. The arcanum is that purification from those foul loves is absolutely vital inside the Church, for the reason also that people inside the Church are capable of rendering sacred things unclean, something that those outside the Church, that is, gentiles, cannot do. For this reason those inside the Church stand in greater danger of condemnation. What is more, those inside the Church are capable of formulating and adopting false assumptions that are contrary to truths of faith themselves, whereas those outside the Church cannot do so because they have no knowledge of those truths. Thus those inside the Church are capable of profaning sacred truths, but not those outside. For more on these matters, see Volume One, in 1059, 1327, 1328.
Arcana Coelestia (Elliott) n. 2112
2112. That ‘Abraham was circumcised, and his son Ishmael’ means that, when the Lord joined His Human Essence to the Divine Essence, He also joined to Himself and saved everyone else who becomes rational from truth is clear from the representation of ‘Abraham’ in this chapter as the Lord in that state and at that time of life, dealt with above in 1989, and from the representation of ‘Ishmael’ here as those who become rational from truth, dealt with above in 2078, 2087, 2088, and also from the meaning of ‘being circumcised’ as being purified, dealt with above in 2039, and, in reference to the Lord, as being glorified – and so as casting off the human and putting on the Divine. That being glorified means putting on the Divine, see 2033 above, and that He also joined to Himself at the same time those who become rational, that is, spiritual, from truth, see 2034, 2078, 2088, above.
Arcana Coelestia (Elliott) n. 4462
4462. ‘To give our sister to a man who has a foreskin’ means unless they could identify the truth and the good of the Church with representatives and disregard the spiritual entities meant by these. This is clear from the meaning of ‘the foreskin’ as an external representative – as the sign that they were members of the Church. It was usual therefore to speak of circumcision and the foreskin when they needed to distinguish between those who belonged to the Church and those who did not. For circumcision meant the departure from filthy loves, namely self-love and love of the world, and the acceptance of heavenly loves, which are love to the Lord and love towards the neighbour, and so an acceptance of the Church. This is why these words mean an acceptance of their semblance of religion and that therefore they identified the truth and the good of the Church with representatives, disregarding the internal things meant by these. For otherwise they would not be like them, as the words that follow show, ‘Only on this [condition] will we consent to you: If you will be as we are’. As regards ‘circumcision’ being the sign of purification from filthy loves, see 2039, 2632, and the expression ‘uncircumcised’ being used of those who were governed by those loves, 2049, 3412, 3413.
[2] Scarcely anyone at the present day knows what circumcision means specifically, and this therefore must be stated. The genital organs in both sexes mean things associated with the joining together of good and truth. They not only mean them but also in actual fact correspond to them. It has been shown at the ends of chapters that all the organs and members in the human being have a correspondence with spiritual things in heaven, including therefore the organs and members devoted to procreation. These correspond to the marriage of good and truth, from which marriage conjugial love also comes down, see 2618, 2727- 2729, 2803, 3132, 4434. Because the foreskin covered the genital organ it corresponded in the Most Ancient Church to the obscuration of good and truth, but in the Ancient Church to the defilement of them. With a person who belonged to the Most Ancient Church, because he was an internal man, good and truth were able to be obscured but not defiled, but with one who belonged to the Ancient Church, because he was in comparison with his predecessor an external man, good and truth were able to be defiled since it is external things, that is to say, external loves, that cause defilement. For this reason those who belonged to the Most Ancient Church had no knowledge of circumcision, only those who belonged to the Ancient Church had it.
[3] In addition circumcision spread from this Church to many nations. It was imposed on Abraham and his descendants not as something new but as the revival of a practice which had been abandoned, it becoming for his descendants the sign that they belonged to the Church. But that nation did not know, and did not wish to know, what it was a sign of, for they identified religion with representatives alone, which are externals. They therefore condemned the uncircumcised as a whole, when yet circumcision was to be merely a sign representative of purification from self-love and love of the world, from which those are purified who have been circumcised spiritually and are called circumcised at heart, as in Moses,
Jehovah God will circumcise your heart, and the heart of your seed, so that you will love Jehovah your God with all your heart and with all your soul. Deut. 30:6.
In the same author,
You shall circumcise the foreskin of your heart, and you shall be stiff-necked no longer. Deut. 10:16, 18.
And in Jeremiah,
Break up your fallow ground, and remove the foreskin of your heart. Jer. 4:3, 4.
[4] People however who are governed by self-love and love of the world are called ‘uncircumcised’, in spite of their having been circumcised, as in Jeremiah,
Behold, the days are coming in which I will visit every one circumcised in the foreskin – Egypt, and Judah, and Edom, and the children of Ammon, and Moab, and all that have the corners [of their hair] cut and who dwell in the wilderness, for all these nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel is uncircumcised in heart. Jer. 9:25, 26.
From this it is also evident that many other nations were circumcised, for it is said ‘I will visit every one circumcised in the foreskin’, and so, as stated above, that circumcision was not something new, nor was it confined to the descendants of Jacob as a distinguishing feature. The Philistines were not circumcised, and therefore ‘the uncircumcised’ is generally used to mean the Philistines, 1 Sam. 14:6; 17:26, 36; 31:4; 2 Sam. 1:20; and elsewhere.
Arcana Coelestia (Elliott) n. 7049
7049. ‘Then she said, A bridegroom of blood in regard to circumcisions’ means that although the internal was full of violence and hostility towards truth and goodness, circumcision was nevertheless accepted as a sign representative of purification from filthy kinds of love. This is clear from the meaning of ‘a bridegroom of blood’ as full of every kind of violence and hostility towards truth and goodness, dealt with above in 7047; and from the meaning of ‘circumcision’ as a sign representative of purification from filthy kinds of love, dealt with in 2039, 2632, 3412, 3417, 4462, 4486, 4493. Zipporah says these words because now that nation was allowed to represent the Church, meant by the statement that He ceased from killing him, 7048. The reason why circumcision became a sign representative of purification is that cutting off the foreskin meant the removal of filthy kinds of love, as a result of which the internal is laid bare, 7045. When therefore no attention at all is paid to what is internal, as was the situation with that nation whose attention was focused on outward forms without their inner meaning, one is left with circumcision or cutting off the foreskin as a sign, that is to say, a sign that means the removal of filthy kinds of love, and so means purification. It was for this reason that that practice could serve as a representative sign.
True Christian Religion (Rose) n. 674
674
Baptism Was Instituted as a Replacement for Circumcision Because Circumcision of the Foreskin Symbolized Circumcision of the Heart; the Intent Was to Create an Internal Church to Replace the External Church, Which as a Whole and in Every Detail Was an Allegory of That Internal Church
It is well known throughout Christianity that we have an inner self and an outer self, that our outer self is the same as our earthly self, and that our inner self is the same as our spiritual self, because it contains our spirit. It is also known that because the church consists of human beings, there is such a thing as a church that is internal in nature and such a thing as a church that is external in nature.
If we conduct research on the succession of churches over time from ancient times to our own, we see that the former churches were external in nature. Their worship consisted of external actions that symbolized the internal practices taught by the Christian church, whose foundation the Lord laid when he was in the world, and which he is now building for the first time.
Circumcision was the main practice that differentiated the Israelite church from the other churches in the Middle East (and differentiated it later on from the Christian church as well).
Since, as mentioned before [670:2], all the rituals of the Israelite church (which were external in nature) prefigured the practices of the Christian church (which are internal in nature), the primary sign that someone belonged to that church was inwardly similar to the primary sign that someone is Christian. Circumcision represented rejecting the cravings of the flesh, and therefore being purified from evils. Baptism means the same thing.
Clearly then, there are two reasons why baptism was commanded as a replacement for circumcision: (1) to differentiate the Christian church from the Jewish church; and (2) to make it more easily recognizable that the Christian church is internal in nature, which is something the functions of baptism (soon to be covered here [677-687]) make clear.