Hi everyone!
Excuse me for I am new to the faith, but I have a few questions and was hoping to clear some things up for my understanding.
I understand that the Gentile converts were to learn Torah gradually, and not have it forced on them at once. That said, was it expected of the Gentile converts to eventually become circumcised, after declaring their faith in the Messiah? Paul speaks about not becoming circumcised, but is he only dealing with the conversion rituals of the Pharisees, or never becoming circumcised?
Yeshua said that not one jot or tittle of the law shall disappear, so I want to make sure I get a consistent understanding of what Paul is saying; keeping in mind 2 Peter 3:15-16.
Not one jot or tittle is correct. However, unless you actually live in the Jewish community, the laws and statutes of Moses does not apply to you. That includes circumcision. Please note what James said to Paul:
Acts 21.21 and
they have been told about you, that you are teaching all the Jews who are among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children nor to walk according to the customs.
22 What, then, is to be done? They will certainly hear that you have come.
23 Therefore do this that we tell you. We have four men who are under a vow;
24 take them and purify yourself along with them, and pay their expenses so that they may shave their heads; and all will know that there is nothing to the things which they have been told about you, but that you yourself also walk orderly, keeping the Law.
25 But
concerning the Gentiles who have believed, we wrote, having decided that they should abstain from meat sacrificed to idols and from blood and from what is strangled and from fornication.
So what was James saying? Jews continue to follow Moses in the New Covenant and Gentiles do not have to.
Paul goes on to say this:
1 Corinthians 7:18 Was any man called when he was already circumcised? He is not to become uncircumcised. Has anyone been called in uncircumcision?
He is not to be circumcised.
That seems pretty clear to me.
The only case recorded where Paul circumcised someone was Timothy - who was Jewish by his mother. Titus (with them at the same time) he did NOT circumcise.
Galatians 2:3 But even Titus, who was with me,
was not forced to be circumcised, though he was a Greek.