If God made us, and God is perfect, why does the Judeo-Christian God (YHVH) not see us as perfect uncircumcised, the way he made us?
Or am I wading in theological false assumptions here?
Well, your assumptions are suspect. God made us, and God is perfect, but from this it does not follow that God made US perfect. And, in fact, He did not.
Why circumcision in particular? Isn’t this the larger question: if God made us to be perfect (rephrasing the proposition to avoid the logical fallacy pointed out by Bricker), why do we have any flaws, such as an appendix, a heart that’s liable to seize up, or a brain that’s vulnerable to strokes? What’s so special about the foreskin?
But this doesn’t avoid the fallacy. Once again, GOD is perfect, not us.
But I don’t think the circumcision thing was about perfecting ourselves, was it? I thought YHVH told Abraham to circumcise his sons and his sons sons in order to mark them as belonging to YHVH - the Chosen People of the Old Testament God.
It’s a primitive branding iron, if you will, marking His flock.
FWIW, I dont think he sees us as imperfect with a foreskin, but IIRC [and a ;j will probably be along shortly] removing the foreskin shows the physical acceptance of the covenant with god made by the jews at gods request. I suppose he could have asked them to lop off an earlobe, but I think that you have to have a pure or unsullied body to be one of the priesthood. Of course, IIRC they dont have a priesthood currently, there being no temple in Jerusalem, that being contingent upon the appearance of the Messiah…and rabbis are more or less ‘lay clergy’ equivalents, teachers and exemplars of piety.
Oops, strictly speaking, I guess it does avoid the fallacy. Instead, it starts with an unwarranted assumption.
Speak for yourself 
Well, I suppose if one is God, one can do whatever One wants, but why would a perfect God make a creation that is less than perfect?
Circumcision as a covenant, or mark of a covenant (good book title! : The Mark of the Covenant), clears it up about circumcision, though.
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Perhaps that God feels that having us perform certain spiritual practices keeps us more mindful of our relationship with him.
SnakeS :“Well, I suppose if one is God, one can do whatever One wants, but why would a perfect God make a creation that is less than perfect?”
Cranefly / daddy-longlegs anyone?? I think he had his mind on something else that afternoon !!
Sin
Well, you are making some false assumptions here.
Firstly, Christianity has no requirement that it’s members be circumcised. Judaism has no requirement that all of humanity be circumcised. Islam (I"m fairly certain – if I’m wrong please let me know) doesn’t care if non-Muslims are circumcised or not. So, (at least from the Christian perspective) there is nothing “imperfect” about being uncircumcised.
As for the Jewish (and, I presume the Muslim perpective), we are circumcised simply because God commanded us to. It’s that simple. Jews believe that God (for whatever reason He has) chose us to keep his commandments. These include circumcision, kashrus, the holidays (and their associated rituals) and the other 600+ commandments that he gave us.
You could ask a similar question: If God didn’t want us to eat pig, why did he make pork taste so good?* The simple answer is that God didn’t command humanity to avoid eating pigs, simply the Jews. The same idea applies to circumcision.
Zev Steinhardt
*Or so I’m assuming. I’ve never (to my recollection) had pork.
<raises hand and jumps up and down> I will happily take your lifetime allotment of the worlds pork away so you dont have to risk getting it by accident=) [i read somewhere that there were so many pigs in the world that there was something like 10 or 11 pigs per person averaged over 20 years … <looks around for my 11 pigs, have I got recipes=)>]
Pork is an interesting taste, definitely nothing like beef or chicken when unpreserved [like bacon or hams, or certain dried sausages] and really cant be describet to people.
OK. False assumption #1 falls on the wayside. It’s OK to be uncircumcised; we can sill get into heaven, be saved, be as perfect as the father intended, etc. Whew! What a load off.
Welll. Works for me. If God told me to jump off a bridge, (and I was sure it was God) - guess what?! I would also cut off my foreskin (my parent’s beat me to it) or anything else I was sure He commanded. I dig God.
Oh, it tastes good, especially the way the pagan Polynesians prepare it. Makes me glad I’m not Orthodox Jewish. ;j
Err…what about people being made in God’s image, though? It stands to reason that if he is perfect in all ways, and his form is one of them, he would consider a creature fashioned after himself to also be a perfect image…
Elfkin477 brings up a good point. God = perfect, his image = not perfect?
Bricker, I think we need your knowledgable guidance here on God NOT making us perfect even though we were made in His perfect image.
In other words: Cite?
No, this isn’t even a theological question, really. Think about it like an artist. If you’re looking in a mirror to use your image to make a statue, is the statue you? Is it as perfect as you? Do you want it to be?
We’re made to resemble God, to be *like * Him, but not to be Him. If you’re a parent, chances are good that your son looks something like you. Heck, he was made out of little bits of your own body! But he has strengths and faults you never dreamed of. He’s like you, but he isn’t you.
(And this is where my personal faith takes a detour from the Christian standpoint. In my universe, the Divine made us imperfect, not out of mallace, but so we could enjoy physical existence and learn and grow. If we indeed achieve perfection, we become gods ourselves, and all questions are moot.)
I guess this is where it comes down to questions of opinion and faith.
In my Universe, the Creative Spirit made us perfect.
However, we ourselves intervene and either sully or don’t live up to our given perfection.
Hopefully all here are adequately erudite to understand how this relates to the OP so I don’t have to go through a long drawn-out explanation. If not, just ask and I’ll explain.
SnakeS
See, here’s where I fall prey to the same questions as I think the OP was trying to ask. If you believe that the Creative Spirit made us perfect, then what about deformed babies? What about miscarriages? I can concur with your statement insofar as I do recognize that *most * of our damage, we do to ourselves. But right now, I’m babysitting a little 3 month old baby who’s just been discovered to have one half of his pelvis growing faster than the other. Is this because his mother or I have “sullied him” or because he isn’t living up to his given perfection?
I’m not trying to be snarky here. I really want to know how this is reconciled. I haven’t been able to do so, hence my belief (and yes, it’s belief and faith) that we’re created imperfect. (And I do so with full belief and faith in a Divine Power, so I’m not, for one, coming at this from a “prove God exists” stance.)
Is it your opinion that a quick snip of some useless skin sullies our given perfection? Ever had a tooth pulled or your appendix cut out?
I think you are right. I have been a life long Christian, and circumcision(male or female) has no connection with our relgion.
I thought that male circumcision was only jewish law/custom, and female circumcision in parts of Africa and some arab states, as far as I was taught.
I was told that female circumcision is now illegal for babies in the United States, and hopefully male circumcision of babies will also someday be illegal. It is extremely painful for babies.
Once you are 18 though, you should be free to get yourself circumcised, tattoed, or pierced.