“Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but the keeping of the commandments of God.”
My Notes
What Does 1 Corinthians 7:19 Mean?
Paul makes one of his most radical declarations: circumcision and uncircumcision are both nothing. The marker that defined Jewish identity for two thousand years — the physical sign of the Abrahamic covenant — is declared irrelevant. What matters is keeping God's commandments.
The statement is deliberately provocative. For Paul's Jewish readers, circumcision was everything — identity, covenant, belonging. For his Gentile readers, uncircumcision was their natural state and potential point of pride. Paul dismisses both: neither your circumcision nor your lack of it matters. Only obedience matters.
The apparent paradox — circumcision was itself a commandment of God, yet Paul calls it nothing — is resolved by the new covenant reality. In Christ, the commandments that matter are the ones fulfilled through love (Galatians 5:6: "faith which worketh by love"). The external sign has been replaced by internal transformation as the operative marker of covenant belonging.
Reflection Questions
- 1.What religious markers (traditions, practices, group identifiers) have you been treating as essential that Paul might call 'nothing'?
- 2.How does Paul's dismissal of circumcision liberate you from identity based on external signs?
- 3.What does 'keeping the commandments of God' look like when the ceremonial markers are removed?
- 4.Where are you more focused on the marker than the obedience it was supposed to represent?
Devotional
Circumcision is nothing. Uncircumcision is nothing. The thing that defined two thousand years of Jewish identity and the thing Gentiles prided themselves on — both nothing. Only keeping God's commandments matters.
This is Paul at his most revolutionary. He takes the covenant sign that Abraham received, that Moses enforced, that every Jewish boy carried in his flesh — and calls it nothing. Not wrong. Not bad. Nothing. It doesn't define you. It doesn't save you. It doesn't count for or against you in the economy of the new covenant.
The flip side is equally radical: uncircumcision is nothing too. Gentiles can't take pride in not being circumcised any more than Jews can take pride in being circumcised. Neither external state — marked or unmarked — carries spiritual weight.
What carries weight: keeping God's commandments. Not the ceremonial regulations about flesh but the moral and relational commands that love fulfills. Faith working through love (Galatians 5:6). Walking in the Spirit (Galatians 5:16). The new creation (Galatians 6:15). Paul replaces the external marker with an internal reality.
This verse should liberate anyone whose identity is wrapped up in religious markers — the things that distinguish you from other groups, the traditions that make you feel like you belong, the practices that signal your membership. Paul says: those things are nothing. What matters is whether you're obeying God. The marker without the obedience is empty. The obedience without the marker is sufficient.
Commentary
Trusted original commentary from respected historical Bible scholars and theologians.
Circumcision is nothing,.... In the affair of justification before God, and acceptance with him; it cannot make any man…
Circumcision is nothing ... - It is of no consequence in itself. It is not that which God requires now. And the mere…
Circumcision is nothing - Circumcision itself, though commanded of God, is nothing of itself, it being only a sign of…
Here the apostle takes occasion to advise them to continue in the state and condition in which Christianity found them,…
Circumcision is nothing It was not circumcision in itself that had any value, but the obedience to a divine command.
Cross References
Related passages throughout Scripture