Old Enough for What?

17:12 | יז:יב
וּבֶן שְׁמֹנַת יָמִים יִמּוֹל לָכֶם כָּל זָכָר לְדֹרֹתֵיכֶם
And at the age of eight days, every male among you shall be circumcised, throughout your generations.

Old Enough for What?

When making a covenant, the parties commit to remain devoted to each other even if eventual discoveries or circumstances might cause them to lose favor in each other’s eyes. Nevertheless, human beings are inherently limited, and are therefore constantly changing. As a result, their treaties are not guaranteed to last eternally.

The covenant of bris milah (circumcision), however, is different. Regarding bris milah, G‑d says, “My covenant shall be in your flesh as an everlasting covenant”—meaning that through circumcision the Jew enters a truly eternal covenant with G‑d. A finite and ever-changing human can indeed not effect something so timeless, but the eternal One can.

Hence, circumcision is not an act through which man attaches himself to G‑d, but one through which G‑d binds Himself to the individual circumcised—forever, as only G‑d can.

This explains why we perform bris milah on an eight-day-old infant, even though the baby is too young to actively participate and contribute toward entering the covenant. For although the act of bris milah is performed by man, the “entering of the covenant” is effectuated by G‑d Himself. Since the eternal covenant of bris milah does not require (nor can it be achieved through) human input, the age and readiness of the one being circumcised is irrelevant. As such, when the first opportunity arrives, and the baby is eight days old and strong enough to endure the circumcision, we immediately grant him the great fortune of entering the bris milah—our eternal covenant with G‑d.

—Likkutei Sichos, vol. 25, pp. 86–88