Texts in Conversation
Genesis 34 ties circumcision to marriage, with the Shechemites agreeing to circumcise their males before marrying into Jacob’s clan. Exodus 4 echoes that older link in the bridegroom of blood scene, where Zipporah circumcises her son to spare Moses.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Genesis 34:14
Hebrew Bible
13 Jacob’s sons answered Shechem and his father Hamor deceitfully when they spoke because Shechem had violated their sister Dinah. 14 They said to them, “We cannot give our sister to a man who is not circumcised, for it would be a disgrace to us. 15 We will give you our consent on this one condition: You must become like us by circumcising all your males. 16 Then we will give you our daughters to marry, and we will take your daughters as wives for ourselves, and we will live among you and become one people. 17 But if you do not agree to our terms by being circumcised, then we will take our sister and depart.”
Exodus 4:25
Hebrew Bible
24 Now on the way, at a place where they stopped for the night, the Lord met Moses and sought to kill him. 25 But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off the foreskin of her son and touched it to Moses’ feet, and said, “Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me.” 26 So the Lord let him alone. (At that time she said, “A bridegroom of blood,” referring to the circumcision.)
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Notes and References
... Several biblical texts support the view that circumcision was originally practiced either as a rite of maturity or as preparation for marriage. Despite the above-mentioned difficulties, the term ḥaṭan dāmîm "bridegroom of blood" in Exodus 4:25 and the story in Genesis 34 about the circumcision required of the Shechemites prior to marriage also suggest that circumcision was originally associated with marriage. The circumcision of the thirteen-year-old Ishmael in Genesis 17:25 and the circumcision of the generation who had grown up in the wilderness in Joshua 5:2-9 may allude to a rite de passage performed on the cusp of adulthood. The Egyptian practice of circumcision was also performed in the second decade of life, and thus at the same point in the life cycle (see Ritner 2008: 178), as was the analogous Arabian practice. Nevertheless, the somewhat ambiguous picture of preexilic maturity rites probably reflects the fact that knowledge of its original context had faded ...
Albertz, Rainer and Rüdiger Schmitt
Family and Household Religion in Ancient Israel and the Levant
(p. 394) Eisenbrauns, 2012
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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