They were, therefore, to lay aside all insensibility of heart and all obduracy, to acknowledge God's supremacy, to imitate his beneficence, and to fear and worship him. Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart.
As circumcision was the symbol of purification and sign of consecration to God, so the Israelites are enjoined to realize in fact what that rite symbolized, viz. purity of heart and receptivity for the things of God.
This is enforced by the consideration that Jehovah the alone God, the Almighty, is mighty and terrible without respect to persons, and at the same time is a righteous Judge, and the Protector of the helpless and destitute.