If we look only at our Latin version, [it] can be answered in a word: [that] the knives were of stone. For [it] is expressly so handed down (v. 3). But some raise a dispute from the Hebrew, so that concerning the instrument of circumcision [there] are now three opinions. The first: [that there] was never a stone knife, but always an iron or steel one. So most of the Rabbis, and, among our own, Arias Montanus, in—
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—this very chapter; and among the heretics, Chytraeus, who expounds “stone knives” [as] “knives sharpened with a whetstone.” For Calvin indeed, perhaps by design, dissembled [it]. And the reason which moves them is, that here and [in] Exod. 4 they think [that] by the Hebrew names only “sharp knives” are signified — or, to say [it] word-for-word, “knives of edges.” For צור [tsur] (Psalm 88 [89] v. 43) they say — and Genebrardus with them — signifies “an edge,” where our [translator has]: “Thou hast turned away the help of his sword.” The second opinion is [that] of those who, from this place and [from] Exod. 4, thought [that] the knife proper to circumcision had to be of stone — and that either always, or at least from Sephora, or [from] this our Joshua, up to the time of David. And in the former part of this opinion are the Master [Peter Lombard] (bk. 4, dist. 5), St. Bernard (sermon 50, on circumcision), [and] St. Augustine (sermon 141). In the latter [part], indeed, [are] the Hebrews [cited] in the author of the Scholastic History [Comestor], of whom he [speaks] thus: “Certain Hebrews fable [that] up to David the circumcision was made with a stone; but because, in the felling of Goliath, the iron of the cuirass and helmet yielded to the stone hurled by David’s sling — as [it were] giving place to it — thereafter, in circumcision, the stone yielded to iron.” The third opinion, finally, holds [that] neither iron nor steel, nor stone nor rock, is necessary, nor was it always held [so] of old; but, provided only [that] the circumcision be done, [that there] was no instrument prescribed; and therefore sometimes an iron [one], sometimes a stone [one], was used — and here indeed, in this very Joshuan circumcision, [a stone one]. So Justin Martyr (dialogue with Trypho), St. Ephrem (oration on the 40 Martyrs, tome 3), St. Augustine (serm. 15, on the words of the Apostle, ch. 10), St. Thomas (3rd part, quaest. 70, ad 2), Hugh of St. Victor (bk. 1, On the Sacraments, part 12), Abulensis (Exod. 4, q., & q. 7 & 8), Masius (fol. 83), Pererius (Gen. 17, disp. 6) — whom, [being] so many and so great leaders, I follow not unwillingly. For, first: that neither iron [is] always, nor stone always, necessary, [there] is a great argument from this, that in the very law of circumcision neither is laid down. Then, that the Hebrews used iron even in the most ancient times is established from their own Masters, and from certain circumcision-knives which in some places are very old; and again, that this cutting was [also] done with stone will be plain to him who ponders these [things] with his mind. First: since the Hebrew name צור [tsur] is most frequent in the Scriptures, [it] always signifies stone or rock — whether [it] be taken properly, or metaphorically, as when [it] is taken for God, or [for] a strong [one]. Why, then, in this place, should [it] not have the same signification? That antecedent [premise] is certain, and is conceded even by the adversaries — except in the cited Psalm 88 [89]; where, however, [there] is no necessity that [it] be understood primarily and properly [as] “an edge.” For if we translate: “Thou hast turned away the rock of his sword,” [it] will be understood metaphorically — either [as] that in which the strength and firmness of the sword is (which, secondarily — the primary notion of “rock” being preserved — is called “an edge”); or [as] that in which someone’s strength and hope [lies], for example, “the sword.” And thus not only our Latin [translator] renders [it] “the help of his sword,” but also the Greek and Chaldaean text from which he received [it]. Secondly: this same Hebrew צור [tsur], when circumcision is treated of, Onkelos clearly renders ציפרא [tsippra] or טינרא [tinra] (Exod. 4) — and by that [word] rock and stone are always wont to be signified (Exod. 33; Ps. 77; Job 28), where, however, in his Syro-Chaldaic, Boderianus (fol. 83)—
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—notes [that] in the Venetian copies [there] is wrongly written שורי [shuri] — that is, “mountains.” Thirdly: by the same word the Bereshith Rabba says [they were] of old employed, galuin detinari — that is, “stone razors.” Fourthly: the Moreh Nebuchim (part 1, ch. 16) [Maimonides] affirms [that] this Joshuan circumcision was performed with hard flints. Fifthly: the manner in which the Lord commanded that matter to Joshua pertains here too. “Make,” he says, “thee knives, tsurim [צֻרִים].” But why would he say “make thee knives,” and not rather “sharpen the knives”? Why “knives of edges,” and not simply “knives”? For [it] was sufficiently established [that] for that work they had to be not blunt. Sixthly: and although our version is [taken] through ancient [sources], yet of much greater age and authority among the Jews are they who — from the midst of their own Sanhedrin — interpreted the Scriptures before CHRIST the Lord: the Seventy. And these here (v. 2) render [it] thus: ποίησον σεαυτῷ μαχαίρας πετρίνας [poiēson seautō machairas petrinas, “make for thyself knives of stone”]; and — as [it were] to remove all evasion — in the corrected Roman [edition] [there] is added ἐκ πέτρας ἀκροτόμου [ek petras akrotomou, “from a sharp-cut rock”]; and again (v. 3): καὶ ἐποίησεν ἑαυτῷ Ἰησοῦς μαχαίρας πετρίνας ἀκροτόμους [kai epoiēsen heautō Iēsous machairas petrinas akrotomous, “and Jesus [Joshua] made for himself knives of sharp-cut stone”]. Seventhly: the same [Seventy], in Exod. 4, render צור [tsur] ψῆφον [psēphon] — a pebble, or flint. To whom, then, shall we give faith — to the more recent Rabbis, or to these most ancient [ones]? Following these indeed (in epistle 143), St. Jerome said of Sephora: “With a pebble — that is, a most hard stone, and [yet] gentlest of all by [its very] hardness — she circumcised.” And again, in the same place, in our text (v. 25), he interpreted that single and monosyllabic Hebrew name [as] “a most sharp stone.” Eighthly: [as for those] which the Chaldaean Targum in this place called “razors,” חרבות [charboth] — we can indeed call [them] “sharp,” but not in such a way that they be denied [to be] of stone; nay rather, [in such a way] that — because rocks are wont to have certain sharp points — on account of their likeness [to sharp things] they are called “sharp.” Ninthly: that sometimes knives of a certain kind, material, and form are required for ceremonies will be no wonder to him who knows [that] the devil — who is wont to imitate the divine [things] — willed [that], in his sacrifices, the sacrificers use not any knives whatever, but those which they called dolabellae or dolabrae (of which [there] is a representation in Martianus [Capella]); and likewise secespitae, which were of iron, oblong, with an ivory handle — round, solid, bound at the hilt with silver, and fixed with gold, with brazen nails, [of] Cyprian bronze. And among the Jews a certain booklet, Secinach, is circulated, in which the whole method and figure of the knife with which cattle ought to be slaughtered and divided is marvelously described. Among the same [Jews] the circumcising knife today has no point, [being] otherwise similar to other knives. Tenthly: that both the foreskin can be cut off with stones, and knives be made [of stone], and [that] sometimes in those Eastern places [they were] made [so], the witness [is], first, that priest of Cybele, in Catullus:
“He himself rolled off from himself the weights [testicles] with a sharp flint.”
Secondly: Juvenal (Satire 6):
“[He] who cut off the soft genitals with a broken potsherd.”
Thirdly: Herodotus (bk. 2 & 3), who also relates (bk. 7) [that] in Xerxes’ army [there] were Ethiopians equipped with arrows, on which ἐπὶ τὸ σιδήριον λίθος ὀξὺς πεποίηται, τῷ καὶ σφραγῖδας γλύφουσι [epi to sidērion lithos oxys pepoiētai, tō kai sphragidas glyphousi, “upon the iron a sharp stone is fixed, with which they also carve seals”]. Fourthly: Lucian (in On the Syrian Goddess). Fifthly: Plutarch (in [the Life of] Nicias), saying [that there] was one who, at the altar of the Twelve Gods, cut off his own shameful parts with a flint. Sixthly: Tacitus (bk. 5 of the Histories); Pliny (bk. 12 ch. 26): “Balsam,” he says, “is cut with glass, [with] stone, or with knives of bone.” Seventhly: Josephus (bk. 14 ch. 7): ἢ ἀποβάλλουσιν μόριον ἀκρωτηριασμένον… [ē apoballousin morion akrōtēriasmenon…, “…or they cast off the amputated member…”]—
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—[Josephus’s Greek continues]. Eighthly: what [says] Arias himself in this place? Does he not testify [that] among the recently-discovered Western peoples little knives are made of stones? Our Beretarius indeed [does so] in the year 1594 and 1595. Finally, this whole denial of stone knives seems to me [to have been] devised by the Jews, so that they might, in whatever way they could, either overthrow or obscure the most beautiful allegory concerning CHRIST the Lord — who is the true rock of circumcision — [an allegory] most celebrated by the exposition of the old Fathers. But of that [allegory] afterward, in another place (quaest. 14). Now this [is] to be noted: [that] the knives are called by a Hebrew name which elsewhere signifies “swords” and “blades”; but by the Chaldaean [name] which [means] “razors,” [and by] the Greek which [means] machairas and acinaces [daggers]. But yet, from the nature of the thing itself, [it] is sufficiently understood [that they] were not longer swords and warlike machaerae, but smaller [ones], which are generally called “knives”; sometimes also “razors,” inasmuch as by them something is cut off — with, as it were, a surgical hand — and, as it were, shorn away; especially since, for this work, barbers are not rarely employed by the Jews themselves. And we read in Cicero (On Duties 2) “barbers’ knives”; and again, “a razor” for any knife whatever, in Columella (last book, ch. 45), when he says: “Take the roundest of the turnips, and, if they be muddy, wipe [them]; and pare off the top skin with a razor.”
Three [things] could still be asked. First: whence so many stones — or [stones] so great — for so many knives, a rock? But either they had gathered stones of this kind in the wilderness, at some time, for making knives, or that very place in which they then were supplied [them]. Theodoret indeed (quaestion 3) says [it] is quite likely [that] those who had spent so many years in the wilderness had few iron knives, but rather stone [ones]. Second: what in the Seventy are ἀκρότομοι [akrotomoi]? Lactantius (bk. 4, ch. 17): “too sharp,” or “very sharply [cut].” Third: why do the Seventy not say only “of stone,” but add also ἀκροτόμους [akrotomous]? Perhaps someone might think [that] here [there] are two versions joined, of which one rendered the Hebrew name of “rocks” [as] “of stone,” but the other [as] ἀκροτόμους.