I praise you for remembering me in everything and for holding to the traditions just as I passed them on to you. But I want you to realize that the head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is man, and the head of Christ is God. Every man who prays or prophesies with his head covered dishonors his head. But every woman who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her head—it is the same as having her head shaved. For if a woman does not cover her head, she might as well have her hair cut off; but if it is a disgrace for a woman to have her hair cut off or her head shaved, then she should cover her head.
A man ought not to cover his head, since he is the image and glory of God; but woman is the glory of man. For man did not come from woman, but woman from man; neither was man created for woman, but woman for man. It is for this reason that a woman ought to have authority over her own head, because of the angels. Nevertheless, in the Lord woman is not independent of man, nor is man independent of woman. For as woman came from man, so also man is born of woman. But everything comes from God.
Judge for yourselves: Is it proper for a woman to pray to God with her head uncovered? Does not the very nature of things teach you that if a man has long hair, it is a disgrace to him, but that if a woman has long hair, it is her glory? For long hair is given to her as a covering. If anyone wants to be contentious about this, we have no other practice—nor do the churches of God.
Headship
It is quite easy to get the wrong idea when reading these verses. Understanding the meaning of the words Paul uses here is essential. It is especially important to note that the word “head” can be used in two senses. It can be used in the sense of “sovereign”, and it can be used in the sense of “source”. I believe that Paul is using the word in the latter sense. Therefore, what Paul is saying is that the source of every man is Christ in the sense that Christ was involved in creation. (John 1)
When Paul says that “the head of the woman is man” he means that the source of the woman is man. Again, he is thinking of creation and the story in Genesis which tells us that woman was taken out of man.
And when Paul says that “the head of Christ is God” he means that Christ finds his source in God. Clearly, in the early Christian understanding of the Godhead, Christ is equal to God. And so, just as Paul does not teach any inequality between Christ and God, so also, he does not teach any inequality between woman and man.
Men
If verse 3 has led many commentators down rabbit trails, verse 4 has multiplied that effect. Here we get into certain cultural issues that seem very strange and distant to us. But let’s keep in mind throughout our examination of this passage that all cultures have certain rules, usually unwritten, about how women and men should behave and how they should dress in certain situations.
For example, if I showed up for Sunday service wearing my bathing suit and no shirt and proceeded to preach, some of you would find that offensive. I hope you would not be similarly offended if I appeared at the beach in such attire.
Just so, there were certain rules of etiquette that were followed by women and men in the first century regarding clothing. The rules varied somewhat from Jewish to Greek to Roman culture. And Paul seems to be establishing some rules of etiquette, that are perhaps, in some ways, new for the churches.
Thus, in verse 4 Paul says, “Every man who prays or prophesies with his head covered dishonors his head.” It should be noted that prophesying included both foretelling and forthtelling. The modern equivalent we might be more accustomed to is the word “preaching”.
Here Paul is using the word “head” in two ways. In the first instance, Paul uses the word “head” to refer to a man’s physical head on which he should not wear a covering. In the second instance he uses the word “head” to refer to man’s spiritual head who is Christ. So, Paul is saying that every man who prays or prophesies in a worship service with his head covered dishonors Christ. What does Paul mean by this?
Here we must tread lightly because no one today can be certain what Paul was talking about. But the Greek phrase is: “κατὰ κεφαλῆς ἔχων” and that phrase can be translated: “anything hanging down from his head”. So, it may be that Paul is talking here about the man wearing a veil. He does not want the man to do this. And there is an interesting parallel passage about this in 2 Corinthians 3 where Paul says…
We are not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face to prevent the Israelites from seeing the end of what was passing away. But their minds were made dull, for to this day the same veil remains when the old covenant is read. It has not been removed, because only in Christ is it taken away. Even to this day when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts. But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplatethe Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.
There is a lot of interest here which we will study more fully when we journey through 2 Corinthians together. Suffice to say, when Moses came down the mountain after meeting with God, he would wear a veil over his face so that the Israelites would not see when the glory, or brightness, faded from his face, a glory or brightness that came from his meeting with God. Paul says that a veil remains over the hearts of his fellow Jews when they read Moses, when they read the Scriptures. They don’t understand how these Scriptures point to Jesus as Messiah. But when a person turns to the Lord the veil is taken away. Rather than the glory of God fading from the face of a Christian, the glory grows from one degree to another. That, perhaps, is why Paul says the man should not wear a head covering or veil in worship.
Women
In contrast to the man, Paul says that the woman should wear a head covering, or veil, in worship. He says that a woman not wearing a veil would be the same as having her head shaved. Such a thing would be disgraceful to Paul’s way of thinking.
There are several factors to keep in mind to properly understand the place of women in the early church.
- Women were not highly prized in either Hebrew or Greco-Roman culture.
- In the Hebrew world it was not much different. Women had no rights, no education. They sat in a gallery in the synagogue.
- As I have mentioned before, in Corinth there was a temple to Aphrodite on the Acrocorinth and a thousand prostitutes operated there in service of the goddess of love.
- Prostitutes were heavily made up, and they wore no bands in their hair, no veils, and a short, brightly colored tunic instead of the normal long garment of the Roman matron.
Now, what was going on in the Corinthian church? We can surmise that what was happening was something like this… The women in the church had discovered their newfound freedom in Christ. They were praying and prophesying in the church worship services—something none of the Jewish women could have done in the synagogue. But some of the women in Corinth were taking their freedom too far, at least in Paul’s eyes, and they were praying and prophesying with their heads uncovered.
Can you see why Paul might want the women to be veiled in church services? He did not want anyone to think that Christian women were like prostitutes or like the women who prophesied in the mystery religions wearing no veils, with their hair let down. On the other hand, Paul was advancing the cause of women by allowing women to sit with the men, to pray and to prophesy in the worship services of the early church.
Paul was, perhaps, taking his cues from Jesus who taught women, like Mary, and allowed them to sit at his feet. Jesus also had some prominent wealthy women who traveled with him and the twelve and supported the band of disciples out of their substantial means.
Unlike their situation in the synagogue, or in the Greek or Roman world, women had a prominent role in the early church. Paul’s most dramatic statement about the equality of men and women comes in Galatians 3:28 where he says, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female: for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”
Glory
What does Paul mean when he says that man is the image and glory of God, but the woman is the glory of man? There are probably a few different Hebrew Scriptures that Paul has in mind here. In Genesis 1:26-27 we read that both men and women are made in the image of God. Paul does not deny this. But he does say that the man is the glory of God, and the woman is the glory of man. There are no other verses in the Bible that say this precisely, so we can only guess, at best, what Paul meant.
Allow me to point out a few things…
First, Paul does not write about women being the “image” of men. Biblically, both men and women are made in the “image of God” (Gen. 1:27; c.f. Jas. 3:9).
Second, Paul also does not claim that men are greater than women. Instead, he affirms the equality and interdependence of men and women later in the passage: “Nevertheless, in the Lord woman is not independent of man, nor is man independent of woman. For as woman came from man, so also man is born of woman. But everything comes from God.”
Third, by saying that the woman is the “glory of man,” Paul is elevating women—not suppressing them. Catherine Kroeger writes, “That woman is called ‘the glory of man’ is not a diminution of her glory, for she is equally made in the image of God (Gen 1:27; 5:2-3). Glory augments the reputation, wealth, or status of another (cf. 2 Cor 3:7-11, 18). Paul declares that the Thessalonians were his ‘glory and joy’ (1 Thess. 2:20, surely not a pejorative term). They are the fulfillment of his aspirations, and his pride and happiness in them know no bounds. Thus, it is that Paul sets forth the interdependence of man and woman and their need for one another.” Likewise, Craig Blomberg writes, “In verses 14-15 ‘glory’ is the opposite of ‘disgrace,’ so in both places it probably carries the sense of ‘honor.’”
Fourth, by writing about the woman being made “for man’s sake,” Paul is not denigrating women. [1] Again, Paul is thinking of the creation story in Genesis and how the woman was made from the man’s rib to be his companion and to relieve his loneliness. Genesis says woman was made to be man’s helper. This is not a lowly position, but a glorious one. After all, throughout Scripture we see God acting as the helper of human beings.
Fifth, what does Paul mean when he says, “It is for this reason that a woman ought to have authority over her own head, because of the angels.”? I think what Paul is doing here is giving to women in the church a sign of authority allowing them to pray and prophesy. The veil is a sign of the woman’s own authority, not the man’s authority over her...
David Yonggi Cho was for many years the pastor of the largest church in the world, the Yoido Full Gospel Church in Seoul, South Korea. One of the keys that unlocked the growth of this church was the start of what Cho called Cell Groups. These were small group meetings that took place in people’s homes. So, everyone in this church would come together in a large setting for worship but also meet in small house groups, very much like the first church in Jerusalem. However, when Cho started the small groups, he could not get men to lead them, despite Korea being a very patriarchal society. He was able to get women to lead the cell groups, but for a while he was stumped by the question: “How do I show that the women are under male authority so that they won’t be rejected by the men?” Cho’s solution was for the female cell group leaders to wear little hats that showed they were under Cho’s authority as pastor.
I think Paul was doing something very strategic in Corinth and elsewhere to get the men in church and society to accept the new role of women in the church worship services. He has the women wear veils to show that they are still honoring the men.
Paul obviously believed in the equality of men and women, but he also knew that he had to tread lightly if he was going to help men in church and society to accept women having new religious roles.
Nature
Finally, what does Paul mean by “the nature of things”? Does he mean that it is biologically unnatural for a man to have long hair or a woman to have short hair? No. If we all followed nature in this sense, we would probably all have very long hair.
The word that Paul uses for “nature” can mean “custom”. Craig Blomberg explains…
When he [Paul] speaks explicitly of length of hair, he grounds his arguments in what is proper (v. 13), normal practice (vv. 14-15) and contemporary custom (v. 16). None of these verses … implies a timeless, transcultural mandate, even if the customs were widespread in the first century and have often been imitated in other cultures and eras.
Conclusion
So, how does all of this apply to us today? We do not often have women praying or prophesying in our worship services here at First Church. We don’t even have men doing that, other than me as your pastor. But could we? Yes, we could have both male and female members of the church both praying and prophesying in our church services. And I think the Church does well when it gives to women at least an equal place in the worship and leadership of the Church just as Jesus and Paul did.
Is propriety still important in our worship services today? Yes, though maybe we don’t follow the same rules of etiquette that the church followed in the first century. Even into my lifetime women were wearing hats in church. The practice can be traced all the way back to the first century. But how we dress for church varies from culture to culture around the world. What would be appropriate in the Caribbean might not be appropriate in New England. If we were trying to reach people with the Gospel who were living in a predominantly Muslim culture, wearing veils in church would still be essential today. In most cases, such attire is not essential.
The most important thing is not so much what we wear or don’t wear. What really counts is whether we are honoring God in worship and honoring one another as human beings. After all, that is another good way to translate the word “glory” in this passage. “Glory” is all about “honor”.
Finally, one of the early church fathers, Irenaeus, once said, “The glory of God is human beings fully alive.” That is, I believe, what God wants for all of us. He wants us to come fully alive. And one of the main ways we do that is through worship, because we were created and redeemed to worship God.
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