Monday 21 September 2020

That peculiar passage about scarves and angels in 1 Corinthians 11: it’s about stopping cross-dressing in church, not subduing the wives.

The other day my wife asked me to listen to a class she was preparing about I Corinthians 11: 2 – 16, that passage which is all about the importance of women wearing head-scarves. To do this she had been sitting at the feet of some of Christendom's finest teachers: Tom Wright, Gordon Fee, Craig Keener. With me, she had a fascinated listener and when she had finished I thought, this is so good, I must write this up for myself.  

When it comes to finding something in the Bible a husband can use to prove to his wife he’s the boss, then that odd passage about head-scarves and angels in 1 Corinthians 11: 1- 16 seems to fit the bill.

 The head of a wife is her husband (v. 3) …woman is the glory of man (7). Neither was man created from woman, but woman from man. Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man (8-9). That is why a woman ought to have a symbol of authority on her head… (10).

That’s it in black and white. Wives, you are under your husbands. Let’s move on.

 That would be a mistake.

It is wiser to follow the advice of Jesus’ brother, James. He said that the wisdom from above is open to reason. And when you bring careful thinking to the passage the idea of the husband as the big boss over a junior wife does not hold up.

Firstly the passage is not about family relations, it’s about public worship. In fact from the start of chapter 10 right through to the end of chapter 14 this is Paul’s subject. The specific issue at the start of chapter 11 is praying and prophesying in public. It is something that men and women are to engage in, but Paul is keen to insist that the men pray with their heads uncovered, and the women with their heads covered. For Paul it was important that all things during the worship service were ‘done decently and in order’ (14:40), and this for him was very much a part of decency and order.

 Why?

Some say it is all about a wife showing her submission to her husband’s authority by wearing a scarf. If she does not wear that scarf, she is declaring that she is a rebel, or possibly worse, that she is a prostitute or an adulteress. That is not decency and order. The women must wear their head scarves

It sounds convincing. But there are problems.

First of all there is absolutely not a whisper about wives submitting to their husbands in this passage. There is nothing along the lines – 'Now wives, you are the junior partners here, so you must submit to your husband, and you must let everyone know that, even in church.' In fact we have the opposite. In two verses Paul spells out that men and women are inter-dependent (11,12). There are no seniors and juniors.

And what about the unmarried and the widows? It is clear Paul wants all women to wear a scarf (11:13). But who are the unmarried and the widows submitting to by wearing a scarf? Should a widow wear a scarf to respect a dead husband? That seems unlikely. Does it mean that all unmarried women should show their submission to all the men in a Christian worship service? That also seems unlikely, if not dangerous.

The context and meaning of the passage do not point to this being a manifesto for a bossy husband to wave in the face of his wife.

Some might say, 'Ah, but the text says the man is the ‘head’ and that means authority. We must respect the Scripture.' However the Greek word for head, kaphale does not have to have a hierarchical and authoritarian sense, it can also mean source, as in the head of the river.

The Anglican London priest David Prior explains this well:

The word for head is kaphale, which on rare occasions means the ruler of a community, but normally carries the sense of source or origin…. So God is the source of Christ, Christ (as creator) is the source of man, and man (‘out of his side – Genesis 2:21ff) is the source of woman.

The crucial truth is not that a husband is to rule over his wife, but that God has chosen to create mankind from two different sources.

That is His choice, and in worship this truth must not be trampled on. So though Paul is happy that the Corinthians are respecting the ‘traditions’ about worship he taught them (11:2), he has heard – as with Holy Communion – some reports that disturbed him. Either men or women or both were praying and prophesying and ignoring the distinction between the sexes.

All cultures have clothing distinctions between the sexes. In the Greek culture – in which the Corinthian church operated – the women in public wore a head covering, not a veil and their hair long; the men did not wear a head covering in public and their hair was short. We know from the rest of the letter that church meetings at Corinth were lively. What was probably happening was in the excitement of the worship women were taking off their head covering and prophesying and praying, perhaps because that was what pagan prophetesses did. Perhaps men were wearing some sort of head-covering. This was cross-dressing during Christian worship and Paul was outraged. The issue had to be addressed.

His argument is primarily theological. To engage in cross dressing while claiming to worship God is to deny God’s order of creation as outlined in verse 3. Both the men and women who do this – dishonour his or her head (4, 5). They reject the source they have been created from: man from dust in the image of God and for the glory of God, woman from man, for the glory of man (7,8).

The word used for angels in v. 10 in Greek literally means messengers. Paul could be referring to heavenly messengers or human ones. The point remains the same. Cross dressing in worship would be deeply offensive to them.

In v. 13 – 15 Paul argues that nature teaches that a man should have short hair, a woman long hair. The point is the same. Cross dressing for Christians is not allowed. It is unnatural.

Once the red-herring of a woman having to cow tow to men by wearing a sign of their junior status is taken out of the passage, then its meaning comes into focus fairly clearly. From v. 3 – 15 Paul is saying one thing: in worship Christians must honour the absolute difference that exists in the origin of men and women.

That principle is relevant today. The LGBT movement is shrilly demanding that the general public accept practices censured in the Bible. As back in Paul’s day, so too today, it is not for the church to dictate to millions of non-Christians how to live their lives. The church believes, and history attests, that the usual outcome of ignoring Christian teaching is misery, but if the non-Christian wants to believe the unscientific story line about sexual fluidity and people being able to claim whatever identity they want regardless of biological reality, that’s up to them. We will all reap what we sow.

However it is very much for the church to hold the line when it comes to her internal affairs, especially her worship. This passage, easily seen as being a little opaque, in fact speaks clearly to the church today: don’t tolerate cross-dressing during worship, men must be seen to be men, women, women.

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