Weaver and Zimmerman devote Chapter 6 of Why Be Plain? to the issue of women’s head coverings, a defining characteristic of Plain women’s attire, which Paul addressed in 1 Corinthians 11:1–17. Although much of what Paul wrote in that passage is clear, honest readers will admit that it raises some questions.
For example, why is Christ dishonored if a man (actually, a married man) prays or prophesies with a covered head? Nothing in the Old Testament supports such a concept. On the contrary, Jewish men have been wearing skull caps since the second century as a sign of reverence towards God. Moreover, as a Jew, Paul certainly knew that the priests under the Old Covenant (who were all males) were required to wear head-covering turbans (and very fancy ones) when they ministered in the tabernacle or temple (see Ex. 28:4, 37–39; 29:6; 39:28–31; Lev. 8:9).
And why are men (actually, married men) dishonored by women (actually, their wives) who do what men should do to honor Christ—that is, not covering their heads when they pray or prophesy?
What is the significance of a woman whose head has been shaved? There is nothing else in the Bible about that. And how is a woman who prays or prophesies with an uncovered head the same as a woman whose head is shaved? And why does Paul mention angels in this passage?
These and other questions challenge modern interpreters. Many offer explanations that are not biblically based, logical, or persuasive. Weaver and Zimmerman’s explanation of Paul’s words, “For her hair is given to her for a covering,” certainly falls into that category:
What Paul is saying is that her hair is a natural covering indicating that she should be veiled with an artificial one. He is using her long hair as an illustration that another covering is needed (pp. 120-121).
That isn’t very persuasive. It isn’t logical.
Weaver and Zimmerman also apparently believe that angels answer prayers and decide whom to protect, as they suggest that “angels might not heed prayers or give protection” to uncovered women (p. 118). Moreover, they suggest that smaller head coverings might result in less protection (p. 125). They even resort to anecdotal superstitions: “Many women have personal testimonies of how their head covering seemed to hinder those who sought to do evil to them” (p. 119).
What Is Clear
It should be clear that Paul’s instructions in 1 Corinthians 11 had nothing to do with all-day head coverings for females. His instructions only addressed women (and men) being covered or uncovered when praying or prophesying—that is, when speaking to or on behalf of God. Here’s the proof:
Every man who has something on his head while praying or prophesying disgraces his head. But every woman who has her head uncovered while praying or prophesying disgraces her head, for she is one and the same as the woman whose head is shaved (1 Cor. 11:4–5, emphasis added).
We can add more proof from another sentence near the end of the same passage: “Judge for yourselves: is it proper for a woman to pray to God with her head uncovered? (1 Cor. 11:13, emphasis added). Paul did not ask, “Is it proper for a woman to ever have her head uncovered?” but “Is it proper for a woman to pray to God with her head uncovered?”
Because Paul specifically mentioned women prophesying in 11:5—something done to edify others (see 1 Cor. 14:4)—it is clear that what he wrote about head coverings applied to women during Christian gatherings. That is, he was not instructing Christian women to cover their heads when praying alone at home, or to cover their heads at any other place or time for that matter.
Weaver and Zimmerman, however, disagree with that point:
Paul wrote that she should have her hair covered when prophesying. If he was only talking about church services he was contradicting himself, since he forbade women to speak or preach in church (1 Cor. 14:34 and 1 Tim. 1:11–12) (p. 126).
So the authors reason that Paul’s instruction to women about keeping their heads covered when praying or prophesying could only have had application to when they were somewhere other than a church gathering—when it was acceptable for them to speak. Therefore, apparently, women’s Spirit-inspired prophecies would not have been permitted at any time when “two or three were gathered together in Jesus’ name”—when He said He would be “in their midst” (Matt. 18:20)—because that would have constituted a genuine church gathering at which women were not permitted to speak! All of that begs the question: When exactly was it okay for a woman who received a prophecy from the Holy Spirit to speak what the Spirit gave her? Only when she was alone? Hmmm.
Weaver and Zimmerman fail to mention that Paul not only told women to “keep silent” (1 Cor. 14:34) during church gatherings but also told those who were speaking in tongues without interpretation to “keep silent” (1 Cor. 14:28) during church gatherings. And he also told certain prophets to “keep silent” (1 Cor. 14:30)[16] during church gatherings—all within the space of eight verses. In no case was Paul telling any of those groups to be totally silent during the entirety of a church gathering. Rather, there were specific times when each group should “keep silent.”
Certain people who were speaking in tongues with no interpreter were out of order. They should stop their practice and “keep silent” in that situation. Similarly, some prophets were not showing consideration to other prophets by giving them an opportunity to speak, which was out of order. They should “keep silent” and let other prophets share what God revealed to them. And some women were asking their husbands questions and disturbing the meeting, which was also out of order. So they should “keep silent.” Paul goes on to say, “If they desire to learn anything, let them ask their own husbands at home” (1 Cor. 14:35).
Obviously, women were praying and prophesying during church gatherings, and the only women whom Paul was hoping to silence were those who were causing disturbances by asking their husbands questions. If the men and women were sitting separately during the Corinthians’ church gatherings, it becomes even clearer why wives asking questions of their husbands would disturb the meetings.
All this is to say that, if we claim that 1 Corinthians 11:1–17 is about women’s daily head coverings, we are reading something that is not there. And if we claim that the passage says women should always wear head coverings, then we must also say that men must never wear hats, or any head covering.
Pray Without Ceasing, So Always Keep Your Head Covered
Those who defend Plain traditions often claim that because the New Testament teaches all Christians to “pray without ceasing” (1 Thess. 5:17), Paul’s instructions to women in 1 Corinthians 11 about keeping their heads covered when praying apply to their every waking hour. Women, they say, should wear head coverings all the time as they “pray without ceasing.” If we apply that same logic to men, however, then men should not wear hats at any time, since they too should “pray without ceasing.”
Without offering any evidence or proof, Weaver and Zimmerman make this astonishing claim:
When Paul said men shouldn’t pray or prophesy with their heads covered, he wasn’t talking about a weather protective covering. He was talking about a prayer cap with a spiritual symbol like the one that conservative [Plain] women wear. We have no reason to think that it is wrong to talk to God while wearing a weather protection hat. We simply ought not put on a prayer cap to pray as do men of other religions (p. 114).
There is not a shred of biblical or historical evidence for Weaver and Zimmerman’s claim. And Paul made no such distinction regarding men’s hat styles. He said nothing about “prayer caps worn by men of other religions.” Rather, he wrote, “Every man who has something on his head while praying or prophesying disgraces his head” (1 Cor. 11:4).
So we have the choice of believing the apostle Paul or Weaver and Zimmerman. I’m going to stick with Paul. If women dishonor their heads (their husbands) any time they don’t wear a head covering, then men dishonor their head (Christ) any time they do wear a head covering.
There are no requirements anywhere in the Bible regarding women wearing head coverings as part of their daily attire. You won’t find daily female head coverings mandated in the Law of Moses or the Law of Christ. The instructions regarding female head coverings that Paul explained in 1 Corinthians 11 are their first mention in the Bible.
Granted, cultural norms have dictated women’s head coverings around the world in both ancient and modern times, including in ancient Corinth (which we will soon consider), but nothing codified it in any scriptural law from God for His people.
Some Historical Context Regarding Corinth
To attempt to interpret Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 11, we should note that in ancient Greece, women were generally kept sequestered in homes, either the home of their parents before marriage, or of their husbands after marriage. When they ventured out into the public, married women in particular not only covered their heads but also fully veiled their faces, with the exception of their eyes.[17]
Those coverings conveyed that a woman was “off limits,” which served a valuable purpose in a society in which sex with prostitutes and female slaves was considered normal and acceptable. For a married woman to go out into public uncovered or unveiled would have been scandalous, something done only by a prostitute or bold adulteress.
So as you imagine Corinthian women at Christian gatherings, that is how you should imagine them. Their head coverings fully covered their heads, including their faces. The part of the head-covering cloth that covered their faces could be easily pulled back so that, for instance, women could expose their faces for conversations with their husbands, children, or other women, or to eat something.
But Corinthian women looked nothing like modern Plain women, who fasten their long hair under a thin, form-fitting white cap tied on with strings. If ancient Greek women saw modern Plain women, they might gasp at their immodesty. “Are all Plain women prostitutes?” they might ask. (Admittedly, they would be even more shocked by non-Plain women.)
Any group appealing to 1 Corinthians 11 in defense of small white head caps, black bonnets, head scarves, or other modern “head coverings” should do some additional historical homework. If any modern Christian group wants to copy the culture reflected in 1 Corinthians 11, their women should start completely covering their heads and veiling their faces. When Weaver and Zimmerman write, “The rejection of the head covering is just another part of the great falling away that is occurring at the end of time draws near” (p. 129), they are unwittingly condemning all Plain women who are not veiling their faces and only partially covering their heads.
Why the Need for 1 Corinthians 11:1–17?
It is reasonable to ask what situation in the Corinthian church caused Paul to write this passage about head coverings. At bare minimum, it seems that at least some Corinthian women were partially removing their head coverings when praying or prophesying publicly. We are not told their reason. It seems highly unlikely that there was, as is sometimes claimed, a contingency of rebellious, “liberated women” in the Corinthian church who were rising up against strongly held, centuries-old Greek cultural norms.
Because Paul specifically mentions Corinthian women not remaining covered when praying or prophesying, it seems logical to wonder if some women, when they prayed or prophesied, were temporarily removing the part of their head coverings that veiled their faces, simply because those veils masked their mouths to some degree when they spoke. That would seem plausible. (Having worn a COVID mask, I can relate.) Why would they ever want to pull their head coverings completely off their heads when they prayed or prophesied? I struggle to think of a reason.
Regardless, in light of Greek cultural standards for women’s head and face coverings, one can understand why such an act might be of concern to those inside the church. And we should not be surprised that Paul addressed the issue. He did so by weaving divine principles within the context of cultural norms. If what Paul wrote was purely based on deference to culture, we could easily ignore it. But if what he wrote has its basis in divine principles (and it does), we should take it seriously and consider how to apply those divine principles within our own culture.
As I have already admitted, much of what Paul wrote in this passage raises questions for which I’ve never found satisfying answers. Commentators have come up with many contrasting conclusions that are sometimes constructed from questionable assumptions. But let’s at least take a stab at it.
The Disgraced Head
According to Paul, one consequence of a woman being uncovered when praying or prophesying was that she “disgraces her head” (1 Cor. 11:5). Was Paul speaking of an uncovered woman’s own physical head, or was he speaking of her husband? Two sentences earlier, Paul referred to her husband being her head.[18] That sentence and the flow of Paul’s argument lead me to think that the uncovered woman disgraces her husband. Is there any other indication that I’m correct on that? I think there is.
Paul goes on to say that the uncovered woman “is one and the same as the woman whose head is shaved” (1 Cor. 11:5), a comparison that all the Corinthian believers must have understood but one that causes modern readers to scratch their heads. It certainly doesn’t sound like a positive or desirable thing. What was Paul talking about?
It is often claimed that Corinthian prostitutes shaved their heads, but there is no historical proof of that claim. Moreover, it would seem odd that prostitutes, who were in the business of attracting men, would do something that would likely have the opposite effect.
A better explanation, and one supported by historical evidence, is that married Greek women who were found guilty of adultery had their heads shaved as a public shaming.[19] Such unfaithful women had removed their head covering and much more, and so as a shaming punishment for their immoral uncovering, their natural covering was removed by shaving their heads.
Tying this together, Paul may have been saying that a married woman who, against cultural norms, removes her covering before other men at a church gathering is acting like an adulteress by wrongly uncovering herself. No Greek husband would want his wife to remove her veil in front of other men. If she did, he would be insulted by her and humiliated before others. From a Christian perspective, her “head” (her husband) would be disgraced.
In that context, Paul reminded Corinthian Christians of divine principles regarding marriage, because those principles had application to the problem. Specifically, he pointed out that husbands are the heads of their wives and that wives should be subject to their husbands. Wives who remove their head coverings to commit adultery and wives who remove their head coverings at church gatherings to pray or prophesy are both out of line with God’s divine order in marriage.
To try to make every aspect of 1 Corinthians 11:1–17 apply to modern, Western culture seems impossible, however, because Western cultural standards are so dramatically different from those in ancient Greece. Unless you are ready to advocate that all Christian women should be fully veiled in public, then the best we can do is to try to apply the biblical principles to marriage and church life within the context of modern culture. Unlike ancient Greek men, most modern, Western husbands do not expect their wives to be always fully veiled in public, and nothing in Paul’s words suggests that women’s veiling is a divine mandate or principle.
The Modesty Question
Although Paul never overtly mentions any issue of modesty in the passage under consideration, modern advocates of female head coverings often appeal to modesty as a primary justification. However, in doing so, Plain people have embraced a cultural view of female modesty that is a few hundred years old, and one that would have been condemned as grossly immodest in ancient Corinth. It would also be considered immodest in many parts of the world today, particularly those Muslim nations where women are expected to veil their entire faces.
Similarly, many modern Christian women who dress quite modestly by current cultural standards would have been condemned in centuries past. So modesty is obviously relative to time and place.
Plain and non-Plain Christians agree that female modesty does not require facial veiling. Yet they disagree on other standards of modesty. Should they devise lists of ordnung rules, separating from and condemning those who differ? No, they should walk in love and respect the convictions of others, just as the New Testament teaches.
Although two New Testament passages admonish women to be modest in general, and although Jesus warned all of us to avoid causing others to stumble, there are no specific instructions that tell us what is or is not modest. Again, a woman’s degree of public modesty is a matter of personal conviction—within her particular culture, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, with sincere respect toward other believers, and, if she is married, in deference to her husband.
Who Is to Blame When Men Stumble?
Hyper-modesty advocates frequently lay the entire burden upon women to prevent men from lusting. That simply isn’t fair. Abraham was afraid he might be killed by men who lusted after his beautiful wife (Gen. 12:14), even though Sarah dressed very modestly by any standards, always wearing a head covering that could be used, if necessary, to cover her face. Still, Abraham knew men would lust after her. There is nothing a woman can do to prevent that.
Jesus didn’t say, “Whoever looks at a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery in his heart, but no man should feel guilty about that, because it is always the woman’s fault, usually because she wasn’t dressed modest enough.” No, God holds men accountable for their lust.
It’s worth noting that a man can notice and appreciate a woman’s beauty without lusting after her. Female beauty was God’s original idea, and so was male attraction to female beauty. There is nothing wrong with either. As we saw earlier, Scripture describes Rachel and Esther as “beautiful of form and face” (Gen. 29:17; Esth. 2:7), suggesting that these aspects of their beauty were visible and apparent. Any man could appreciate Rachel or Esther’s beauty without having to succumb to lust, just as a father might admire the beauty of his own daughter. There is no basis for equating beauty with immodesty.
But What About All the Divine Principles Paul Enumerated?
We cannot ignore the fact that Paul appealed to divine principles in 1 Corinthians 11, though he applied them within the context of cultural practices. We should not ignore those divine principles. They lay down the divine order regarding gender and marital roles. Let me quote these verses below while leaving out the cultural applications:
But I want you to understand that Christ is the head of every man [husband], and the man [husband] is the head of a woman [wife], and God is the head of Christ. … For a man … is the image and glory of God; but the woman is the glory of man. For man does not originate from woman, but woman from man; for indeed man was not created for the woman’s sake, but woman for the man’s sake. … However, in the Lord, neither is woman independent of man, nor is man independent of woman. For as the woman originates from the man, so also the man has his birth through the woman; and all things originate from God (1 Cor. 11:3, 7-12).
Those are timeless, unchanging truths that should be applied by followers of Christ at all times in every place. Their application, however, could vary at different times and places, depending on cultural practices. How they were applied in Corinth, Greece, in AD 60, for example—where culture dictated a certain degree of female modesty and public identification of marital status via women’s head coverings—is not necessarily how they should be applied in Corinth, Kentucky, in AD 2025. If Paul were establishing a church today in Kentucky, I don’t think he would require all the married women to start completely veiling their heads and faces in public and at church gatherings. But he certainly would admonish believing husbands and wives to follow God-given gender and marital roles.
If you were a Christian woman in first-century Corinth, it would have been reasonable for you to be asked to keep your head covering and veil on while praying or prophesying in public. If you are a woman in the United States today, you should keep your wedding ring on when you publicly pray or prophesy. In either time and place, you would be expected to dress modestly by your culture’s standards. If your husband feels uncomfortable, or even disgraced by what you wear publicly, change it. Women who behave in this way will not transgress any of Paul’s timeless truths.
[16] In all three cases, the Greek verb translated as “keep silent” is identical: sigaō.
[17] An excellent historical resource regarding these facts is the book Aphrodite’s Tortoise : The Veiled Woman of Ancient Greece, by Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones. Here is the publisher’s description: “Greek women routinely wore the veil. That is the unexpected finding of this meticulous study, one with interesting implications for the origins of Western civilisation. The Greeks, popularly (and rightly) credited with the invention of civic openness, are revealed as also part of a more Eastern tradition of seclusion. Llewellyn-Jones’ work proceeds from literary and, notably, from iconographic evidence. In sculpture and vase painting it demonstrates the presence of the veil, often covering the head, but also more unobtrusively folded back onto the shoulders. This discreet fashion not only gave a privileged view of the face to the ancient art consumer, but also, incidentally, allowed the veil to escape the notice of traditional modern scholarship. From Greek literary sources, the author shows that full veiling of the head and face was commonplace. He analyses the elaborate Greek vocabulary for veiling and explores what the veil meant to achieve. He shows that the veil was a conscious extension of the house and was often referred to as `tegidion’, literally `a little roof’. Veiling was thus an ingenious compromise; it allowed women to circulate in public while maintaining the ideal of a house-bound existence. Alert to the different types of veil used, the author uses Greek and more modern evidence (mostly from the Arab world) to show how women could exploit and subvert the veil as a means of eloquent, sometimes emotional, communication. First published in 2003 and reissued as a paperback in 2010, Llewellyn-Jones’ book has established itself as a central—and inspiring—text for the study of ancient women.”
[18] See 1 Cor. 11:3. Ancient Greek did not have different words for “man” and “husband” or for “woman” and “wife.” Translators must look at the context to determine the best English equivalent. However, it is obvious that every man is not the head of every woman. Only husbands are heads of their wives; see Eph. 5:23.
[19] “It was well-known that women who committed adultery could have their head shaved as a sign of shame and humiliation. In fact, Meander (ca. 341–290 B.C.) once wrote a play set in the scene of Corinth, where a wife was suspected of having an affair, so her husband has her hair shaved off as punishment.” (https://theologyintheraw.com/the-cultural-context-for-the-hair-length-style-vs-head-coverings-debate-in-1-cor-11-the-meaning-of-kephale-part-12/#)
