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.

(Wow – I can’t believe I’ve written more than twenty posts about this passage already…I can’t wait to be finished with it!)

So…does long hair count as a head covering??

For women who wrestle with this passage and conclude that this applies to them today–can they conclude that their long hair serves as the kind of head covering Paul was calling for? To me it’s certainly a reasonable conclusion at first glance. After all, verse 15 reads, “for long hair is given to her as a covering”. But upon closer analysis of this passage, and considering the principle which head covering is supposed to express, a woman’s long hair doesn’t seem to be adequate. At least it doesn’t seem so to me, and for a couple reasons:

  1. If the head covering is to be understood as long hair, then some of Paul’s reasoning becomes nonsensical.

Let’s read the passage with the assumption that the covering is meant to be long hair:

“…But every woman who prays or prophesies with [short hair, or hair that is not long]–it is the same as having her head shaved. For if a woman does not [have long hair], she might as well have her hair [cut short]; but if it is a disgrace for a woman to have her hair [cut short] or her head shaved, then she should [have long hair].” (v5-6)

Paraphrased, “if a woman has short hair (doesn’t have long hair), then she might as well have short hair (cut her hair short [this is a different word used than for shaving the head]).” In other words, Paul’s reasoning would not make sense. If a woman’s hair is already short (and if that was problematic in Paul’s mind) then for Paul to say that “that is the same as having her hair cut short” means nothing; it is nonsense. In contrast, if the head covering was meant to be some sort of material head covering, then to say that not covering her head dishonors a Christian woman the same way that cutting her hair short does–that, at least, is a logical statement (whether we agree with it or not).

Hopefully that makes sense!

Here’s the other main reason why I don’t find the “long hair = head covering” conclusion totally convincing:

2. If long hair does serve as the head covering, then the passage seems to become about hair length again, when hair length is clearly not the focus of the passage.

And consequently, a practice (head covering) that is explicitly set within a particular context (a worship setting) then becomes tied to a condition that is not setting-specific or easily alterable–a person’s hair length. It would seem silly for Paul to urge Christian men to make sure that when they are praying/prophesying, they must have short hair (but they are allowed to grow it in between times of worship!) and to urge Christian women to make sure that their hair is long when they worship (but they may cut it short in between…as long as it grows long again before the next time they worship!).

All that said, the better conclusion when examining the reasons that Paul gives in scripture here–at least as I see it–seems to be that the head covering is meant to be more than merely a woman’s long hair.

 

 

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