Are Head Coverings in 1 Corinthians 11 Still For Today?

In 1 Corinthians 11:2–16 the apostle Paul encourages women in the Corinthian congregation to wear head coverings. Are veils and coverings for women in the church still for today?

Although there are some churches that still have their women wear coverings according to 1 Corinthians 11, many westernized churches do not practice this. Why? They assume that there must have been a cultural issue at stake at that time, which warranted Paul discussing this point. In essence, they are correct.

It should be pointed out that this section of 1 Corinthians is framed by Paul’s words, “tradition” (paradosis 11:2) and “custom” (sunetheia 11:16). This implies that:

1. The issue of head coverings is not dealing foremost with commands that if violated necessarily means that violators are sinning.
2. This issue is not dealing foremost with vices or sinful habits. Nowhere in any of Paul’s vice lists (e.g., 1 Cor 6:9–11; Gal 5:19–21) do we read that if a woman worship without a head covering, or if a man worships with a head covering, they are vice-doers and in jeopardy of salvation.

What then is it dealing with? Things that were customary in first-century Pauline churches that engaged with cultural norms and worship practices for the time and location. To understand these things better, it is important first to go back to what such teaching meant back in first century context.

Head Coverings Back Then: Meeting in Houses

These women in Corinth perhaps confused public places for private places. It was socially and culturally proper at that time for women to be veiled when in public. At home, however, they were free from societal norms to be unveiled.

It so happened that the early churches at that time often met in homes. As such, certain women who were accustomed to unveiling themselves in the privacy of their own home, probably still did so when the church happened to meet in their own home. Perhaps this also encouraged other women to not wear head coverings in house churches.*

This problem might have been compounded if these women were influenced prior to their conversion by certain pagan practices. The maenads of that region, for example, would dishevel their hair when prophesying in the name of the god Dionysus. Could it be that the women prophets in Corinth, now converted to faith in Christ, brought this style of maenadic prophesying into the congregation?**

In either or both scenarios, for the ancient Mediterranean world, a woman’s uncovered hair in public would likely be interpreted as disorderly and inappropriate. Moreover, it very likely distracted male worshippers, perhaps provoking some to lust. An unveiled woman would seem to symbolize her as sexually promiscuous and, if married, disrespectful of her husband.

In 1 Corinthians 11–14, Paul is encouraging the congregation to practice decency and orderly conduct when worshipping in local gatherings. It would seem to be quite a distraction for women to have disorderly and unveiled hair.

Head Coverings Now?

We go back to the original question—is such a passage applicable today? No, if it means that western women must wear head coverings. Yes, if it means that there are still universal principles we can derive from this text that are relevant for today.

Men today in our culture do not normally get distracted in worship due to a women’s visible hair. Nevertheless, there are still timeless principles from 1 Corinthians 11—modesty, the celebration of gender distinction, and the importance of not letting what you wear, or what you don’t wear, become a distraction to other congregation members as they worship.

Even the most progressive churches today would consider it inappropriate for guys to wear swimming trunks and ladies to wear string bikinis to church. Why? Because modesty still matters! And churches still value parish members being able to worship and hear the pulpit message without getting visually distracted. Such points are the essence of what is meant in 1 Corinthians 11:2–16.

Notes

*See further my commentary, B. J. Oropeza 1 Corinthians, NCCS (Eugene: Cascade), 140–51. Journal articles by Preston T. Massey are useful here.

**See further Catherine C. Kroeger, “1 Corinthians,” in The IVP Women’s Bible Commentary, 648–64, ad. loc. Also, see my early work on this theory in B. J. Oropeza, A Time to Laugh: The Holy Laughter Phenomenon Examined (Peabody: Hendrickson), ch. 7.