Reflections on 1 Corinthians 11:5
“But every woman who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her head—it is the same as having her head shaved.” (1 Corinthians 11:5, NIV)
In my last post I wrote about the man’s covering in verse 4. I came to see it as a veil over the mind, the lies about God that keep a man from knowing the One who is his head. Remove that veil, and he can speak of Christ without bringing Him shame.
Today Paul turns to the woman, and the picture flips. The man is to be uncovered; the woman is to be covered. If the man’s covering is a veil of lies between his mind and Christ, the woman’s covering cannot mean the same thing. So what is it?
I’ll be honest: I came away from this verse with more questions than answers. But I think the questions are worth sharing, and a few things did come clear.
What the Translations Say
Nearly every translation ties the uncovered woman to a shaved head. Knox and Moffatt say she is “no better than” a shaven woman. The TCNT says she makes herself “like one of the shameless women who shave their heads.” The Remedy explains it as breaking the circle of God’s Love, making it appear that she is selfishly seeking to sever herself from her husband and take his place in God’s plan.
The Living Bible, as with verse 4, gives the most concrete reading: her covering is “a sign of her subjection to him.” But I keep coming back to what I said about verse 4. Christ is not petty. There is no merit in a piece of cloth. The covering is a symbol, and the question is what it symbolizes.
What Is She Veiling Her Mind Against?
The man was to remove the veil so he could see truth. Is the woman then to veil her mind against something, against lies? Why would a woman with an unveiled mind be such a disgrace to herself and to her husband? What exactly is the veil, and what is she to cover herself with?
So I looked at how the Bible clothes its pure women. In Revelation the woman is “clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet” (Revelation 12:1). The bride of the Lamb is arrayed in fine linen, “the righteousness of saints” (Revelation 19:8). The pure woman’s covering in Scripture is light and righteousness, never cloth.
Eve’s Covering of Light
In the garden before the fall, Eve was covered with the light of God’s presence shining through her. It was her clothing. Ellen White describes the sinless pair as clothed “with a covering of light and glory.”
Here is what caught my attention. There is no mention that Eve lost that light when she ate. When she brought Adam the fruit, he did not see that she was naked. It was only after Adam ate that “the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked” (Genesis 3:7).
What does that say about Eve’s deception? Being deceived is not the same as choosing, with full knowledge, to distrust God. Paul himself says that “Adam was not deceived” (1 Timothy 2:14). It was not until Adam deliberately chose to break the trust and agreement he had with his Creator that the connection was severed for both of them.
She Does Not Need a “Head” to Be Saved
This much I am sure of. A woman’s head is her husband, but a woman can have a close relationship with Christ on her own. The verse itself takes for granted that she will pray and prophesy in public, just as the men do. Her covering in no way shields her from Christ or keeps her connection with her Saviour from forming and growing strong on its own.
Her husband does not take the place of Christ in her life. If he did, an unmarried woman could not be saved. Peter calls husband and wife “heirs together of the grace of life” (1 Peter 3:7). A woman does not need a “head” to be saved.
Then What Is the Head For?
So what is the husband’s purpose in Christ’s plan for a married couple? How does he cover her? We are told the two shall become one. He is to share in her life, support her plans and goals, and be her protector and wise best friend.
Paul gives the pattern in Ephesians 5: the husband is head “even as Christ is the head of the church,” and he is to love his wife “as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it” (Ephesians 5:23, 25). Christ’s headship is self-giving, not ruling. A husband who would be his wife’s head must be someone she can respect and whose counsel she can trust. If they do not grow together, there will be strife and upset at home.
It seems the covering lets a woman say without words that she welcomes her husband’s counsel. A woman who will not allow herself to be reasoned with by her husband shames him. But I am still not sure what it fully means that he is her head.
Does It Go Back to the Fall?
I suspect it does. After the fall God told Eve, “thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee” (Genesis 3:16). Ellen White puts it this way: “In the creation God had made her the equal of Adam. Had they remained obedient to God… they would ever have been in harmony with each other; but sin had brought discord, and now their union could be maintained and their harmony preserved only by submission on the part of the one or the other.”
If that is right, then the headship Paul describes isn’t God’s original design. It is God’s provision for keeping a home happy in a fallen world.
Only in Public?
One more thing troubles me. Paul speaks only of the woman’s public spiritual life, how she is seen when she prays or prophesies. Is the covering only for appearances? That is not the Christ I know. He would not have us put on airs, pretending to be something we are not for others to see.
In Corinth, a married woman uncovered in public sent a message about her marriage, so the covering said something true to everyone watching. But the same rule holds for the woman as for the man: the outward sign honors no one unless it is true in the heart.
Questions I’m Still Carrying
This is a first look, and I have more questions than answers:
- What exactly does the woman’s covering symbolize, if it is not a barrier between her and Christ?
- Paul says man is “the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man” (1 Corinthians 11:7). Is her covering meant to hide the glory of man in worship, so that only God’s Glory is seen?
- What does Paul mean when he says she ought to have “power” on her head “because of the angels” (verse 10)?
- Is the husband’s headship a part of creation, or God’s remedy for what sin did to the home?
As Graham Maxwell used to say, when confused, read on. Paul doesn’t finish this thought in verse 5; he keeps building it through verse 15. I’ll keep going one verse at a time and trust that the picture will clear. What I can say today is this: whatever the woman’s covering means, it does not stand between her and her Saviour. Like Eve before the fall, she was made to be clothed in His light.
