[Diligent]

Originally Posted by jerry

Nature doesn't teach us that a woman should cover her hair - but that a woman should have long hair and a man have short hair.

We should be very careful not to misquote the Bible. The Bible says nature teaches it is a shame for a man to have long hair -- not that a man must have short hair. There is a difference, I think.

(Says a guy who sometimes shaves his head in the summer!)

Hi Pastor Mikie, Just wondering about your treating this as the same as a matter of faith and esteeming days differently, if you would apply the same scriptures to women's dressing to show off their bodies, or men's wearing a hat to church and the like? Or how about where Paul exhorts us not to be ostentatious in how we dress, decorating the hair with braids and jewels and so on? These are all outward things like the head covering. If those aren't a matter of faith and Christian liberty but of church order why do you make the issue of covering the head that kind of issue?

To answer your question about how I feel, some of the women in my church who think I'm wrong about the head covering like to let me know it in slightly unfriendly ways, so I don't feel too great around them. Obedience is more important than how I'm treated, though, and the scriptures I try to remember have to do with patience and longsuffering. I've heard of churches too where women who cover their heads are disciplined or even sent away.

Thank you, Granny. I really appreciate your contributing to this thread. It helps a great deal not to be completely alone with this.

That's right, the scripture doesn't say how long a woman's hair has to be or a man's. The main thing may be the difference between them. In the centuries when men in Europe and America had very long hair by today's standards, the women had even longer hair. Even among the hippies that difference was usually the case.

Connie, I was applying the principal in general terms. Because "whatsoever is not of faith is sin" can stand alone.

And for the record, I'm appalled at the way women dress, especially church women. Cleavage has somehow become a token of being feminine. Also, some wear their pants so tight, no one can breathe. And, dresses are so short or form fitting, I want to run and hide. Hair is about the only safe thing left to look at these days.

I was trying to help you not be in bondage over this issue. I'm not convinced Paul is teaching that women need to wear hats to church. I'm a happily married man, and I have a wife who dresses modestly. Even she gets embarrassed by how women dress. She gets angry because she thinks (and I agree) that women are being a distraction in the house of God.

Diligent, would you elaborate a little more about the comment on shaving the head.

I understand and feel the same way, Pastor Mikie, though of course I see the matter of the head covering as in the same category as modest dress and men's not covering their heads, as obedience rather than Christian liberty or a matter of personal faith.

I get your point about long hair being the least of the distractions at times, but that may only be in our culture we're so used to it. But as for dressing modestly, women go to the gym these days to keep their bodies toned and sometimes wear clothing including pants designed to show off that toned muscle even in church. I can't help staring at them myself. It doesn't seduce me of course as it might a man but it does distract me. I don't understand why they don't feel convicted about such things. Even if a woman covers up from neck to ankle the clothing can reveal more than it hides.

Another question is, Why isn't having long hair a matter of bondage if covering the head is, since both are worn as a matter of obedience according to one's understanding of the Bible?

Originally Posted by Connie

Another question is, Why isn't having long hair a matter of bondage if covering the head is, since both are worn as a matter of obedience according to one's understanding of the Bible?

1 Corinthians 11:15 But if a woman have long hair, it is a glory to her: for her hair is given her for a covering.

For a woman to have long hair, is a glory to her, not a command. and as this verse says her hair is given her for a covering.

What is your understanding of 1 Cor 11:15?

Connie, I have to admit this verse is confusing to me also.

Here is some commentary in case John Gill can explain better then any attempt I might make. Which would be the case of course.

John Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible
1Co 11:6

For if the woman be not covered,… That is, if her head is not covered with some sort of covering, as is the custom of the place where she lives,

let her also be shorn; let her hair be cut short; let her wear it as men do theirs; and let her see how she will look, and how she will like that, and how she will be looked upon, and liked by others; everybody will laugh at her, and she will be ashamed of herself:

but if it be a shame for a woman to be shorn or shaven: as it is accounted in all civilized nations: the very Heathens1 speak of it as a thing abominable, and of which there should not be one single dreadful example: then let her be covered; with a veil, or any sort of covering in common use.

Sorry to add another post, but this also looked helpful

John Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible
1Co 11:5

But every woman that prayeth or prophesieth,… Not that a woman was allowed to pray publicly in the congregation, and much less to preach or explain the word, for these things were not permitted them: see 1Co 14:34 but it designs any woman that joins in public worship with the minister in prayer, and attends on the hearing of the word preached, or sings the praises of God with the congregation, as we have seen, the word prophesying signifies,

with her head uncovered. It may seem strange from whom the Corinthian women should take up this custom, since the Jewish women were not allowed to go into the streets, or into any open and public place, unveiled1. It was a Jewish law, that they should go out no where bare headed2: yea, it was reckoned scandalous and ignominious to do so. Hence it is said,3 שגלוי הראש גנאי להם, "that uncovering of the head is a reproach" to the daughters of Israel: and concerning the adulterous woman, it is represented as said by the priest4,

"thou hast separated from the way of the daughters of Israel; for the way or custom of the daughters of Israel is להיות מכוסות ראשיהן, "to have their heads covered"; but thou hast gone "in the ways of the Gentiles", who walk with head bare.''

So that their it should seem that these Corinthians followed the examples of the Heathens: but then, though it might be the custom of some nations for women to go abroad bare headed; yet at their solemnities, where and when they were admitted, for they were not everywhere and always, they used to attend with their heads veiled and covered5. Mr. Mede takes notice indeed of some Heathen priestesses, who used to perform their religious rites and sacrifices with open face, and their hair hanging down, and locks spreading, in imitation of whom these women at Corinth are thought to act. However, whoever behaved in this uncomely manner, whose example soever she followed, the apostle says,

dishonoureth her head; not her husband, who is her head in a figurative sense, and is dishonoured by her not being covered; as if she was not subject to him, or because more beautiful than he, and therefore shows herself; but her natural head, as appears from the reason given:

for that is even all one as if she were shaven; to be without a veil, or some sort of covering on her head, according to the custom of the country, is the same thing as if her head was shaved; and everyone knows how dishonourable and scandalous it is for a woman to have her head shaved; and if this is the same, then it is dishonourable and scandalous to her to be without covering in public worship. And this shows, that the natural head of the man is meant in the preceding verse, since the natural head of the woman is meant in this.