Now I want you to realize that the head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is man, and the head of Christ is God. Every man who prays or prophesies with his head covered dishonors his head. And every woman who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her head – it is just as though her head were shaved. If a woman does not cover her head, she should have her hair cut off; and if it is a disgrace for a woman to have her hair cut or shaved off, she should cover her head. A man ought not to cover his head, since he is the image and glory of God; but the woman is the glory of man. For man did not come from woman, but woman from man; neither was man created for woman, but woman for man. For this reason, and because of the angels, the woman ought to have a sign of authority on her head.

In the Lord, however, woman is not independent of man, nor is man independent of woman. For as woman came from man, so also man is born of woman. But everything comes from God. 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. If anyone wants to be contentious about this, we have no other practice – nor do the churches of God. (1 Corinthians 11:3-16)

A common approach is to cite the ancient culture to make the passage inapplicable or somewhat inapplicable for today. Some people have used it in an attempt to undermine my argument about Paul’s commands regarding spiritual gifts. That is, I argue that Paul commands us to desire spiritual gifts, to forbid not speaking in tongues, to test all things, and so on, but they answer that I must then also accept 1 Corinthians 11 as it is written. The fact is that I do, and I find it insulting that they assume I would not, as if I am like them. Their argument backfires, and confirms my complaint that they so easily dismiss Scripture and find ways to disobey it whenever it teaches something that they find even slightly inconvenient.

In verses 8-15, Paul does not appeal to culture, but to creation and the inherent relationship between God, man, and woman. The command stands today. It does not teach that a woman must wear a veil, but only that she should not look like a man. She should have long hair and maintain a feminine appearance. If any part of the passage is indeed restricted to the culture of that day, to take the reference to a shaved head as a possible example, notice that it still has no effect on the application. The basis of Paul’s argument is still creation and not culture, and the application still requires women to look like women and men to look like men. And if the retort is that how men and women ought to look depends on the culture, first, I contest this assumption – I demand an infallible proof for this – and second, this is not what Paul says, so again it is smuggled into the discussion by force in order to subvert the passage’s explicit instruction. Rather, it seems that the Bible itself has defined how men and women ought to look as men and women.

The hermeneutical principle that interprets every little detail of the biblical text against ancient cultural background is overrated and overused. It is common to find that one can either reach the same conclusion just by reading the text (the scholars took off to the archaeological sites before they finished reading the sentence), or that the cultural analysis (often based on much speculation, reducing the reliability of the conclusion at every step) actually leads to a conclusion that is contrary to the plain words of the text. This principle in hermeneutics, especially when it becomes such an obsession that it becomes more significant than the text itself, does great injury to the sufficiency and perspicuity of Scripture.

Like they do to many other passages, with this one in 1 Corinthians 11, Christians immediately reach for a cultural explanation to neutralize it, because it seems to be a threat against our modern lifestyle and preferences. But Paul gives a number of reasons for his command, and they have nothing to do with culture. He appeals to creation, to nature, and so on, but not the culture that exists around his audience. Yet they appeal to a culture that Paul does not refer to in order to dismiss what he commands on the basis of creation.

Now if there is an infallible and biblical argument that Paul is referring only to his culture, then this would satisfy the requirement I stated (that only an infallible biblical argument is able to release us from an explicit biblical command), and one would still be unable to use this passage to contest the requirement itself or my insistence that the apostolic commands in 1 Corinthians 12-14 remain in full force. In his attempt to reduce verse 14 to a mere cultural allusion, one foolish commentator cites the Nazirite vow, but that would be an explicit and infallible exception, as not everyone is a Nazirite. So it has no effect on 1 Corinthians 11. And then he refers to Absalom…but wait, are we to let Absalom teach us what it means to follow the law? Absalom also did other things. Maybe this commentator should read about him first.

While we are at it, stop making this passage a mere test case. It is an actual teaching to be learned and followed, but so many Christians use it only as an exercise in hermeneutics or a tool to overturn other passages that they dislike. It is certainly true in any culture, as Proverbs would attest, that whether or not they cover their heads, Christians (if they are Christians at all) who have little reverence for the Scripture and who do not know what they are talking about should at least cover their mouths, lest they continuously spew out foolishness and bring shame to their head, Jesus Christ.