Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Soul Invictus · 10-22-2006, 08:29 AM

I wonder where this custom started. I wonder if its foundation began in 1 Corinthians 11:1-16. The specific verses have been bolded.

1Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ.

2Now I praise you, brethren, that ye remember me in all things, and keep the ordinances, as I delivered them to you.

3But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God.

4Every man praying or prophesying, having his head covered, dishonoureth his head.

5But every woman that prayeth or prophesieth with her head uncovered dishonoureth her head: for that is even all one as if she were shaven.

6For if the woman be not covered, let her also be shorn: but if it be a shame for a woman to be shorn or shaven, let her be covered.

7For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man.

8For the man is not of the woman: but the woman of the man.

9Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man.

10For this cause ought the woman to have power on her head because of the angels.

11Nevertheless neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord.

12For as the woman is of the man, even so is the man also by the woman; but all things of God.

13Judge in yourselves: is it comely that a woman pray unto God uncovered?

14Doth not even nature itself teach you, that, if a man have long hair, it is a shame unto him?

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

16But if any man seem to be contentious, we have no such custom, neither the churches of God.

1) Is anyone aware that this passage (or possibly another biblical passage) explains the origin of women wearing hats/coverings in church?

2) Verses 4-5, & 13 only indicate utilizing coverings for prayer/prophecy, If #1 is true, then how does this passage explain wearing hats for the primary portion of the service?

3) Regarding v 10 - what is this 'power' that is on her head? Is it the hat/covering? Is it her man/husband? Is it her hair?

Malachi151 · 10-22-2006, 09:22 AM

Yeah, women need to wear hats, supposedly so that they won't tempt God and the angles into raping them. This is yet another practise in Christianity that comes from paganism.

Toto · 10-22-2006, 09:48 AM

See this post

Quote:

Originally Posted by neilgodfrey

it's about testicles (seriously!) not head covering

The usual explanation that Paul is arguing for the wearing of a veil is contradicted within the same passage (1 Cor 11:2-16) that says a woman's hair itself is given her as a covering.

Troy Martin in a recent Journal of Biblical Literature article (123/1 2004 75-84) sorts everything out (to my satisfaction anyway) with a closer look at the word "peribolaion" (v.15) usually translated as "covering".

The word is used by Euripides (Herc. fur. 1269) and Achilles Tatius (Leuc. Clit. 1.15.2) as a euphemism for testicles. Ancient medical texts by Hippocratic authors explain: hair is hollow and thus acts as a suction for semen, and semen is, of course, stored in the brain and that is why hair is most profuse around the head. After pubescence bodies are large enough for the semen to travel from the brain way way down to the genitalia. Men have to have hairy bodies because they have more semen and hotter bodies than women, so as the semen makes this journey it froths because of the heat of the male body and thence finds temporary escape hatches in the extra male body hair. Women by nature have longer hair than men because, being hollow and hence a good suction agent it is needed to draw up the semen the male attempts to implant in her.

And who can argue with Hippocrates? Certainly not Pseudo-Phocylides who wrote, "Long hair is not fit for males, but for voluptuous women". Nor Aristotle, who said the male testicles are weights that facilitated the drawing of the semen down from the brain to its place of ejaculatory exit, while women on the other hand need hollow bowls to collect it, assisted by the suction power of her longer hollow hair.

Knowing as the ancients did then that hair was part of a woman's genitalia one could easily devise fertility/sterility tests. If a perfumed device was placed in a woman's uterus the doc should be able to smell it through the woman's mouth. This would prove that her body channels for allowing her hair to suck up semen were in good working order. Naturally the woman could enhance her fertility by shaving her pubic hair which otherwise threatened to distract the semen from its correct path. Troy Martin cites Aristophanes and Soranus et al to indicate the widespread understanding of all this medical knowledge.

And this is why in the view of Tertullian (Virg. 11, 12, 17) prepubescent girls were not expected to wear the veil like adult women were. Only after puberty did hair become "a functioning genital".

So Paul, like his contemporaries, understood that a woman's long hair was a glory for her female nature -- it facilitated her true womanly nature of being the most efficient receptacle of semen -- but would of course be a shame for a man's nature. Martin gives reasons from ancient medical and more popular literature for us to believe that the woman's hair was the counterpart of a man's testicles. (He doesn't quite say it, but I guess one might conclude that the respective glories were in direct proportion to size and length.)

Paul is saying that it is just as shameful for a woman to pray with her long hollow suction-powered hair uncovered as it is for a man to pray with his testicles peaking through his garments somehow. This was obviously a quite ghastly problem in olden days since God even gave seraphim extra wings (total 6) to ensure they had the wherewithal to cover their "feet" (Isa 6:2); and while delivering the ten commandments he apparently saw enough to prompt him to issue a quick follow up command about this very thing (Exod. 20:26); and finally warned the priests that unless they took this sort of thing as seriously as he did they would surely die (Exod 28:42-43)!

No wonder 1 Cor 11:13-15 has never been put to rest with the usual explanations. As Troy Martin observes, it has been our ignorance of ancient philology and physiology that has led us to confuse Paul's references to testicles with head coverings!

Troy Martin is at St. Xavier's University, Chicago, but I don't know if any of this should have implications for Catholic teaching on birth control.

Last edited by neilgodfrey : August 1, 2005 at 08:33 PM.

from this previous thread: 1 corinthians woman wearing veils when praying

and

Women covering their hair so as not to tempt the angels?

Chili · 10-22-2006, 11:26 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Soul Invictus

3) Regarding v 10 - what is this 'power' that is on her head? Is it the hat/covering? Is it her man/husband? Is it her hair?

The "power on her head" represents the idea that the woman is the soul of man that was taken from man to be his completion or fulfillment upon his return to Eden. Eden is where the two become one, once again, after the divine marriage of true minds wherein two become one. This divine marriage takes place inside the brain wherein these two minds are estranged from each other to the point that many people deny the existence of a soul.

This division in our mind led to the fall of man who was therefore banned from Eden and thereby also leaves his father and mother behind in Eden to create a world of his own and there look for a female to fill the void that this banishment created. This female, of course, will have a mind and a soul of her own which is the woman that the eye of the soul is attracted to . . . wherefore it is said that love is blind and all good marriages are arranged in heaven.

The head covering by females in Church points at the subservience of the soul to the faculty of reason that is exposed by males in Church where they speak from the pulpit and walk about in the sanctuary as if on the hymen of woman until the bubble breaks and consummation joins two hemispheres = no homo's in Church by inference.

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10-22-2006, 08:29 AM	#1
Soul Invictus Contributor Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: Milwaukee, Wisconsin Posts: 15,576	Church: Women and hats I wonder where this custom started. I wonder if its foundation began in 1 Corinthians 11:1-16. The specific verses have been bolded. 1Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ. 2Now I praise you, brethren, that ye remember me in all things, and keep the ordinances, as I delivered them to you. 3But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God. 4Every man praying or prophesying, having his head covered, dishonoureth his head. 5But every woman that prayeth or prophesieth with her head uncovered dishonoureth her head: for that is even all one as if she were shaven. 6For if the woman be not covered, let her also be shorn: but if it be a shame for a woman to be shorn or shaven, let her be covered. 7For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man. 8For the man is not of the woman: but the woman of the man. 9Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man. 10For this cause ought the woman to have power on her head because of the angels. 11Nevertheless neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord. 12For as the woman is of the man, even so is the man also by the woman; but all things of God. 13Judge in yourselves: is it comely that a woman pray unto God uncovered? 14Doth not even nature itself teach you, that, if a man have long hair, it is a shame unto him? 15But if a woman have long hair, it is a glory to her: for her hair is given her for a covering. 16But if any man seem to be contentious, we have no such custom, neither the churches of God. 1) Is anyone aware that this passage (or possibly another biblical passage) explains the origin of women wearing hats/coverings in church? 2) Verses 4-5, & 13 only indicate utilizing coverings for prayer/prophecy, If #1 is true, then how does this passage explain wearing hats for the primary portion of the service? 3) Regarding v 10 - what is this 'power' that is on her head? Is it the hat/covering? Is it her man/husband? Is it her hair?

10-22-2006, 09:22 AM	#2
Malachi151 Veteran Member Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: Colorado Posts: 8,674	Yeah, women need to wear hats, supposedly so that they won't tempt God and the angles into raping them. This is yet another practise in Christianity that comes from paganism.

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