It is the plain teaching of scripture, if one would merely read the words and define them with primary meanings, that a woman is supposed have her head covered with hair. Under the inspiration of God, the apostle Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 11 that, “every woman that prayeth or prophesieth with her head uncovered dishonoureth her head: for that is even all one as if she were shaven. For 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” (1Co 11:5-6). Paul, in this passage, gives a stern warning to believers that women ought to have their heads covered and if they don’t then it would be just as shameful as if they were shaven or shorn. Paul reiterated this warning again by posing the question, “Judge in yourselves: is it comely that a woman pray unto God uncovered?” (1Co 11:13). The question was rhetorical by nature and to ask it was to answer it, and the answer is obviously no. God likewise commanded that “Every man praying or prophesying, having his head covered, dishonoureth his head” (1Co 11:4).
As people are wont to do when they either have a poor understanding of scripture or wrest the scripture to their own destruction when they should have known better, some have established a doctrine from this text that women must wear an artificial covering, such as a veil, to cover their heads in order to keep with the teaching of these verses. After all, the Greek word that translated the word “uncovered” in 1Co 11:5 and 1Co 11:13 is the word “akatakaluptos” (G177) which according to James Strong, the infallible source of all truth (I speak as a fool), means “unveiled”, and the Greek word “katakaluptō” (G2619) that is translated “covered” in 1Co 11:6-7 means “to cover wholly, that is, veil: – cover, hide”. Therefore they reason that a woman must cover her head with a veil to be submissive to her husband as 1Co 11:3,8-10 teaches.
The way in which many hairesies (pun intended) are invented is by only reading part way though a passage and stopping prior to getting the entire context of the passage. If one would simply read the following two verses, then he would clearly understand just what this covering is, “Doth not even nature itself teach you, that, if a man have long hair, it is a shame unto him? But if a woman have long hair, it is a glory to her: for her hair is given her for a covering.” (1Co 11:14-15). Now isn’t that so plain? A woman’s HAIR is given her for a COVERING. It was said that if a man pray having his head COVERED, then he dishonoureth his head (1Co 11:4) and verse 14 says that if a man have LONG HAIR, it is a shame unto him. By simply defining the terms with the Oxford English Dictionary, the standard of the English language, we can see that these two passages are speaking of the same thing.
Shame-I. 1. a. The painful emotion arising from the consciousness of something dishonoring…
When the plain words of the King James Bible in English are too obvious to deny, there are always the “scholars” who will invariably “go to the Greek” because they don’t like what the English says because it conflicts with their traditions of men that make the word of God of none effect (Mar 7:13); just as Jesus said, “Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition” (Mar 7:9). The only reason a person will go to the Greek when promoting a false doctrine is because they do not believe that God perfectly preserved His word in English and they need to correct it by relying on a different translation such as Strong’s concordance or a Greek lexicon in which some man has translated the Greek words into English so that the “scholars” can read it and then say, “now that Greek word means thus and so, and that English word should have been translated thus and so”. In the case of the controversial head covering, an educated fool will then go on to tell us that the Greek word translated “covering” in 1Co 11:15 is different from the other words that were translated “covering” in the previous verses. It is the word “peribolaion” (G4018) rather than “katakalupto” and “akatakaluptos” that were used in verses 5-7 and 13. Therefore it is abundantly obvious to the person who refuses to believe the plain words of the KJV, that the “covering” in verses 5-7 and 13 is completely different from the “covering” in verse 15. Only a mere English-only speaking simpleton would not understand that the covering in verses 5-7 and 13 is an artificial veil, and that the covering in verse 15 is totally different, being the woman’s hair. With the help of a Greek lexicon, these “unlearned and unstable” people have wrested part of Paul’s epistle, just like Peter said they would (2Pe 3:16).
This whole hairetical doctrine is based on the fact that the Greek word in verse 15 is different than the others. This false doctrine falls to pieces as the sandy foundation it is built upon gets eroded away by its own method, which accords well with what the scripture says about an heretic, that he is “condemned of himself” (Tit 3:11). Let’s first destroy this hairesy with the very thing it is built on: the Greek words that underlie the KJV English words and their supposed definitions out of a Greek lexicon. The Greek word translated “covering” in verse 15 is “peribolaion”. Strong’s concordance defines “peribolaion” as: “something thrown around one, that is, a mantle, veil: – covering, vesture”. The definition is basically identical to the definitions of the other two Greek words translated as “covered” in verses 5-7 and 13, which were defined a few paragraphs ago. The interesting thing is that the “covering” in verse 15 is the woman’s hair, “…her hair is given her for a covering…”, which even a “hairetic” could not deny. The Greek definition says that the woman’s hair is therefore “something thrown around one, that is, a mantle, veil: -covering, vesture”. The whole idea that the veil in verse 6 is not a woman’s hair is a boldfaced lie based on poor Bible hermeneutics (interpretation); and the Greek definition proves it.
Since we speak English and any other language is “all Greek to us”, we need not go to the Greek to prove this heresy to be false; we need only to define the English words with their primary meanings and be like the Levites who “gave the sense, and caused them to understand the reading” (Neh 8:8). A covering is defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as: “That which covers or is adapted to cover, whether for protection, shelter, concealment, or adornment; a cover; a cloth to spread over; clothing; the outer coating or integument.” A woman’s hair is a veil in that sense of the word, it is a “cover; a cloth to spread over; clothing” to clothe her head. She need not wear some artificial veil made of fig leaves or some other material that God never commanded her to wear, but only to wear her hair long enough to cover her head.
