📖WEB · 1 Corinthians 11:13
What does 1 Corinthians 11:13 mean?
"Judge for yourselves. Is it appropriate that a woman pray to God unveiled?"
— 1 Corinthians 11:13 (World English Bible)
Surrounding context
For this cause the woman ought to have authority over her own head, because of the angels.
Nevertheless, neither is the woman independent of the man, nor the man independent of the woman, in the Lord.
For as woman came from man, so a man also comes through a woman; but all things are from God.
Judge for yourselves. Is it appropriate that a woman pray to God unveiled?
Doesn’t even nature itself teach you that if a man has long hair, it is a dishonor to him?
But if a woman has long hair, it is a glory to her, for her hair is given to her for a covering.
But if any man seems to be contentious, we have no such custom, neither do God’s assemblies.
Explanation
In this verse, Paul pauses his argument about head coverings during worship to appeal directly to the Corinthians' own sense of propriety. Rather than simply issuing a command, he asks them to reason it through themselves: given everything he has just said, does it seem fitting, appropriate, or proper for a woman to pray publicly with her head uncovered? It is a rhetorical question, expecting the answer "no" within the cultural framework he has been building throughout the passage.
The letter of 1 Corinthians was written by the apostle Paul to the church he had founded in Corinth, a bustling, cosmopolitan Greek city with a reputation for mixed cultural customs and social status displays. In chapter 11, Paul addresses disorder in worship gatherings, and one issue concerns whether men and women should have their heads covered or uncovered while praying or prophesying. In that Greco-Roman setting, head coverings (or the lack of them) carried social meaning related to honor, shame, gender distinction, and marital status. Paul's argument leading up to verse 13 draws on creation order, the relationship between Christ, man, and woman, and even the natural analogy of hair length (verses 14-15) to make his case that women should pray with their heads covered as a sign of propriety and honor.
Theologically, the verse reflects Paul's broader concern that worship be conducted "decently
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