1 Corinthians 11:5

The opposite condition existed when women prayed or prophesied in the church meetings. Every woman who had her physical skull uncovered thereby dishonored her metaphorical head, namely, her husband (if married) or father (if single; 1 Corinthians 11:3).

What did Paul mean when he described a woman’s head as "uncovered?" There have been three major explanations. He may have meant that her head lacked some type of external cover, such as a shawl. Second, he could have meant that she had short hair that did not cover her head as completely as long hair. Third, he may have meant that she had let her hair down rather than leaving it piled up on her head. In this culture it was customary for women to wear their hair up when they went out in public. Probably he meant that she did not have an external covering on her head (view one). [Note: See Fee, The First . . ., pp. 495-97, 509-10.] The woman would dishonor her man by participating in public worship as he did, namely, with head uncovered.

Christian women typically wore a head-covering in the church meetings. This was not a stylish hat, skullcap, or inconspicuous doily, as some western women do today, but a shawl that covered her entire head and concealed her hair. [Note: Bruce, 1 and 2 Corinthians, p. 104.]

"Her face was hidden by an arrangement of two head veils, a head-band on the forehead with bands to the chin, and a hairnet with ribbons and knots, so that her features could not be recognized." [Note: Joachim Jeremias, Jerusalem in the Time of Jesus, p. 359.]

This was similar to what some modern Islamic women wear: a head-covering (Arabic hijab) and a face-veil (Arabic niqab). In Paul’s culture most women, Christians and non-Christians alike, wore such a covering whenever they went out in public. Conservative Islamic women still veil themselves similarly when they go out in public.

Probably the issue in the Corinthian church that Paul was addressing was that certain "wise," "spiritual," liberated women had stopped wearing this covering in the church meetings. Paul had previously written that in Christ males and females are equal before God (Galatians 3:28). He meant we are equal in our standing before God. This teaching, combined with the Corinthians’ carnal tendencies, were evidently the root of the problem.

"It seems that the Corinthian slogan, ’everything is permissible,’ had been applied to meetings of the church as well, and the Corinthian women had expressed that principle by throwing off their distinguishing dress. More importantly they seem to have rejected the concept of subordination within the church (and perhaps in society) and with it any cultural symbol (e.g., a head-covering) which might have been attached to it. According to Paul, for a woman to throw off the covering was an act not of liberation but of degradation." [Note: Lowery, p. 529. See also H. Wayne House, "Should a Woman Prophesy or Preach before Men?" Bibliotheca Sacra 145:578 (April-June 1988):141-61, who concluded that she should not.]