Over the last year, I have been on a quest to discover what the Bible actually says about the role of women in ministry. As I have been diving into this subject, the topic of head coverings has surfaced over and over again. I have spent countless hours combing through research trying to answer the questions surrounding this topic:

• Was Paul commanding the women to wear head coverings as a reaction to the culture around the church in Corinth?
• Is this a command for the Corinthians then and for us now?
• If this is a command for us now, what are the parameters? Is it for while we pray? While we worship? Only at church, or also at home?

The passage addressing head coverings is 1 Corinthians 11:2-16. Some would argue that because this is the only passage in Scripture that mentions this topic, we shouldn’t put much weight on it. On this issue, I agree with Partridge when he points out that the number of times something is mentioned in the Bible doesn’t negate its truth. There are many commands in Scripture that appear only once, and we don’t question their authority (11). So we should treat this passage as we treat any passage in Scripture and study it to answer the questions it raises.

I have listened to both men and women discuss this topic, most in favor, yet have not been convinced by their arguments. I’m not trying to be obstinate; I have truly wanted to be convinced. I even wore wide headbands to church for a while wanting to err on the side of caution until I fully studied the topic. Yet no argument has proven to me definitively that Scripture commands head coverings for women today. I also watched a seven-hour-long YouTube video from Mike Winger in which he concludes that head coverings are not mandatory but an issue of Christian liberty and potentially church or location specific.

When I saw that Dale Partridge, a pastor I have admired and respected for some time*, published a book on the topic, A Cover for Glory, with the subheading, “A Biblical Defense for Headcoverings,” I was excited to get my hands on it and dive in. I was not disappointed by the amount of research he put into the book. He cites many Bible scholars throughout church history, discusses the topic of submission in depth, and honestly, seems to come at the topic from every possible angle. Yet I find myself unconvinced that I should be wearing a head covering during my church’s worship service. While he includes all of the research, he fails to prove biblically that all women in all times and in all places should wear head coverings in church.

I am certainly not dismissing this book as poorly written or lacking in content. Partridge includes a lot of great information about the history of head coverings in the church, the definition of submission, and the meaning of glory. He simply fails to prove the point his book is intended to prove.

The Role of Feminism

One thing that has bothered me for a long time, and honestly one reason I have wanted to be convinced on this topic, is that women stopped wearing head coverings in church due to the feminist movement.  As feminism grew, many of the symbols of submission in our society began to fall out of practice, including the wearing of head coverings during worship. I, like many other Christian women, do not subscribe to the feminist ideals and would have relished a way to react against it, even in some small rebellion like wearing head coverings.

Partridge dives into this issue and points out the influence feminism has had on the church. In fact, he goes so far as to accuse pastors who don’t encourage head coverings in their church of bowing to feminism because they don’t want to “poke the bear” (115-18). There is no doubt that feminism has affected the American church, but this raises another question for me. Did women understand the reason they wore head coverings in the first place? If there had been a biblical reason for it, would they have been so quick to toss it aside?

As a child, I remember watching the movie Easter Parade in which the focus of Easter, a religious holiday with so much meaning, was the hat or bonnet on each woman’s head. If the concern is what our hat looks like instead of what it is supposed to represent, we are wearing it for the wrong reason, potentially even sinning in doing so. So while it is true that the practice of head coverings diminished due to feminism, I have to wonder how many women even understood the meaning behind wearing a hat (or bonnet) to church. The purpose fell away long before the practice.

The Definition of Submission

Partridge does a good job of explaining biblical submission in the book. He spends multiple chapters talking about biblical authority and gender roles, and he returns to the topic again and again throughout the book. Overall, I was impressed with his ability to explain this complicated and nuanced topic. However, I will add that many times he left the statements incomplete, leaving the impression that women are to submit to men in general while Scripture says that a woman is to submit to her own husband. This is an important distinction.

The dilemma I had with this topic is that, while he goes to great lengths to define and describe biblical submission, he does not successfully tie it back to the practice of head coverings. Yes, the passage talks about headship but it is unclear if this discussion about head coverings was specific to the Corinthians due to their culture or if it is for all believers in all time periods and cultures.

Errors and Inconsistencies

One major concern for me in this book is the misrepresentation of Scripture. In chapter 2, Partridge introduces Tamar. While he says she disguises herself as a prostitute in one paragraph, in the next, he refers to her as a harlot as an introduction into the topic of punishment for harlotry in the Old Testament. This is misleading because the account of Tamar is not about prostitution but about a woman who is mistreated by the men in her life and how God vindicates her (in spite of her tactics) and allows her to be included in the lineage of the Messiah.

In another instance (chapter 10), he begins to tell the story of Haman and Mordecai. The book of Esther makes it clear that in God’s sovereignty and providence the king innocently made Haman honor Mordecai in the way Haman himself hoped to be honored. Yet Partridge tells the account differently: “For those of you who know the story of Esther, Haman had planned to sabotage Esther’s uncle Mordecai, but the king had become aware of his scheme, and Haman is now forced to honor Mordecai in public” (145). It made me question if he knew the story.

Finally, Partridge discusses Naaman, the military commander who was stricken with leprosy. When he visits the prophet Elisha and is told to dunk in the Jordan seven times, he is offended and refuses. Partridge ends the story here, using it as an argument that pride keeps us from blessing (so women should not be too proud to cover their heads during worship). But the story goes on, and Naaman does what he is told, thus healing his leprosy. So he didn’t miss out on the blessing.

At best, Partridge simply doesn’t know these stories. At worst, he is twisting Scripture to support his argument. In either case, this is not proper handling of the Word of God.

Adding to the Book

But worse yet is when Partridge adds to God’s Word. This is most notable when he claims “Eve’s purpose was never to rule but to ornament and help her husband” (emphasis mine) (92). Scripture never says that a woman is an ornament to her husband. Yes, the Proverbs 31 woman does make her husband look good, and wives should always strive to be a positive reflection on their husbands, but there are times in a woman’s life when the last thing on her mind is to be an ornament to her husband because she is concerned with her duties as a wife and/or mother. Scripture never commands that a woman must ornament her husband but that she honors God in all she does. (I would also argue that the command to have dominion over the earth was given to both Adam and Eve, so in some sense, Eve’s purpose was to rule, just not over her husband.)

More subtly in the same chapter, he presents the argument that women are not to have authority over men in any arena of life. Scripture only addresses this in the realms of church and home. The Bible does not forbid women to participate in leadership positions in their communities, education, business, etc. You could certainly make an argument for this being your preference, but it is not discussed in Scripture.

Honestly, this chapter (chapter 7) was the most problematic for me. Partridge quotes a Dr. McFall in a way that leaves one thinking a woman must go through a man to reach God (though he denies this in other sections of the book). At one point, I even wrote a question in the margin: “Can a woman lead a man to the Lord?,” and I wonder how Partridge would answer this question.

But this chapter was also the most interesting because he presented an idea that was new to me. He described Adam as a representation of Christ and Eve as a representation of the church–a new Adam and a new Eve. Since he quotes Tertullian and Augustine in this section, it is obviously not a new idea, but it was one I had never encountered, and it caused me to ponder. 

In chapter 10, Partridge brings up the topic of a woman’s long hair being attractive to men and baldness being unattractive to them. This leads to the implication that women should cover their hair during worship so as not to become a distraction to men. While it may be true that some men are sexually aroused by a woman’s long hair, the only passage in Scripture about head coverings does not point to this as a reason for wearing them. Since this would be an easy position to defend and would certainly make this passage clearer to modern readers, one would think Paul would have included it if it was pertinent, yet he didn’t. 

“Universal” Examples of Head Coverings

Partridge includes several examples from our culture to reinforce his points, but he fails to see that these examples are unique to our culture. For example, he claims that women demonstrate submission by laying down their last names at the altar. I grew up in a culture where this was not the practice. He claims that there is gender-specific attire for special occasions (weddings, the opera, etc.), yet women refuse to wear the appropriate attire for worship. Again, this is very culture-specific, and honestly seems to be changing in modern times. 

He uses the example of men removing their hats during prayer at a Nascar event as evidence that men don’t struggle to practice the command to them to not wear a head covering during worship. Yet when you walk into a worship service at many churches in our country, you will see many men wearing hats because this is not something they have been taught. And when it is taught, men are to remove their hats inside any building, not just the church.

“Spiritual Transgenderism”

At the beginning of the book, Partridge states that our culture’s current confusion about gender is a result of women no longer wearing head coverings (14). His argument is that removing this symbol of truth has caused the truth of gender distinctions to be forgotten. But at the end of the book, he brings this argument full circle when he says, “To God, a man worshiping with his head covered and a woman worshiping with her head uncovered is a sight of spiritual transgenderism, and it is shameful” (158). This is a bold claim!

What I Learned about Head Coverings

While Partridge claims this book is a biblical defense for head coverings, I felt it was a better defense of the cultural argument for head coverings. Chapter 5 discusses the Corinthian culture at the time this letter was written. After going through several descriptions of religious practices in Rome during this time period, he says, “In sum, Paul’s teaching here in 1 Corinthians 11:2-16 is not simply affirming the religious customs of Corinth; it was instructing a new Christian practice that was the exact opposite of the religious customs of Corinth” (61). 

Paul was giving the Corinthians a new practice to set them apart from the religious customs of their culture at that time. It even set them apart from Jews whose Rabbis wore prayer shawls during religious events. To this day, Jewish men wear yamakas during their worship. This argument seems to fit the best with this passage based on my study. 

 Where I Land on Head Coverings

As believers under the New Covenant, we do not follow all of the laws given to the Old Testament Jews. The laws that still apply to us are those that are repeated or reinforced in the New Testament. This is why we don’t worry about eating pork and why we no longer offer birds or livestock as sacrifices. This practice of head coverings was not even a law for the Old Testament Jews, so this mention in the letter to the Corinthians is the first time any Jew would have heard the law, yet it is vague as if it is given to people who would understand and have a reason to practice it.

Another concern I have with the practice of head coverings is that it adds to the to do’s of the Christian life while Christ and the authors of the New Testament were continually removing things from the lengthy to-do list. This goes so far as circumcision, the symbol of being one of God’s chosen people. Paul goes to great lengths in the book of Romans to establish that circumcision is no longer necessary and to reinforce that God is more concerned about the heart of the person than any outward symbol.

I am not saying that women should not wear head coverings if they feel led to do so. There are countries where a head covering is culturally necessary. And there are churches here in America that teach head coverings, so wearing one is a sign of submission to the leaders of the church. You may attend a church that does not practice head coverings but you feel a conviction to do so. By all means, submit to the guidance and conviction of the Holy Spirit in your life. 

I am saying that I am still waiting to be convinced that this command is meant for all people at all times in all places, and thus far, I remain unconvinced. And I want to be convinced! If this is truly what God would have all women do, I want to be obedient. But until such a time as that happens or the Holy Spirit convicts me personally, I will continue to worship from the heart knowing that is what God sees.

*Recently, Dale Partridge, along with Joel Webbon, the author of the foreword in the book, have made some public statements about the role of women that add to the standards set in Scripture. As a result, I have ceased to follow or listen to Dale Partridge, relearnhq, and Right Response Ministries.

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