What does Paul mean in 1 Corinthians 11:14-16 ?

[McCulloch]

Does not 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 one is inclined to be contentious, we have no other practice, nor have the churches of God.

"Nature itself teach you" ? How does that work? In what way does nature teach us about hair cuts and gender?

[Talishi]

Does not 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 one is inclined to be contentious, we have no other practice, nor have the churches of God.

"Nature itself teach you" ? How does that work? In what way does nature teach us about hair cuts and gender?

If a fellow doesn't cut his hair, nature causes it to grow as long as the hair of the ladies.

[Elijah John]

Does not 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 one is inclined to be contentious, we have no other practice, nor have the churches of God.

"Nature itself teach you" ? How does that work? In what way does nature teach us about hair cuts and gender?

This is "Adam's rib" kind of thinking. Hard to believe that someone so eloquent and wise as Paul can make such an unexamined observation.

But don't it beat all, he's gone and done it!

[Talishi]

This is "Adam's rib" kind of thinking. Hard to believe that someone so eloquent and wise as Paul can make such an unexamined observation.

Then again, in this time, people didn't understand inertia, and went along with Aristotle's thing about motion requiring a continuous impulse to be sustained. Nobody bothered to check that until Galileo (pbuh).

[JehovahsWitness]

Does not 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 one is inclined to be contentious, we have no other practice, nor have the churches of God.

"Nature itself teach you" ? How does that work? In what way does nature teach us about hair cuts and gender?

QUESTION: Was Paul indicating that mens hair would naturally stay shorter than a womans when left uncut?

It's very unlikely that the Apostle Paul was unaware of how hair works. Indeed his very point is that if left uncut a mans hair would grow as long as a womans and that that would be dishonorable to him. So what did he mean by "does not even nature teach you..."

Nature is defined as ..." the physical world and everything in it (such as plants, animals, mountains, oceans, stars, etc.) that is not made by people"... "the way that a person or animal behaves : the character or personality of a person or animal"

So Paul was speaking of learning a lesson from the world, that is the sum of human behavior, the natural way of things as expressed in the order that exists. The lesson was taught not by the hair (and how *it* behaves or is constituted, ie that it falls out in men if left beyond a certain length), the lesson came from the physical world around us, in relation to hair.

What then do we see when we look at the world and everything in it? Do we see men favoring long hair and women short? While there are cultures where long hair is worn by men, especially warriors (to specifically give them a more dramatic appearance) or for religious purposes* generally speaking women have traditionally worn their hair longer than their men, while men for convenience and practicality have favored shorter styles. This has been especially true amongst ordinary working class folk whose men had neither the time, the means nor the inclination to follow the dandy styles of the "idle rich".

So Paul was not indicating the length of hair was gender specific because of its constitution, but rather that observable human behavior naturally tends to create certain gender specific distinctions which are considered dishonerable when disregarded. We use the word nature/naturally in a similar way today.

For example someone might say "He was an abusive, violent husband so naturally (or it was natural) that she divorced him". This does not mean that divorces spring up unaided by humans as a force of nature like mushrooms but that the consequence was the natural, or logical consequence true to what one would expect in the world of human behavior.

CONCLUSION: Paul was not expressing his ignorance of how hair works, but making an observation of how the world works in naturally created gender distinctions.



* There are a number of bible stories that specifically mention men with long hair, but this was the exception rather than the rule; long hair was worn by a particular religious group in Hebrew culture (Nazarines) as a sign of their submission to God, but was cut at the end of their devotional period.


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[Talishi]

CONCLUSION: Paul was not expressing his ignorance of how hair works, but making an observation of how the world works in naturally created gender distinctions.

Paul asserted that long hair was a shame to men. He was not correct. Samson, for example, lost his God-given strength when his hair was cut off.

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to post 6 by Talishi]

Did you have a point to make? If so, do you feel inclined to express them in your own words? I do believe this is a debating forum that favors such exchanges.


JW

[JehovahsWitness]

Paul asserted that long hair was a shame to men. He was not correct. Samson, for example, lost his God-given strength when his hair was cut off.

I will direct you to the footnote to my post #5 above.

* There are a number of bible stories that specifically mention men with long hair, but this was the exception rather than the rule; long hair was worn by a particular religious group in Hebrew culture (Nazatites**) as a sign of their submission to God, but was cut at the end of their devotional period.

** I mistakenly wrote "nazarene" ; it should have read NazaRITE. Here corrected.

Paul was making a general statement about "nature"; it seems reasonable he (as an Israelite, very familiar with the Mosaic law) was aware of the "exceptions" such as those under the vow of Nazariteship.

I'd point out that normally that provision under the law was temporary. There are only a few men in scriptures for whom this seemed a permanent arrangement, Samson was one and Samuel another. These were as I said "exceptions" rather than what Paul seems to have been drawing attention to "the rule".

JW

[liamconnor]

[Replying to post 1 by McCulloch]

Phusis (Greek) does not necessarily refer to "nature" in our sense of the word (wilderness, wildness, uninhibited and unmodified processes etc.).

In Poetics Plato says that "nature itself teaches that the heroic hexameter is the right meter." Plato is merely reemphasizing what he said previously, that the superiority of the heroic hexameter is proved from experience; one might say, customary consensus.

That seems to be Paul's use of the word. Paul is relying upon the customary consensus that men with long hair are, well, weird, as well as women with short hair. This customary consensus serves as "nature".

From here Paul builds an analogy between hair lengths and liturgical practices. Just as women have a "natural" covering (long hair) so too in worship they should wear an artificial one.

Now, why it was important to Paul that women wear coverings during worship is not clear.

[marco]

Does not 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 one is inclined to be contentious, we have no other practice, nor have the churches of God.

It isn't a dishonour for a man to have long hair. Therefore Paul is wrong. If he is commenting on some convention, this statement has no place in Scripture and should never have been included.

Drawing conclusions about women's long hair or men's short hair is rather silly. When he strays from what he's good at, Paul is as capable as anyone else of blundering. This is a good illustration.
Defending him on theological grounds reduces Scripture to silliness, so perhaps we should simply accept that Paul is a fallible human being.