Day 2: Head Coverings and the Lord's Supper

Reading: 1 Corinthians 11

Listen to: 1 Corinthians chapter 11

Historical Context

First Corinthians 11 addresses two distinct but related problems in Corinthian worship, both rooted in the same fundamental confusion about what it means to gather as the body of Christ. The first half (vv. 2-16) deals with the head-covering controversy, and the second half (vv. 17-34) with the scandalous abuse of the Lord’s Supper. Both reveal a congregation that treated worship as an arena for self-assertion rather than mutual edification.

The head-covering passage is among the most debated texts in the Pauline corpus, and honest interpretation requires acknowledging its complexity. Paul begins by commending the Corinthians for maintaining “the traditions” he had delivered to them (v. 2), then introduces a hierarchical framework: “the head of every man is Christ, the head of a wife is her husband, and the head of Christ is God” (v. 3). The Greek word kephalē (“head”) is the crux of the debate. In classical Greek it can mean “source” or “origin” (as a river’s head is its source) or “authority over” (as in the head of a household). Scholarly opinion remains divided, but the context suggests Paul is working with both senses: Christ is both the source and the authority of man, the man is both the source (in the Genesis 2 narrative of woman being formed from man) and the relational head of the woman, and God is both the source and the authority of Christ in the incarnational economy.

The practical issue was that some Corinthian women were praying and prophesying with uncovered heads, and some men with covered heads, reversing the cultural conventions of the ancient Mediterranean world. In Roman society, elite men typically covered their heads during religious rituals (the capite velato tradition), while Greek custom expected men to worship bare-headed. For women, an uncovered head in public could signal sexual availability or a deliberate rejection of marital modesty. In Corinth’s melting-pot culture, these conventions were colliding, and some believers – perhaps influenced by an over-realized eschatology that erased all social distinctions (cf. Galatians 3:28) – were deliberately flouting gender conventions as a sign of spiritual liberation.

Paul’s argument weaves together creation theology (drawing on Genesis 1-2), cultural propriety, the witness of “nature” (v. 14, likely meaning established custom), and the practice of all the other churches (v. 16). He insists that while men and women are mutually interdependent (“in the Lord woman is not independent of man nor man of woman,” v. 11), their worship should reflect – not obliterate – the created distinctions between them. The passage is notoriously difficult to apply across cultures, precisely because Paul appeals to both transcultural theology (the creation order) and culturally specific practices (head coverings). The church has wrestled with the right balance between principle and practice ever since.

What is unmistakably clear, however, is that Paul assumes women pray and prophesy in the gathered assembly (v. 5). He does not challenge their right to do so; he addresses only the manner in which they do it. This assumption has significant implications for the interpretation of the apparently contradictory command in 14:34 (“women should keep silent in the churches”), suggesting that the later passage addresses a different and more specific situation.

The second half of the chapter turns to the Lord’s Supper, and here Paul’s tone shifts from pastoral reasoning to prophetic rebuke. “When you come together, it is not the Lord’s supper that you eat” (v. 20). This stunning declaration effectively says: what you are doing is so far from what Jesus intended that it does not deserve the name. The problem was rooted in the social stratification of Corinthian culture. The Lord’s Supper was observed as a full communal meal (an agapē feast, or love feast) hosted in the home of a wealthy patron. In Roman dining conventions, the host and his social equals reclined in the triclinium (the formal dining room, which held perhaps nine to twelve people), enjoying the best food and wine, while the lower-status guests crowded into the atrium (the courtyard), receiving inferior fare. The wealthy arrived early (they had leisure); the working poor and slaves arrived late (they had no choice). The result was that “one goes hungry, another gets drunk” (v. 21). The meal that was supposed to display the radical equality of the body of Christ was instead reinforcing the very social hierarchies the gospel had abolished.

Paul responds by transmitting the earliest written account of the Last Supper, using the technical language of tradition: “For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you” (v. 23). The words paralambanō (“received”) and paradidōmi (“delivered”) are the standard Jewish terms for the transmission of authoritative tradition, and Paul’s account (written in the early 50s AD) predates the Gospel accounts by a decade or more, making it the oldest written record of the institution of the Eucharist. The words of institution – “This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me” and “This cup is the new covenant in my blood” (vv. 24-25) – connect the supper to the Sinai covenant meal (Exodus 24:8-11) and to Jeremiah’s prophecy of a new covenant (Jeremiah 31:31-34).

Paul then issues a solemn warning: “Whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord” (v. 27). The “unworthy manner” is not about the individual’s subjective feelings of unworthiness but about the social behavior that dishonors the body – both the body of Christ on the cross and the body of Christ gathered at the table. “For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself” (v. 29). “Discerning the body” means recognizing the gathered community as the body of Christ and treating its members accordingly. The Corinthians’ sin was not a liturgical error but a social one: they failed to see Christ in one another.

Key Themes

• Created distinctions in worship – Paul argues that worship should reflect, not erase, the distinctions embedded in creation, even as it affirms the mutual interdependence of men and women in the Lord.
• The Lord’s Supper as social equalizer – The eucharistic meal is meant to embody the radical equality of the body of Christ, abolishing the social hierarchies that divide the community.
• Discerning the body – To partake of the Lord’s Supper rightly requires recognizing Christ in one another and treating every member of the community with equal dignity.

Connections

• Old Testament Roots: Genesis 1:26-27 (male and female in God’s image) and Genesis 2:18-23 (woman formed from man) undergird the head-covering argument. Exodus 24:8-11 (the covenant meal at Sinai) and Jeremiah 31:31-34 (the new covenant) provide the theological backdrop for the Lord’s Supper. The covenant formula “the blood of the covenant” directly echoes Moses’ words at Sinai.
• New Testament Echoes: The Synoptic accounts of the Last Supper (Matthew 26:26-29, Mark 14:22-25, Luke 22:14-20) parallel and expand Paul’s tradition. John 13 provides the foot-washing as a complementary image of the equality and mutual service the supper demands. Jude 12 warns of those who are “blemishes on your love feasts.”
• Parallel Passages: Matthew 26:26-29 (institution narrative), Luke 22:14-20 (institution narrative), Acts 2:42, 46 (breaking of bread in the early church), 1 Corinthians 10:16-17 (participation in the body and blood of Christ).

Reflection Questions

1. Paul affirms that women pray and prophesy in the assembly while insisting on maintaining certain distinctions. How do you navigate the tension between equality and differentiation in your understanding of worship?
2. The Corinthians turned the Lord’s Supper into a reinforcement of social hierarchy. In what ways might modern churches inadvertently reproduce class, race, or status distinctions at the communion table?
3. Paul says to “discern the body” when partaking of the Lord’s Supper. What would it look like for you to more fully recognize Christ in the other members of your faith community?

Prayer

Lord Jesus, on the night you were betrayed you took bread, gave thanks, broke it, and said, “This is my body, which is for you.” You poured out the cup of the new covenant in your blood for the forgiveness of sins. Forgive us when we come to your table without discerning your body – when we fail to see you in the faces of the poor, the marginalized, and those we consider beneath us. Break down the walls we build around your table. Teach us to wait for one another, to share with one another, and to recognize in one another the members of your own body. Until you come again, may every time we eat this bread and drink this cup proclaim your death and your love. Amen.