The Highway Forums General Discussion Theology Discussion Forum Head Coverings and more

Marcus,

To most of us, it seems you haven't dealt with the "grammar" of the text, nor it's immediate context in an honest way. In fact, you have admitted on several occasions that if one were to take Paul's words as they appear in the text, non-influenced by "outside factors", then one would have to conclude that head coverings are to be the rigor de jour. But, what you have done, which so many of us here have objected to, is to bring Jewish (personal) customs into the mix, but more so, you have made THAT the standard by which the Bible is to be understood. You have also conceded the remote possibility that Paul (after assuming that the Jews would never pray without the tallit after thousands of years of tradition) could be abrogating that practice, but then rejected it as being impossible.

However, the biblical text, to which Tom and others have been asking you to "deal with" and to which I thought, along with quotes from Hodge, et al, show that the practice to which Paul says is to be followed, had already been dealt with previously by him AND it was the universal practice in ALL the churches; so says Paul. And, that anyone who would be contentious in the matter concerning the wearing of coverings by women or not wearing one by men is going against the entire Christian church.

Your "tradition" problem belongs to you ..... it is not ours! We, instead of "bending" the Scriptures to fit a historical custom/tradition, would rather find an explanation for the tradition or conclude that it was spurious or abrogated, or whatever. For the Bible is the sole authority in all matters of faith and practice. Lastly, I gave you an illustration re: "Theistic Evolution", simply to illustrate how even some very good men can be led astray and into error in an attempt to "make the church look good". The pressures of the so-called "scientific evidence" for Darwinian Evolution were too much to bear, it would seem for some, and so they performed a Vulcan mind meld in an attempt to find a "middle ground" doctrine that would remove the stark contradiction that exists between biblical Creationism and Darwinian Evolution. The problem was not with the antithesis but with those who couldn't stand the heat which came from the antithesis. So, they exchanged good biblical exegesis for unbiblical eisogesis and a fractured hermeneutic in order to "marry" God's Word with ungodly and contradictory "evidence". It is my contention that you are trying to accomplish the same thing, for whatever reason you have. I've offered you a reasonably good exegesis of the passage. You have rejected it on the grounds that "Jewish custom" must determine how we read the Bible. Sorry.... I reject your proposition and thus your view. Perhaps you would have me believe that all the years I spent learning Greek and Hebrew and studying hermeneutics was really unnecessary, when all I had to do was to "become a Jewish scholar"?

In His Grace,