Defending the Underdog?

Every man who has something on his head while praying or prophesying disgraces his head.  But every woman who has her head uncovered while praying or prophesying disgraces her head, for she is one and the same as the woman whose head is shaved. (1 Corinthians 11:4,5 NASB)

Therefore when you meet together, it is not to eat the Lord's Supper, for in your eating each one takes his own supper first; and one is hungry and another is drunk. (1 Corinthians 11:20,21 NASB)

We Americans love to defend the 'underdog'.  We love it when the 'little guy' wins.  There are probably a host of reasons for this, and they probably apply in a wide variety of degrees only in the most general of ways.  But I know I do.  Captain America is one of my favorite characters because he's the scrawny yet plucky little guy from Brooklyn.  Had he been another 'great' seeking to be greater, his character would not have held my interest.

Anyway, with this passage, it seems we have one social underdog winning, and one not.  Paul seems to defend the poor in his correction of the Lord's Supper practice, but then seems to be correcting women instead of defending them about the 'head covering'.  The poor win, the women lose?  This passage is one of the ones referred to when people say that Paul seemed to have it in for women in churches.  I'm not inclined to agree with that assessment.

Paul, in some passages, does seem to land pretty hard on women, and treat them with a degree of contempt.  But not so far in 1 Corinthians.  He refers, in the first chapter, to Chloe's people, a clear reference to a church leader who also happens to be a woman.  Chapter 7 is amazingly balanced in its treatment of men and women, almost excessively so.  Keep in mind that chapter 7 is about marriage, so this is not necessarily the topic in which to be balanced if he were truly against women.

In this chapter, Paul seems to have some sort of problem with women prophesying and praying in worship without a head covering of some sort.  What sort of head covering is unclear, so that can't really be the take away from this.  But what often gets missed is that Paul never says here that women shouldn't prophesy or pray in worship.  What ever else is considered in terms of what Paul says about women's roles in church, this needs to be included in that assessment.

In fact, one of the most common 'mistranslated' elements is the word 'symbol' added to modern translations.  In the King James version, it says, "...ought the woman to have power on her head..." If 'symbol' or 'sign' is removed (and it should be), then the verse reads more accurately, "...the woman ought to have authority on her head...'  This carries a very different meaning.  Paul isn't saying that the 'man' has authority over the woman, but rather that she has authority over herself, in a sense.  In other words, the point of his correction of women in chapter 11 isn't that the natural order is 'men-over-women', but rather to maintain the natural distinction between the genders.  It's relational, not hierarchical, if that helps.

But even with that, Paul does correct the women, and it does seem to be a 'loss' for this social segment, already seeming to struggle against so many social ills.  Why add another?  I think the answer is really obvious.  Because they were in the wrong in this particular point. 

That may seem overly obvious, but consider that what this means is that Paul doesn't prefer the women over the men because of their social hurdles.  That actually elevates women as well.  He's spent a lot of time slamming the conduct of men or male references to leadership gone awry.  This shows that he's not playing favorites.  He's not calling on the men to 'fix' this issue with the women, he's calling on the women to adjust to correct this practice.  In a sense, this is a sneaky practice that sets women on a higher social level by assuming one precedence in the background of an argument in the foreground; if the argument is accepted, then so is the assumption in the background.  Lawyers try to accomplish this in litigation, and it's not easy.

So, because Paul addresses women and their practice, calling on them to adjust their practice to align to Scripture, then women stand at the same level of men on whom he has been calling all along in this letter.  When the men accept this correction of the women, they accept their elevation to their level within the church.  It may not work that way in their Roman/Greek/Jewish homes, but in church...well, Paul has adjusted something rather subtly.

This doesn't really establish a complete view of Paul on women in ministry, but it needs to be considered as one is pieced together.  One of the problems is that too often, single passages are preferred over others, and no cohesive treatment is applied.  If we want to really get a picture of how Paul views women's roles in church, then we must consider all his references, evaluate them within their literary and cultural contexts, and then try and make sense of the mosaic they provide.  That's not easy, and unfortunately, not many want to spend the time or effort to do it.

And before I leave this topic, there are two problems that stem from this, not one.  The obvious one is some, without getting a good sense of Paul's view, improperly use him as an excuse to suppress the activities of women in church.  But the equally wrong approach is to assume Paul is against women, ignore his teaching, and in the void that creates, make up our own rules for the roles of women in church.  There's no shortcut, the work must be done.  Our Master didn't inspire Scripture with the caveat that we are free to throw out the pieces we don't like any more than we are free to only focus on the parts we do like.

My application here is to avoid being 'politically correct' in showing the 'underdog' preferential treatment.  What I need to understand is that, sometimes, in addressing the 'underdog', I help elevate them to the same level as everyone else.  In other words, if I only address those who I think can take it (perhaps correction), or who I think will have a more detrimental or positive effect then I'm judging more than just behavior, I'm judging value.  That's not right.  But when I equally apply what God reveals to me, then I hold everyone at the same level without judging their 'value' within the church, but rather acknowledging their value before our Master.  Yeah, maybe that's it...although I'm not sure when I'd have the opportunity to apply such an application.  But when I do...!