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Appendix 3

 

"Symbol of Authority"

 

 

Rex Banks



 

 

As I read 1 Cor 11:10 Paul is saying that the Christian woman is duty bound to exercise or retain the proper control or government over her head and he is insisting upon this because sisters at Corinth had failed to exercise this control (see Text). However generations of able students of scripture have understood Paul to be affirming that the woman “ought to have a symbol of authority on her head” (NASB). True the words "symbol of" do not occur in the Greek text, but many hold that the addition of these words brings out Paul's meaning here.

 

The words "symbol of " or "sign of" (NIV) or their equivalent  do not occur in the Greek text. These words or their equivalent are added to the English text (or in some cases placed in a footnote) because translators have felt that they help us with the meaning.  In their view, context suggests that in this verse Paul is saying that the woman is to wear a covering as a sign that she is under the authority of the man. According to Calvin " In the term power, there is an instance of metonymy, for he means a token by which she declares herself to be under the power of her husband; and it is a covering, whether it be a robe, or a veil, or any other kind of covering." Thus "authority" in v 10a is understood by most as a metonym, a figure of speech whereby one thing is used to stand for another. In this case authority is taken to mean ‘semeion, exousias’ (symbol of authority).”

 

Now, those who take this position acknowledge that they take authority as a metonym because of context. “The clear drift of the context is that the authority must be the man’s” (McGuiggan p 149). McGuiggan says that the context is “persuasive.” Certainly the Bible furnishes many examples of metonym, and certainly context often plays a key role in identifying this figure of speech. For example, in Numbers 6, we read of the nazirite vow. A key word in this chapter is separate/separation (vv 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 12, 13, 21). In this context, speaking of the nazirite, Moses says that  “...his separation to God is on his head” (v 7 [NASB). Clearly Moses' point is that "the symbol of his separation to God (i.e. his uncut hair) is on his head" (N.I.V). (Probably the best known example of metonym in the Bible is the use of cup for fruit of the vine in connection with the Lord’s Supper.)

 

The word translated authority is indeed used metonymically in the Bible in both Testaments  (Thayer p. 225).  For example, the Psalmist says of Jehovah: “Judah became His sanctuary, Israel His dominion” (Sept, exousia) (Psalm 114:2). We understand that Israel was subject to Jehovah’s authority, even though the words “subject to“  do not appear in the text. Thayer actually refers to 1 Cor 11:10 in his discussion of exousia: “D. A sign of the husband’s authority over his wife, i.e., the veil...”  So there is no reason why the word translated "authority" could not be used metonymically in 1 Cor 11:10a. Too, the word have (echein) is employed in the sense of wearing in scripture (Thayer p. 266), and in fact Paul has just used it in this way (v 4).

 

The translators of ASB, NIV, NKJV, NASB, NEB, ESV, New Living Translation, Young's Literal Translation and others understand sign or symbol or token to be suggested by context. RSV has "a veil," and a footnote: “Greek ‘authority’ (the veil being a symbol of this).” The KJV English Reference Bible  (American Bible Society) has a marginal note:  “That is, a covering in sign that she is under the power of her husband.”

 

In his A Textual Commentary of the New Testament  Bruce M. Metzger speaks of “the explanatory gloss" found in 1 Cor 11:10. Metzger is referring to the fact that the word "kalumma,” meaning "that which covers, veil" (Rienecker/ Rogers) was placed in the text to explain "the presumed meaning of this difficult text." According to Metzger, this "explanatory gloss" is "read by several versional and patristic witnesses." One manuscript which he cites, cop (bo), dates from the fourth century. Clearly the view that the word translated authority is used metonymically in 1 Cor 11:10 is not new.

 

Under “exousia” in TDNT  Forster reports  G. Kittels’ suggestion that exousia rests on an Aramaic word meaning veil  and comments that this is a “possibility” but “no more than a conjecture” (vol 2, p 574). Thomas R. Schreiner points out:

 

In an example very similar to 1 Corinthians 11:10, Diodorus of Sicily (1.47.5, written ca. BC 60-30) refers to a stone statue that has "three kingdoms on its head (echonton treis basileias epi tes kephales)," but it clearly means in the context that the statue has three crowns, which are symbols of governing kingdoms…

 

Moreover, the example from Diodorus is also helpful here. The text describes a statue of the mother of King Osymandias, and reads as follows: There is also another statue of his mother standing alone, a monolith twenty cubits high, and it has three kingdoms on its head, signifying that she was both daughter and wife and mother of a king (1.47.5). Here the three crowns (which Diodorus calls kingdoms) all represent someone else's authority - the authority of the woman's father (who was a king), husband (who was a king), and son (who was a king).  In no case is the woman's own authority symbolized by the crowns she wears. Similarly, the head covering of the woman in 1 Corinthians 11 may well represent the authority of the man to whom she is subject in authority”  (Head Coverings, Prophecies and the Trinity 1 Corinthians 11:2-16 Thomas R. Shreiner Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood editors John Piper and Wayne Grudem Kindle Edition).  

 

Much more could be said, but here is the point:  many  exegetes throughout history have  understood  Paul to be saying that the woman ought to wear the covering as a sign or symbol that she is under the authority of the man in the setting under discussion.  Such an understanding of v 10a is compatible with the position set forth in this paper.  However I prefer the approach set forth in our study of the text.