Women's Hair

Granny, my hair lays on my shoulders, and I could very well wipe a persons feet with it. I could try it on my husband tonight if you'd like me to prove it.
I'll take scripture too. But I'll take mine as it is written instead of reading into it. And there is no instructions given on the exact length. If you believe there is an instructional verse then please give it.

 

In the strictest sense, no. Presuming the Bible to say "yes" is to take the Bible out of context.

 

Donna

I need for you to provide some scripture that says we have a right to our own preferred lengths..

You will find none on that..

Only that men are to have short, and women are to have long..

Lengths are not mentioned, it is true, and therefore, it would be legalistic to say that women should have their hair at the very least 4 inches below their shoulders, or a mans hair should not go past his ears..

but, that doesnt stop the bible from saying

long hair on man=shameful
long hair on women= glorious

are we really so dumb as to pretend we dont know what that means?

 

Except in several other verses, men are praised for their long hair: Num.6:5, Jg.13:5, and
1 Sam.1:11. Hence, the biblical requirement of hair length is contextually one of cultural significance, not a biblical absolute. That is why I said in my previous post that the Bible DOES NOT say that hair length is biblically mandated.

 

John

the men that were praised for long hair were also Nazarites..

there is a difference, and later on, they did shave their hair, when their vow was over.

 

ok....

How much of the hair has to be "long" on a woman? The back? The sides? The front? What about bangs?

What if a woman grows only one side of her head long and keeps the other side shaved. She could still have a covering...is that ok?

And, again, how long is too long? If I was in the military, my hair would be way too long and it is practically shaved! So, how long is too long for a man. Only those with absolute answers need reply (please back up your reply with sound numbers).

jason

 

Jason

Nobody will have an absolute answer.. you are only begging the question..


Nature itself teaches us what is long and short for a man, and I absolutely cannot understand why it has to be so difficult and legalistic to understand this.


I doubt this is any kind of salvation issue.. If a man choses to be shameful, I would have to say that that is up to him. If a woman choses not to have long hair be her glory, then that is up to her..

I have to take the scripture for what it says though, and as for me and my house, I will have long hair, and my husband and son will have short hair.

its not that big of a deal, but why are people saying that scripture doesnt say long for women, short for men? Since it doesnt mention exact lengths, lets just throw the whole thing away? I dont think so.

Whether dark blue or light blue, they are still both blue.

 

That is true in only two of the verses. The third verse does not refer to Nazarites.

In any event, even if we were to assume that the Nazarites are an exception to the rule, it clearly shows that hair length is not a biblical absolute.

 

"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."

Can someone explain what Paul meant when he said "even nature itself" teaches us that long hair is a dishonor? How does nature actually teach this? If a man lets his hair go, it will grow long...naturally.

Is there any biblical evidence as to what length of hair Jesus wore?

 

Actually, to be technical, you are begging the question

Again, to be technical, you are being legalistic. I am asking for the terms of your legalism.

I doubt this is an issue at all. If there are no parameters stated, how is it a useful statement? What if the bible said that women are not to have too much sex? How much is too much?

The point is, you cannot make the judgement therefore you cannot judge this situation at all. Drop the issue.

How short must your husbands hair be to appease you? What if you meet someone who thinks your husbands hair, which is fine by your standards, is still too long. Will you call them crazy and legalistic?

Probably because the idea of long and short are so arbitrary that the term is useless.

Am I tall? I am 6'1". Yes, by general standards, I am tall.

Now, am I tall for a basketball player? I do play, after all. Well, that depends. If I play at the YMCA, I am still considered sorta tall, but if I play in a league or for a college team, no, I am average to short.

So, what is tall? Who is considered tall? What is the cutoff?

And, more one point, what is long and what is short?

jason

 

Im not being legalistic, I am going on what the bible says..

Nothing in the bible is useless.

I understand that you believe it is relative, and I agree.. but we still all know what short is, and we still all know what long is.

Wasnt the third mention of a man with long hair in God's disgraces? I remember reading the story.. he was a beautiful man.. right? I will have to go back and read it.

and, hair length is not absolute in the bible. You are correct about that. However, I cant ignore the scripture that says it is a shame for a man to have long hair, and it is a glory for a woman to have long hair. It is still in there. It says what it says, and Im not just going to call that scripture useless.. what else would you be willing to call useless?

I know you brought this up as just an example, but I dont believe that you can compare too much sex with long or short. The bible would say
"it is shameful for a woman to have sex"
or it would say
"It is her glory to have sex"

too much or too little is not implied.

hair length is cultural, and I believe that we all are smart enough to know what would be considered short and what would be considered long.

YOU are asking me to provide legalism, and there isnt any.. There is just what the bible says. Im not going to take you saying that the statement is "useless" over what the bible says about it.. and I hope others dont do that either.

Thank you
Emily

 

In I Cor. 11:13-16 Paul is presenting an arguement for conformity to the common church practice. Versus 14-15 contain a final appeal to the sense of propriety that the contemporary Greek society would consider "natural".

As far as women's hair, my step-grandma was a very Godly Christian woman. When she was younger, she wore her hair long. As she got older she wore her hair short, because she said she couldn't afford to have someone come out to the house every day to do her hair.

Also she would wear dresses whenever she would leave the house. However, if she was working in her garden she would wear slacks. She always said that God said that women are to dress modest. She also said that working in her garden with her bloomers showing to God and the neighbors was not modest.

 

Of course you are doing what the bible says, and you are being legalistic. They are not mutually exclusive. Do you know why? Because you are using interpretation.....

No, we do not all know what "long" is and what "short" is! That is exactly the point.

Now, tell me when a man's hair is too long.....
And tell me when a woman's hair is too short....

I am not asking you to call the scripture useless. I am stating that using relative modifiers that are not clearly defined is useless. This, by the way is addressed below as well.

By that rational, the bible would also say "it is shameful for a woman to not have hair" or "it is shameful for a man to have hair".

What you have done is effectively avoided the question. Please just answer it. Your counter-example is not a proper comparison.

So, again, what is long? My definition of long is quite different than yours! So, if I have hair halfway down my back, and I do not consider it long, is it long? You have to answer that question. If you do not, I am not even going to bother responding because it would be fruitless to debate with you.

I just thought I would post that so you can let the definition wash over you. Maybe then you would realize that you are in fact being legalistic (note the words 'strict' and 'literal').

I am just asking for the parameters of your legalism.

jason

 

In order to say a woman's hair is a shameful length you must first know what length God says is shameful. Without it you can not tell any woman her her is a shameful length.

 

Emily

And you can not find one verse that says just how ling it needs to be in order to qualify as not shameful. I keep asking and no one answers. Do you not have one bible verse?

For one you are adding to scripture by trying to state a certain predetermined length. If the bible does not say how can we judge and determine?
You may be dumb, but I am not. I can read what it says and do not need to add or change anything to make it say whatever I want it too.

Explain this please. What in nature tells us this? Please explain this verse. People always use it, but not one has ever been able to explain it.

No one is saying it does not say short hair for men and long hair for women. You made that up. What we are saying it it does not explain this length.

Again no one is saying this. We are asking for a biblical explanation. So far there has been none, only personal opinion with no scriptural support.

In the nazarite vow, why would God tell them to sin by growing their hair? Does God anywhere in scripture tell people to sin?

 

cultural?
Then that means the length differs according to the culture you live in.
Then you have to asks what culture was Paul writing to so why did he have to write that? Culturally what did it mean to him and the people reading it.
What some fail to consider when reading scripture is the culture the people lived in. Do we live in the same culture? Obviously not. We have cars and computers, they did not. We have running water and they did not. They had temple prostitutes, we do not. It is very obvious we live in a different culture. So we must look for the cultural differences and see what it meant ot them and how it applies to us in our culture. I am not saying it does not apply and we should throw it out. Ia m saying look at it from the view of the writer and readers. If your culture is different then theirs then it is quit possible we are to apply it differently.

If scripture does not specify how long is long, and we both have different opinions what long is, then what? God didn't say so neither of us is scripturally wrong. But when you say it is a certain length, and scripture does not thats adding to scripture.

 

Matt

As long as I've been asking this (about 3 years)no one has yet to answer that.

 

We have different ways of learning things.

If we are taught by careful explanation, we then can understand and learn more.

If we are taught by fiat and refusing to accept any other option, we are less able to change what we have learned that way.

The trends over historical times are for more and more things to be taught by explanation and fewer and fewer things to be taught by fiat.

People who learned things by fiat don't have explanations. They say "of course you should understand" without being able to explain. Kind of like what Emily keeps repeating over and over about hair length. That's the way she learned it.

You learned hair length as a technical thing that doesn't matter. You're offended that somebody thinks they have a right to judge you on your hair length.

What Paul was referring to - Nature itself telling you something - is a perfect explanation of how it feels to someone who has learned the thing by fiat. Any other idea, to someone who has learned their idea by fiat, is completely unnatural, against nature.

It would seem that Paul himself had learned about hair length in general (except when under a religious vow) by this fiat kind of way of thinking.

But Paul expressed it as a rhetorical question.

I believe the Holy Spirit had him do that because there comes a time when less and less of our learning has been by fiat and more and more by technical - that we can honestly answer the question "Does not nature itself teach you. . " with no, nature doesn't teach me that.

And when we realize it really doesn't matter about hair length, why, we enter into freedom in that area.