1 Corinthians 11:16 – Habit versus law

Now if anyone is presuming to be rivalrous, we have no such usage, neither the ecclesias of God.

Habits develop very quickly. You have been in the same seat a few times and it has become ‘your’ seat. It is not a law and you cannot rely on it. That is why we call it ‘an unwritten rule’.

The custom to which Paul refers here is about the use of veiled women. That is not a law and it is not prescribed anywhere in the Scriptures. Not even in the law of Moses. It is therefore inconceivable that the apostle of the nations, who preached freedom like no other, would have introduced a new rule on this.

What Paul put forward in the foregoing was not a reduction on freedom. Or scribble back ‘everything is permitted’. No, it is an example of ‘not everything is useful’. Paul fully respects the customary use of female head cover and points to the Biblical symbolism it expresses. Those who did not want to know about this (: 3) merely displayed ignorance and, moreover, an attitude of ‘opposing to oppose’. That serves no purpose whatsoever, nor is it to build up God’s ecclesia.

Delen: