When encountering difficult commands in the Bible, a commonly expressed sentiment in softening or even avoiding the same application for today is something like, "That must be cultural, so we are not obligated to follow such a teaching." Such a sentiment may be termed cultural relativism, since it communicates a belief that certain commands or patterns may lose their relevance due to cultural changes. This approach has been used so often that many people in modern churches assume that any teaching of the New Testament must be subjected to the "culture test." Sexual behavior (especially homosexuality), the nature of the church meeting, standards of dress, the Lord's supper, and head-coverings are seemingly unrelated topics that are all united by the assault of cultural relativism: the original and historic position on each has been forcefully and repeatedly challenged by the claims of cultural irrelevance.

Several books in the New Testament (especially 1 Corinthians), when carefully examined, shed a great deal of light on the question of whether or not culture can abrogate Scriptural directives. Two case studies serve as fruitful starting points.

Case study 1: Seating and eating arrangements in church

When you come together, it is not the Lord's supper that you eat. For in eating, each one goes ahead with his own meal. One goes hungry, another gets drunk. What! Do you not have houses to eat and drink in? Or do you despise the church of God and humiliate those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I commend you in this? No, I will not[...] So then, my brothers, when you come together to eat, wait for [or share with] one another. (1 Corinthians 11:20-22,33)

My brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory. For if a man wearing a gold ring and fine clothing comes into your assembly, and a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in, and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and say, "You sit here in a good place," while you say to the poor man, "You stand over there," or, "Sit down at my feet," have you not then made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts? (James 2:1-4)

These passages often mystify modern readers for two reasons. First, these letters were written to house-churches that met (the better word would be reclined) around the Lord's supper, celebrated as a full meal. The host, in whose house the church met, would have guests sit at varying positions around the table. This practice resembles visiting a new home for dinner and waiting for the host to tell you where to sit around the table. It does not resemble going to a modern institutional church where people generally sit wherever they like. In addition, because the early church typically met around an evening meal, some people might have arrived late, especially the poor or the slaves delayed by work.

Second, we must remember that it was considered proper decorum to determine seating and fare by social status:

Pliny the Younger describes in detail the categorization of qualities of food and drink as marks of favor to grades of guests: 'The best dishes were set in front of himself [the host] and a select few, and cheap scraps of food before the rest of the company. He had even put the wine into very small flasks, divided into three categories.. one for himself and us, another for his lesser friends (all his friends are graded) and the third for his and our freed persons.'¹

Another reference from the non-Christian writer Lucian illustrates how stark differences could be:

Since I am asked to dinner... why is not the same dinner served to me as to you? You eat oysters fattened in the Lucrine Lake while I suck a mussel through a hole in the shell. You get mushrooms while I get hog funguses. You tackle turbot, but I brill. Golden with fat, a turtledove gorges you with its bloated rump, but a magpie that has died in its cage is set before me. Why do I dine without you Ponticus, even though I am dining with you?²

Such treatment exemplifies the normal cultural practice: differences in classes resulted in differences in treatment -- to do otherwise would violate proper decorum. These situations described in 1 Corinthians and James arose because some people in these early churches assumed that church should function like the world around it, following these customs. James Jeffers summarizes:

Ancient society provided a number of special benefits to those of high class and status. Those with the highest status in a locale could claim the front seat at shows, they had the right to wear and display certain symbols of their status, and when the state distributed money, food, or wine, they were entitled to a bigger portion than were the poor[...] A person's place at table and the quality of food served depended on the person's status. This was true both of private dinner parties to which a rich patron invited some clients and of public banquets given by an aristocrat for fellow citizens. The dispute at Corinth that Paul takes up may reflect this practice: the host at a Christian agape feast is acting like a patron at a banquet, making distinctions between the guests with higher status and those with lower status (1 Corinthians 11:17-34). The Epistle of James depicts a similar situation in which a stranger with a gold ring and fine clothes is given a seat of honor while a poor stranger is given a place of dishonor.³

Strong internal and external pressures therefore influenced church members to function as they were accustomed in the culture. In looking at the passages in historical context, our conclusion is this: Paul and James are exhorting their readers, "Do not allow the cultural customs of how to seat and feed people to encroach upon the practice of the church. You must be different."

Case study 2: Head-coverings

Now I praise you because you remember me in everything and hold firmly to the traditions, just as I delivered them to you. But I want you to understand that Christ is the head of every man, and the man is the head of a woman, and God is the head of Christ. 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. For if a woman does not cover her head, let her also have her hair cut off; but if it is disgraceful for a woman to have her hair cut off or her head shaved, let her cover her head. For a man ought not to have his head covered, since he is the image and glory of God; but the woman is the glory of man. For man does not originate from woman, but woman from man; for indeed man was not created for the woman's sake, but woman for the man's sake. Therefore the woman ought to have a symbol of authority on her head, because of the angels. However, in the Lord, neither is woman independent of man, nor is man independent of woman. For as the woman originates from the man, so also the man has his birth through the woman; and all things originate from God. Judge for yourselves: is it proper for a woman to pray to God with her head uncovered? 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. But if one is inclined to be contentious, we have no other practice, nor have the churches of God. (1 Corinthians 11:2-16, NASB)

Paul's insistence on the head-covering includes some of the strongest language that he uses anywhere in his writings ("we have no other practice, nor have the churches of God." v. 16). He employs multiple arguments rooted in the nature of God, the creation of humankind, and angelic activity. Lastly he appeals to the universality of this practice in the churches.

Very few churches in today's world practice the head-covering (especially in the West), and those who do not typically cite the cultural relativism argument, saying something like, "Paul is commanding the Corinthian church not to violate cultural standards, which would cause offense. Because people today are not offended by a woman's head being uncovered, we are allowed to disregard this command."

Such an argument bears an appearance of plausibility, but crumbles under further thought and examination. We will not exegete this text itself (see Witherington, pages 231-240 for one good treatment), but must note that nowhere in the text does Paul cite reasons relating to offending others, or to anything about the culture -- something he does concerning other issues in 1 Corinthians 8:9-13 and 10:23-33. Given that he does so elsewhere, and is thus in full possession of the vocabulary and thought paradigm to have potentially offered an argument of cultural offense, it defies plausibility to infer that such reasons are being adduced in this text. Instead, Paul decisively refers to the nature of the Godhead (clearly not cultural), the creation of man and woman (which would encompass all cultures), and angelic activity (which is mysterious but almost certainly not related to culture).

Cultural relativists instead say that Paul is drawing out a universal principle of not offending others that might have specific cultural application. Again, the principle of not offending others is nowhere to be found in his argument, so this conclusion would seem to be eisegesis. However, for the sake of argument, let us grant that it is merely a command to fit the cultural norms of the day and lacks absolute, timeless instruction. This hypothesis quickly falls under its own weight. Such a line of thought is illogical because it ignores the fact that this text is also addressed to men, who were supposed keep their heads uncovered. Yet we know that in the Corinthian culture (which was Roman, not Greek)⁴, men were supposed to keep their heads covered in worship or pietistic acts. Evidence from archeology demonstrates "the widespread use of male liturgical head coverings in the city of Rome, in Italy, and in numerous cities in the Roman East... on coins, statues, and architectural monuments from around the Mediterranean Basin."⁵ In addition, "The practice of men covering their heads in a context of prayer and prophecy was a common pattern of Roman piety and widespread during the late Republic and early Empire."⁶ A statue of Augustus found at Corinth itself revealed that even Caesar covered his head when sacrificing to the gods.⁷

In view of the argument about both men and women and head-coverings, it is likely that both, not just women, were creating the disorder in Christian worship. In light of Roman practice, it is very believable that some Christian Roman males were covering their heads when they were about to pray or prophesy. Paul is not interested in baptizing the status quo or normal Roman practice. He is setting up new customs for a new community, and these customs are deeply grounded in his theological understanding of creation, redemption, their interrelation, and how they should be manifested in worship.⁸

Hence we can conclude that Paul's instruction to the men in this passage is profoundly counter-cultural -- interestingly, for the women, it is less so! Women were supposed to cover their heads as a sign of modesty and respectability.⁹ Garland correctly notes the emphasis of the text is upon women's practice, something which must be kept in full sight.¹⁰ It may be the case that women were drawing examples from various pagan rites where women were uncovered, but this remains speculative. Taken as a whole, we are confronted with the fact that Paul was not merely meeting cultural expectations -- he was overturning them. This is corroborated by the universality of the practice; Paul informs his hearers that in all churches men are to uncover their heads and women are to cover them. Given the diversity of locales and cultures represented by churches at the moment of Paul's writing (Rome, Asia minor, Macedonia, Achaea, Cyprus, Syria, Judea, Samaria, etc.), the unity of this practice is astonishing. Moreover, 1 Corinthians opens with, "To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours" (1 Corinthians 1:2). The addressees of 1 Corinthians are explicitly named as all believers everywhere. To bind its commands and patterns to one group in one place does injustice to the entire letter. Witherington summarizes Paul's instructions about head-covering to the Corinthians:

Paul is not simply endorsing standard Roman or even Greco-Roman customs in Corinth. Paul was about the business of reforming his converts' social assumptions and conventions in the context of Christian community. They were to model new Christian customs, common to the assemblies of God but uncommon in the culture, thus staking out their own sense of unique identity.¹¹

Concluding thoughts

When one appreciates that the Corinthians were lapsing into old cultural patterns in these two cases of the Lord's supper and head-coverings, many other examples of this same phenomenon leap out throughout the book. The strongest example is the issue of eating food in the temples of idols (Greek: eidolothyta), something that was a mainstay of ordinary social life. Paul ferociously attacks this practice (1 Corinthians 8 and 10), along with other apostles (Acts 15:20) and even Jesus himself (Revelation 2:14, 2:20). Given this additional example of rebuking cultural norms, Paul's statement at the beginning of his letter could be regarded as a theme for the entire letter:

Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?[...] [W]e preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. (1 Corinthians 1:20, 23-24)

Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? What accord has Christ with Belial? Or what portion does a believer share with an unbeliever? What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said,

"I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them,
    and I will be their God,
    and they shall be my people.
Therefore go out from their midst,
    and be separate from them, says the Lord,
and touch no unclean thing;
    then I will welcome you,
and I will be a father to you,
    and you shall be sons and daughters to me, says the Lord Almighty." (2 Corinthians 6:14-18)

My prayer is that the church today will stop conforming to the world around it in many dimensions: sexual behavior, the Lord's supper, head-coverings, standards of dress, entertainment, and the very way that it meets. May we be a new social order, with a wholly new identity! For when the scales fall from our eyes, cultural relativism will be seen as nothing more than a repetition of the Enemy's tactic in the garden, "Did God really say?"

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