κατακαλύπτω

From the study of 1 Corinthians 11:7

Range of meaning

To cover over or completely; to veil. The prefix kata- ('down') gives the picture of covering something by drawing a covering down over it. In the middle voice it means to veil oneself or have oneself covered.

Against the English

English versions say 'cover his head' or 'have his head covered'. Modern readers tend to picture a hat or a Jewish skullcap. The Greek points rather to a garment or veil drawn down over the head, or (on one view) to hair worn long or loose.

How it drifted

Over the centuries the custom of men taking off their hats in church moved the picture to hats. Neither hats in the modern sense nor the later Jewish skullcap is what a first-century Corinthian would have seen.

Used elsewhere in the period

Greek Old Testament: Genesis 38:15 (Tamar 'had covered her face', katekalypsato); Susanna 32 (the elders have her unveiled, since she was veiled, katakekalymmenē); Isaiah 6:2 (seraphim cover their faces). In Numbers 5:18 the priest 'uncovers the head' (apokalypsei) of a woman suspected of adultery, an act of public shaming; Philo (Special Laws 3.56) explains it as removing the 'symbol of modesty'. In 1 Cor 11:4 the related phrase kata kephalēs echōn ('having [something] down from the head') most naturally describes a draped garment, though some take it as hair.