1 Corinthians 14:34 - Meaning and Application

Here the apostle tells women to be silent in public church meetings. He says they should not even ask questions there for their own learning, but should ask their husbands at home. They are to learn quietly and with a submissive spirit, and in 1 Timothy 2:11-12 he says that he does not allow them to teach.

There is a passage in 1 Corinthians 11:5 that suggests women sometimes prayed and prophesied in church. In that place, Paul does not clearly condemn the act itself, but the way it was done, namely with the head uncovered. In that culture, that would have blurred the difference between men and women and put women on the same level as men. But here he seems to forbid all public speaking by women in the assembly.

That would include both praying and prophesying, at least in the limited sense used in this chapter, where prophesying means preaching or explaining Scripture by the Spirit’s help. In that sense, a woman prophesying would be teaching, and teaching carries an authority that does not fit her role of submission. A teacher has a kind of standing over those who learn from him, and Paul says that this is not given to the woman over the man.

Still, praying and speaking inspired hymns were not the same as teaching. Since women in that time did have spiritual gifts of that kind, as in Acts 22:9, some have wondered whether they should always be silenced even when under a clear impulse from God. For that reason, some think Paul’s command applies to ordinary cases, while allowing rare exceptions when a woman was clearly moved by God in an extraordinary way. But in normal church life, they were not to teach, debate, or ask questions publicly. If they had questions, they were to ask their own husbands at home.

This also points to a duty for men. If it is the woman’s place to learn in submission, then it is the man’s place to be able to instruct her. If she is to ask her husband at home, then he should try to know enough to answer her questions. And if it would be a shame for her to speak in the church when she should be silent, then it is a shame for him to be silent at home when he should speak and give an answer.

Paul gives the reason for this command: God has placed women under obedience. They are set in a lower rank than men, and it would be wrong for them to act as if they were changing that order. In that time and place, public speaking in church gave that impression, and public teaching would do so even more. So Paul says it is a shame for women to speak in the church assembly.

Shame is the uneasy feeling we have when we have done something improper. And what could be more improper than for a woman to leave her God-given place, deny the order of her sex, or act in a way that people would naturally see as doing so? We should think and act in ways that fit the place God has given us. Those whom God has placed under others should not try to put themselves on the same level or act as if they are above it. The woman was made subject to the man, and she should remain in that station and be content with it. For that reason, women must be silent in the churches and not set themselves up as teachers, because that would be taking a place of authority over the man.