On Prayer 21
Summary: Tertullian takes up the disputed question whether virgins must be veiled, beginning with the argument of those who say Paul's command applies only to married women.
Latin text · CSEL 20:192–193
Sed quod promisce obseruatur per ecclesias quasi incertum, id retractandum est, uelarine debeant uirgines, an non. qui enim uirginibus indulgent capitis immunitatem, hoc niti uidentur, quod apostolus non uirgines nominatim, sed mulieres designauerit uelandas esse, nec sexum, ut diceret feminas, sed gradum sexus, dicendo mulieres. nam si sexum nominasset, feminas dicendo, absolute definisset de omni muliere, at cum unum gradum sexus nominat, alium tacendo secernit. potuit enim, inquiunt, aut et uirgines nominare specialiter aut compendio generaliter feminas.
English · Claude translation
But a matter observed variously among the churches, as if uncertain, must be reconsidered: whether virgins ought to be veiled or not. Those who allow virgins to go with uncovered heads seem to rely on this: that the apostle specified not virgins by name but women as the ones to be veiled; not the sex, so as to say “females,” but a class of the sex, by saying “women.” For if he had named the sex, by saying “females,” he would have laid down the rule absolutely for every woman; but when he names one class of the sex, by passing over the other he sets it apart. For he could, they say, either have named virgins specifically too, or females generally, in a word.
About this passage
Notes
Translation notes
- “Woman” renders mulier (which can mean a married woman), “female” femina. The passage discussed is 1 Cor 11:5–6. Tertullian develops the question at length in On the Veiling of Virgins.
Cite this passage
Tertullian, Or. 21 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/tertullian-oratione/21/).
Plain text
Tertullian, Or. 21 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/tertullian-oratione/21/).
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