Must a woman dress plainly or wear a covering at all times?
Question:
I am a head-covering lady and a modest dresser. I see that you have links to different head covering sites for ordering them. Do your ladies wear them all the time or just for church and praying?
Also, about modesty: Are their dresses or skirts plain or with prints? Do they wear skirts? I have switched from head coverings as the Amish wear to scarfs. Do the ladies have their hair showing, such as bangs?
We have a home church and I have been wearing a covering for ten years but in our home church there are two ladies who wear none and one who wears one just for church. We only have a total of four families. We used to go to an Amish church where I started wearing plain, but now that we have a home church I am thinking of changing my clothes a little.
Answer:
Some of the women here wear head coverings and some do not. The decision regarding wearing a covering is left up to each woman. See: "Why do some women not wear a head covering?" for more details. In regards to when a head covering is required, see "Is a head covering needed for all prayers or only during worship?" and "Should a head covering be worn all the time?"
There is no requirement that a headcover completely covers all the hair on the head.
There is no passage that requires the use of plain, unpatterned cloth in clothing.
There is no passage that requires women to wear dresses or skirts. See: "Is it wrong for a Christian woman to wear pants?"
In Jewish society, the Pharisees were seen as the religious conservatives of their era. They wanted everyone to follow God's laws, so they wrote at length giving fine detail regarding what did and did not meet various requirements of the law. Those details are preserved for us in a huge series of documents known as the Mishna. While their goal was noble, the problem is that they made restrictions and laws where God had not. This led to various conflicts between Jesus and the Pharisees (see Matthew 15:1-9) as one example. In their zeal, they broke the law which said, "Do not add to His words, lest He rebuke you, and you be found a liar" (Proverbs 30:6).
That tendency continues today in a number of religious groups, including the Amish. There is nothing wrong with choosing to dress plainly, speak in Dutch, and to reject modern conveniences. But they step over the line of propriety when they state that one must do so to be considered a proper Christian. God didn't make those laws and so man cannot enforce them on other men.
