CHAPTER 4:
HOW DO THE GREEK EXPERTS DEFINE KOMAO?
POCKETSERMONS.org
By Rick Cutter (contact)
Plainly, all these literally-minded English Bible translations were getting their definitions for komao (koma’s infinitive) from some Bible lexicon somewhere, so it was time to turn over some more stones.
That’s because if there was any hope left for my ailing Uncut Hair doctrine, surely I would find it nestled comfortably in the technicalities of the New Testament Greek-English lexicons, and in how authentic scholars defined and conjugated the Greek verbs found in 1 Corinthians 11:2-16. (By the way, if you’re new to Greek lexicons, they’re basically dictionaries of all the New Testament’s Greek words; the New Testament was originally written in Koine [i.e., common] Greek).
Of course, I was especially interested in how the scholars defined the verb “komao” (as stated, komao is the infinitive form of “koma”).
In fact, growing up, my understanding of the Uncut Hair doctrine seemed to be entirely based on Thayer’s definition of komao—so you can imagine how eager I was to look at his lexicon in particular. So, I got busy and scrounged together a list of all the Bible lexicons I could find at the time (11 to be exact—many more are easily available now online, and they confirm the same). Here’s how those 11 lexicons (alphabetically listed) defined the verb komao:
F. Wilbur Gingrich’s Greek Lexicon:
To wear long hair
H. G. Liddell & R. Scott’s Greek Lexicon:
To let the hair grow long
New American Standard Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible:
To wear long hair
The New Analytical Greek Lexicon (Wesley J. Perschbacher):
To have long hair, wear the hair long
The New Greek-English Interlinear N.T.:
(R. K. Brown & Philip W. Comfort)
To wear long hair
The New Strong’s Guide to Bible Words (James Strong):
To wear long hair
The NKJV Greek-English Interlinear New Testament (Farstad, Hodges, etc):
To wear long hair
Thayer’s Greek Lexicon:
To let the hair grow, have long hair
(NOTE: ALL of this represents the primary definition, not just the first part!)
Walter Bauer’s Greek Lexicon:
To let one’s hair grow long
Word Study Greek-English New Testament (Paul R. McReynolds):
To wear long hair
Young’s Analytical Concordance to the Bible (Robert Young):
To have long hair
In looking at this list, it became immediately clear to me why all the literal translations rendered koma as “have/has/wears long hair.”
That’s because “to have/wear long hair” was by far the majority definition for komao. In every single definition above—including Thayer’s—the idea of “length of hair” was a standard part of the primary definition itself.
In other words, if any translation committee had excluded the notion of “length of hair” in their translation, it would have been a colossal oversight. (Therefore, none of them did!)
But Didn’t Thayer Disagree with the Other Lexicons?
Remember, the main reason why many in our churches believed that a woman must never cut her hair was almost entirely based on Thayer’s definition of komao.
And if you’ll take another look at the above list of lexicons, it’s easy to see that Thayer’s definition seems a bit odd. That’s because all of the other lexicons simply defined komao as, “to have (or wear) long hair / to let one’s hair grow long” (or similar).
But Thayer’s definition of komao was: “To let the hair grow, have long hair.”
(By the way, both “to let the hair grow” and “to have long hair” are valid, literal primary definition possibilities, depending on the context.)
Because of Thayer’s lexicon, the following Uncut Hair “proof” was sometimes heard: “How can a woman cut her hair and still ‘let it grow’?” Clearly, Thayer’s definition of komao seemed to provide strong evidence in support of the Uncut Hair doctrine.
But the question is: Did Thayer actually take a different view of koma than all of the other lexicons above? To help answer this, please look again at verse 15:
1 Corinthians 11:14-15 NKJV
Does not even nature itself teach you that if a man HAS LONG HAIR (koma), it is a dishonor to him? But if a woman HAS LONG HAIR (koma), it is a glory to her; for her HAIR (kome*) is given to her for a covering.
Please notice the phrase: “…for her HAIR (kome) is given to her for a covering.” In Thayer’s comments on kome he clearly stated his opinion that length of hair was “secondary and suggested” (for kome in this passage).
Again, Thayer did not say what I had always believed, which was that “length of hair” was “not at all suggested” for this passage. But rather, that length of hair, although secondary, was in fact “suggested” (for kome in this passage).
By saying this, Thayer was essentially agreeing with all the other scholars that the proper way to understand/translate this passage was “to have/wear long hair,” rather than “to let the hair grow,” “to have uncut hair,” or the like.
Very shortly I hope to demonstrate the compelling grammatical and logical reasons why none of the literal translation scholars believed that “to let the hair grow” was the proper understanding for komao, and why all of the scholars above, including Thayer, agreed that the “length of hair” concept was absolutely critical to proper understanding, interpretation, harmony, and obedience to Paul’s teachings in 1 Corinthians 11:2-16.
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*KOME: By the way, interestingly, in 1 Cor 11:15, Thayer defines κόμη (kome) as: “hair, head of hair.” There, Thayer referenced the concept of the woman’s hair being worn as “an ornament”; thus, a visible covering. And, again, he stated that the notion of length (of hair) was suggested (for this context).
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