If a Woman Willfully Cuts or Shaves Off Her Hair but Wears a Scarf or Hat to Pray, Is She Covered?
1) Direct answer
No. If a woman willfully cuts or shaves her hair and then puts on a scarf or hat to pray, she is still uncovered before God. The only covering Scripture names is her hair. She must repent, stop cutting, and let it grow. A scarf may be worn for modesty, but it does not fulfill 1 Corinthians 11.
2) Scriptural explanation
- “Every woman that prayeth or prophesieth with her head uncovered dishonoureth her head… for if the woman be not covered, let her also be shorn… but if it be a shame for a woman to be shorn or shaven, let her be covered” (1 Corinthians 11:5–6). Uncovered is tied to being shorn/shaven.
- “Her hair is given her for a covering” (1 Corinthians 11:15). The Bible names the covering: hair.
- God receives the repentant: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive” (1 John 1:9).
3) Simple clarifying logic
- Willful cutting/shaving = shorn/shaven = uncovered, regardless of any hat.
- The remedy Paul gives is not a hat, but to be “covered”—and he defines that covering as hair. So obedience is to cease cutting and let the hair grow back.
- While it grows, she can pray and walk modestly, but she must not claim a scarf as the Scriptural covering. God forgives the repentant heart immediately; the visible sign returns as the hair grows.
4) Reinforcing statement
Now notice, God is not measuring hats—He honors obedience. Let the hair grow, don’t cut it again, and the God-given covering will return.
Ask a Follow-up Question
What did the Laodicean Church Age (our age) Angel (- messenger) Say about this?
Ranked passages from the local William Branham sermon and Church Age Book database. Relevance is relative, not a statement of doctrinal certainty.
A thinking man's filter
65-0822E §38
Notice. But the woman who wants to have short hair and wear shorts or wear paint and anything, she can go right through a Pentecostal filter just as easy as pie. Nothing about it. Right into death. Because he that... She said, "Well, there's no harm in that." "If you love the world or the things of the world, it's because the love of God's not even in you." Down through this spirit then, she can pull down into her soul things that isn't of God and against God's Word if that's the taste in the soul. It can come thro...
Why I'm against organized religion
62-1111E §114
Now, if you didn't have any hair, and you wanted to wear some hair, it'd be all right, but wear one that looked like human. And if you didn't have any fingernails, and you wanted to get some fingernails, don't get them like hulls off of navy beans, get real fingernails. If you haven't got any of these things, it's all right. If you haven't got any teeth, get you some if they make you some, get them. But don't pull your God-given teeth out just because they're a little crooked, and they're good teeth, to get some. D...
A testimony on the sea
62-0720 §63
women. There was only one woman in the Bible that ever painted her face, and that was Jezebel. And God fed her to the dogs. So, if you see a woman wearing that, you can say, "How do you do, Miss Dogmeat?" That's exactly what God called her. He fed her to the dogs. Exactly right. What we need today is a house cleaning for the kingdom of God. Right. Yes. And I was going to go over and pray for that poor girl. If she'd been washed up, and let her hair grow down, she'd have been a fine looking young woman. And I starte...
Questions and Answers, Part 2
64-0823E §14
Now, I'm just telling you this for me, 'cause I have no Scripture to back this up. The only thing I have for the ladies about their hair is not to cut it. How they want to wear it, that's up to them. And about the pin curls, actually, I don't know what they are, unless it's these things look like clothespins that they stick in their hair. As I ... the only thing that I know... And the lengths of the sleeves, I think, being a Christian, God would tell you what to do about those things. You see? I believe as a Christ...
A True Sign that's overlooked
61-1112 §116
Now, Jezebel and Ahabs... Yes, sir! Why? Why do they do it? Why does them women do ... keep their hair bobbed off, and wear make-up, and go out and put on shorts when men are coming by and things like that, their husbands do it? Because they haven't got a true prophet in their pulpit to tell them the truth. They tell them, "Well, that's no different. That's all right. You don't have to do with that." You... It is the Word of the Lord! The Bible said any woman that'll put on a garment pertains to a man is an abomina...