R.C. Sproul

possibility.

I'm not saying that's what happened.

I don't know exactly what happened.

The point I want to make is nobody knows exactly what happens because the scriptures don't tell us exactly what happened.

They leave us to fill in the blanks by way of guesswork and rational deduction.

So we must be careful that when we draw inferences like that, draw implications from the text, that the text doesn't necessarily demand that

that we need to be honest about it and say, this is a possibility, but certainly not a necessary inference.

Another one where implications can get us into big trouble is one that we find as a result of some reasoning done on Paul's letter to the 1 Corinthians.

I'm thinking of the 11th chapter.

In the 10th verse of 1 Corinthians 11, we have this very strange passage.

For this cause ought the woman to have a covering on her head because of the angels.

In this section, Paul's talking about whether women should come to church with their heads covered or uncovered, with a veil or without a veil, in terms of the worship experience.

And he adds this particular reason.

He said that women ought to have their head covered because of the angels.

What do the angels have to do with it?

I mean, why does Paul make a statement about the angels here?

I have seen not one, but at least 20 term papers written by students arguing that angels have a peculiar weakness, particularly male angels, namely that male angels are often tempted to thoughts of lust and even beyond that, to even contemplating rape,

at the sight of beautiful women, particularly beautiful women whose hair, for one reason or another, is particularly enticing to the angelic beings.

And so Paul is saying, look, in this passage, you want to be careful, be sensitive towards this inherent weakness in the angelic post there.

Ladies, keep your heads covered.