Tag: modesty

You keep using that word. I don’t think it means what you think it means.

This is what I think when I hear people talking about modesty. Because more often than not, what they mean is how much of a woman’s body is covered by her clothing. They love to quote scripture here too. 1 Timothy 2 is a common one. And sometimes will detail a list of attire they deam appropriate. They love to quote the Proverbs 31 woman as being covered in fine linens to mean she’s modestly dressed because she’s covered. But let’s look at the verses a little more deeply, avoid applying our own perceptions to them, and see what conclusions we come to.

Before we get started, I’m listing here the Miriam Webster 1828 Dictionary definition of modest.

MOD’EST, adjective [Latin modestus, from modus, a limit.]

1. Properly, restrained by a sense of propriety; hence, not forward or bold; not presumptuous or arrogant; not boastful; as a modest youth; a modest man.

2. Not bold or forward; as a modest maid.

3. Not loose; not lewd.

4. Moderate; not excessive or extreme; not extravagant; as a modest request; modest joy; a modest computation.

Notice how only one of these definitions could even potentially be applied to dress and appearance. In fact its base word it is derived from is defined as a limit.

I find it is very important when reading spiritual texts is to understand both the time in which it was written, and the language it was written in. Having a good handle on the language you are reading it in is also a big help.

First let’s look at the verses in 1 Timothy that are so often used. I’m going to use the KJV as its probably the one you heard as a kid or the person arguing for this would use.

In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety; not with broided hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array; But (which becometh women professing godliness) with good works.
1 Timothy 2:9-10 KJV

Now, just for a comparison, read these same verses but in the Amplified version.

Likewise, I want women to adorn themselves modestly and appropriately and discreetly in proper clothing, not with [elaborately] braided hair and gold or pearls or expensive clothes, but instead adorned by good deeds [helping others], as is proper for women who profess to worship God.
1 TIMOTHY 2:9‭-‬10 AMP

In this instance, κοσμίῳ is the Greek word used in 1 Timothy. Its defined as well arranged, seemly, modest. Interestingly when I stuck this in Google translate, which is using modern day Greek, it came out as cosmic.

Now, let’s take a look at Proverbs 31: 21-22 again in both the KJV and AMP simply for comparison.

KJV

She is not afraid of the snow for her household: for all her household are clothed with scarlet. She maketh herself coverings of tapestry; her clothing is silk and purple.

AMP

She does not fear the snow for her household, For all in her household are clothed in [expensive] scarlet [wool]. She makes for herself coverlets, cushions, and rugs of tapestry. Her clothing is linen, pure and fine, and purple [wool].

And lastly this piece of Proverbs that describes a woman with the attire of an harlot, and I have heard used to line out what a harlot does look like and how not to look like one. This is Porverbs 7:10-12

KJV

And, behold, there met him a woman with the attire of an harlot, and subtil of heart. (She is loud and stubborn; her feet abide not in her house: Now is she without, now in the streets, and lieth in wait at every corner.)

AMP

And there a woman met him, Dressed as a prostitute and sly and cunning of heart. She was boisterous and rebellious; She would not stay at home. At times she was in the streets, at times in the market places, Lurking and setting her ambush at every corner.

Other verses describing the “evil woman” or an “unfaithful woman” don’t give us an image of her appearance or attire. They are filled with descriptions of her sharp tongue, her smooth words, and inappropriate behaviors. As though our actions are more vital than our clothing.

Now let’s go back to the top, to Timothy and the verse that uses the specific word, modest. Isn’t it interesting that the majority of those verses are about elaborate and expensive clothing? It says, costly array. This verse states we should wear modest apparel, not gold plated and expensive, but rather clothe ourselves with good works. We obviously cannot literally cover ourselves with good works, but a point was being made here. Are you more worried about having nice things than you are about caring for your fellow human? Do you greedily spend all your money on gold necklaces and ignore the hungry child? This is what was happening in the early church. In the Amplified version it says it is proper for people who worship God to help others. So according to the 1 Timothy passage, our selfishness is the issue, not how much skin is showing. Modest means moderate, not excessive or extreme, and this is the exact meaning of the word in this verse.

Now the passage in Proverbs 31, I think is pretty straightforward, but nonetheless, I’ll go over it. This woman is first off, not a real woman. But she is held as the pinnacle of godly womanhood. She is indeed someone impressive. She’s intelligent, financially prudent, crafty, businesslike, and loving. But the verses discussing how her children are warm in winter and her family can afford expensive clothing because of her wise investments has nothing to do with how much that expensive clothing covered her body. These verses are expressing her families prosperity more than anything.

Now the verses from Proverbs 7 say to beware a woman with the attire of an harlot. But what is the attire of an harlot? If this had been written today, you might describe a woman with lots of makeup, short tight skirts, maybe fishnet tights. But surprisingly clothing was not the same when this was written as it is now. So if trends and styles have been changing continuously then how are we to know what the attire of a harlot is and how do we avoid it? First of all, based on every other verse describing bad women, your actions and words play much more into your appearance than you think. This woman speaks softly and tempts the young man to come home with her. She is unfaithful to her husband, and lays in wait at every corner. Secondly this verse suggests there was a specific way harlots dressed and if I said the word prostitute, you know a specific image came to your head. So I think society plays a piece in this idea of harlots attire.

Another thing to consider is to take a look at our biology. Every part of our bodies has a function, even parts we have sexualized. Woman’s breasts can be sexual, but that is not their primary purpose. They are meant to produce milk to feed our young, exactly like every other mammal on earth. Elephants don’t cover to breastfeed. Our necks house our esophagus and throat. Our feet hold us up when we stand and our toes keep us balanced. But yet some people are aroused by neck biting, and foot fetishes are a very real thing. We cannot cover every piece of the body that arouses somebody or we’d all be walking around in body bags. The only body part designed and meant for sex are the sexual organs, and even they serve a purpose to reproduce as well. So we can’t make modesty rules based off of potentially being considered sexual. Beside the fact that this is a big variant, we can’t cater to everyone. And nowhere does the Bible say, woman be sure not to tempt that random man at the store, it says men keep better control of your eyes.

I know, I know they use the verse about not causing a brother to stumble, but I also refer you back to we’d be walking around in body bags. And that verse discusses being mindful of a friends struggles and helping them as they heal and grow. That random man isn’t my friend and I’m not responsible for his growth, he is. Plus, in the state of him growing, he will eventually not be tempted and be able to control his eyes. I am not to remove temptation from his path, whatever his temptation may be, he is learning to control himself.

Additionally, what does this teach girls and women? If we are to dress in such a way as to not cause any man, anywhere, to stumble or look at us lustfully, what are girls learning? To start with, this is impossible, you cannot keep every man ever from looking at you and thinking, “Dang, I’d like to tap that” no matter how you dress. Go back again to, we’d have to be walking around in body bags. But this is placing the personal growth and responsibility of all men and boys on women, not on the men it belongs with. It is no woman’s duty to keep another man from sinning. That is his duty. We are each responsible for our own actions, it is no one else’s, only ours. It is degrading and insulting to inappropriately place that duty on the shoulders of girls.

This is also degrading to our men and boys. You are teaching them they have no control, no limits. You are telling them they are barbaric and stupid, while simultaneously telling them they are in charge and in control of women. If you say it enough, they will believe it. You are teaching them if they see a scantily clad woman in the mall, they aren’t able to avert their eyes and wrangle their thoughts. You are teaching them it’s the woman’s fault, not theirs.

Which leads directly into, this nonsense feeds rape culture. From youth these boys are being taught they are not at fault, that a womans attire can literally make them insane. If they are not to blame when they have lustful thoughts, its only two steps further to say, it’s not their fault they raped a woman, because she was wearing a low cut blouse. Case after case after case have proven this is horse manure. Men and women have been assaulted in pajamas, robes, floor length pants and long sleeve shirts. It is never what they were wearing, it is always because a disgusting person attacked them. But we’ve also seen case after case of assault victims coming forward and their rapist is defended and they are demonized. Sadly, we see this a lot in the IFB group. Satan is not attacking your pastor, this is not spiritual warfare. Your pastor assaulted teen girls and he is a bad person. Period. End.

To say the idea of modest dress being disproportionately applied to women didn’t effect my childhood would be the biggest lie I ever told. I sometimes look at old pics and just cringe by how awful I was dressed. I’d be told they didn’t want me to dress frumpy, they wanted me to dressed tastefully. That was a lie. I looked like a boat.

I started pushing back fairly early, so I had to go back pretty far to find a picture that exemplified what I mean by good gracious I looked terrible.

You (and by you here I mean women and girls) couldn’t wear a shirt more than three (some places it was two) finger widths below your collarbone. Have you ever measured that? Its remarkably high, much higher than the average shirt comes. So shirts under shirts were incredibly common. Pants were out of the question. They were seductive and clung to the body exposing the curves of your female form. If you needed to do a physically strenuous activity in which a skirt would be indecent, you were provided with culottes. Should you be unaware what a culotte is, it is a knee length overly poofy legged split skirt. Historically I think they were created for women during the Victorian era to remain ladylike but be able to ride a horse (don’t quote me on that though). Some of these were pleated and so full in the legs you couldn’t tell they were culottes. Those were ideal.

Shirts were never to be sleeveless, some people wouldn’t allow cap sleeve shirts either. Shoulders and armpits were not to be shown, and an exposed bra strap was indecent. Your shirt also needed to be long enough that even with your arms raised over your head, it still covered the waistband of your skirt or culottes. Skirts varied a small bit. Some people said a skirt had to come to the knee, some specified that a skirt had to come to the knee while sitting, and others still dictated that your skirt had to cover your knees while sitting. Even the type of fabric of your clothing was regulated. Clingy fabrics like spandex blends were not allowed as they tended to stretch and hug the body. Your clothes had to be loose fitting and not show any form of your body. Girls were allowed to wear jewelry but your leadership could deny you the ability to wear something they deemed “too gawdy”. Only one ear piercing, no brightly colored makeup, no unnaturally colored hair, small necklaces only and one or two bracelets.

Boys had dress codes too but they were much shorter than for the girls. Boys were also not allowed to wear sleeveless shirts. They weren’t allowed to wear jewelry except for a watch and the men allowed a wedding band. Boys and Men were also not permitted to wear shorts. I’m honestly not sure of the reason for this. The girls could show their calves, but the boys could not.

Of course no outlandish hairstyles or colors. Neat hair dos. Clean and well kept clothes and hair were mandatory. Somehow God cared about your hair being brushed.

For how much I heard Samuel’s anointing David because, “God does not look on the outward appearance because God sees the heart” preached, I remember God caring a lot about how I looked. To dress modestly was pleasing to God. In explanation of why God cared so much when he looks on the heart, was because we were to be separate from the world in every way. Someone should be able to look at us and know we were Christian. God also cared because he loved all his children and didn’t want one of them to cause another to sin. In the case of looking different we definitely succeeded. Even the boys and men stuck out in a crowd usually. The women looked odd and frumpy in their loose shirts and long skirts and the men looked like struggling bussinessmen in their tucked in collared shirts and loose legged high waisted khaki pants. Especially in a group, we stuck out. As to not causing someone to sin, I think I’ve covered satisfactorily.

After I left the church I went through a phase of awkwardness. I never went through the discovery teenage phase because I hadn’t been permitted to. I had no idea what looked good on me or what styles I liked. Through controlling how I looked and how I thought and acted, my confidence and self image had been destroyed. Or rather, it had never been allowed to grow strong. I was not just building a personal clothing style, I was building myself. Then I entered a phase of anger. For a long time I couldn’t wear a skirt or dress of any kind. I still had my skirts, but I never wore them. Eventually that started to fade and I’d wear skirts and dresses but I couldn’t wear denim skirts. If I did wear a skirt it had to be too short for the church’s guidelines or I’d have to wear it with a tank top or low cut blouse. I was afraid if I wore something they approved of, I was falling back into their grasp. I finally realized that even years down the road, the group I’d left behind was still dictating how I dressed. I was still being controlled. I got rid of all of my clothes I’d had as a youth. I had to clean the space of it. I realized that no matter what I put on, I was still somehow breaking their rules. Their rules were so outlandish that by dressing like a normal human, I wasn’t falling close to their grasp at all. I realized that it didn’t matter how I dressed, how I live and believe is so contrary to them, I couldn’t fall back to them.

I have noticed over the years some churches and localised groups have started to shift in terms of apparel as the younger generations come up an take on leadership positions. You may actually see a woman at a church event in jeans. I see this as mostly good, but it has also created this double standard. The organization as a whole has not changed, and the churches haven’t changed their tunes on modesty. So it makes dress even more complicated. It’s ok to wear jeans to an activity, but not to a church service, and not to a different church’s event. And you can wear jeans, but not too tight and not with any holes. You may wear a dress shorter than the knee, but wear leggings underneath of it to cover your legs. None of this is spoken, it’s just this odd understanding that nobody is sure who made up. Instead of relieving pressure, it’s just made more. But hopefully, this will progress further and real relief will be seen in the future.

When you dress yourself what is your purpose for wearing what you do? If you wish to dress modestly remember these things actually taught in the Bible. Are you spending more money and effort on your clothes than you are helping those in need? How do you behave and carry yourself? Is it seductive and tempting? Are your sexual organs covered? Then if you are good on all counts, wear what you want with confidence and don’t let anyone shame you or convince you to change. You are modest.