clear (14:34–36; 1 Tim. 2:12–14). Thus the potential of 11:2–16 for a more radical assertion of women’s roles within the church was largely lost to sight, with only the uneasy compromise left that Paul must have had private and not public worship in mind in 11:2–16. In the middle decades of the century two studies went some way to indicate that Paul’s attitude may have been softer than the traditional interpretation allowed. S. Bedale argued that the word kephale should not be taken in the sense