The Greek word for head is kephale. Its meaning as a metaphor is a hotly disputed issue in biblical scholarship. One metaphorical use of "head" in Hebrew, Latin, and English is the idea of ruler. (ex. "head of state) Yet "head" does not appear to carry this same connotation in Greek. Gordon Fee writes:
The clearest evidence for the real differences between the Jewish and Greek metaphorical uses is to be found in the Septuagint (LXX). In the hundreds of places where the Hebrew rosh is used for the literal head on a body, the translators invariably used the only word in Greek that means the same thing, kephale. But in the approximately 180 times it appears as a metaphor for the leader or chieftain, they almost always [six exceptions] eliminate the metaphor altogether and translate it arche (“leader”), which is evidence that they were uncomfortable with (unfamiliar with?) the Jewish metaphor and simply translated it out. ("Praying and Prophesying in the Assemblies: 1 Corinthians 11:2-16," Chapter 8 in Discovering Biblical Equality: Complementarity Without Hierarchy. (Downer's Grove, IL: IVP, 150, fn 28)
I recently read about the "head of the synagogue" in first-century Judaism. The Hebrew title is rosh ha-keneset or "head" (rosh) "of the assembly" (ha-keneset ). Now, if kephale had the same metaphorical meaning in Greek, we would expect to find a title that combined kephale and synagoge (the gathering). Correct? But instead, we find archisynagogos, or "leader/ruler" (Arche) of "the assembly" (synagogues).
Why didn't they use "head" in Greek? Because kephale does not carry the connotation of ruler in Greek.
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