Mr. Holt sued under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, a federal law that requires prison officials to show that policies that burden religious practices advance a compelling penological interest and use the least restrictive means to do so. The United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, in St. Louis, ruled in June that the justifications offered by the officials satisfied that standard.

Image In an interim order in November, the Supreme Court ordered that the prisoner be allowed to grow a half-inch beard. Credit... Gabriella Demczuk/The New York Times

Mr. Holt filed a handwritten petition in September asking the justices to hear his case, Holt v. Hobbs, No. 13-6827, pointing out that other courts had struck down policies banning beards in prisons. In an interim order in November, the Supreme Court ordered that Mr. Holt be allowed to grow a half-inch beard.

In their response to Mr. Holt’s Supreme Court petition, prison officials told the justices that “homemade darts and other weapons” and “cellphone SIM cards” could be concealed in even half-inch beards. They added that they did not welcome the task of monitoring the lengths of inmates’ beards.

In a reply brief, Mr. Holt, now represented by Douglas Laycock, a law professor at the University of Virginia, said 39 state corrections systems and the federal system allow prisoners to grow beards. He added that the justifications for the policy were illogical as there were easier places to hide contraband — shoes, say — than in a short beard.

In other action at the Supreme Court on Monday, the justices turned down an appeal from a German couple, Uwe and Hannelore Romeike, who had been denied asylum in the United States.