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Goodbye Jesus

Speaking In Tongues


Alan Bragg

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Ok, I am new to this whole idea of xtians speaking in tongues. Rather shamefully I admit that the first time I came accross it was in the Borat movie. Here in the UK, with the exception of the evangelical teeny church phenomenon, I have never seen a church service where anybody starts talking mush unless they are suffering from senile dementia (and that isn't just the congregation. I once heard a minister describe islam as a "threat to the kirk"), so how new is this phenomenon? Did Billy Graham have something to do with this?

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It's so nice to hear someone say they've never even come close to having their intellect assulted in such a way before. :grin:

 

OK...

 

 

The roots of Pentecostalism, as the roots of all fundamentalist history are pretty murky.

 

When I was attending a PAOC church, I heard a story about a woman in the early 1900s who started having charismatic experiences.

 

From searching the Internet, I believe there are significant reasons to question this as the first outpouring of emotion based Protestent religion.

 

Setting aside the question of what were the early "quakers", I don't think we can gloss over 1700s/1800s America and assume it was all prim and proper religion "a la Victoria". My gut tells me that 2nd coming religion could not have been born of anything but emotion based worship. Just my opinion but if I were studying history and looking for a thesis... I'd be scratching at that.

 

Nonetheless, the early 1900s appears to be the *emergence* of the charismatic movement.

 

Out of that grew the Assemblies of God (A.K.A. Ass of God by some here) and the PAOC or Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada. I am unaware of any other charismatic denomination having its roots in this era.

 

Charismatic churches encourage emotion based religion but they will certainly deny the accusation.

 

Getting excited about god is the emphasis and as an expression of being close to god, it is anticipated, if not expected, that you will display the so called, "gifts of the spirit". Among those gifts are speaking in tongues (supposedly an actual foreign language but usually sounds like 'waxamahonda') as well as to prophecy which is to interpret the message that god sent to the tongue speaker. The gift of healing is another gift of the spirit but aside from some headaches, god doesn't do much in the healing side of the gift distribution. There are other gifts.

 

I got hitched up with the PAOC in the late 70s.

 

At the beginning of church service, there would be soft music where people could feel comfortable praying before church and/or sitting and chatting with the brethern. Once church started we would being to sing a rousing song of faith but not the whole song - just the chorus over and over(and over).

 

This repetitive chanting of a message with a catchy tune serves to turn off the alert mind and allows the believer to slip into a more automatic, if not robotic form of behaviour. As the tune moves on and other tunes are sung, people "get into the spirit". It is all very dramatic and if you are a **willing** participant (I was - I'm soooo ashamed) you will get sucked into the zeitgeist of this Charismatic behaviour.

 

A service would be a lot of things and included some heart grabbing story (but false or exaggerated) story from the christian urban legend farm or from the pastors past and some emotional pleas to not ignore god.

 

As well, Charismatics encourage profuse and loud thanks and praise of god. The end of the service has a lot of thanks and praise and it often sounded like chanting, cooing and shouting.

 

About once or twice a month during a service, someone would stand up, raise their arms and start babbling some unintelligible syllables. They would do that for about 30 seconds or so and then be quiet. The whole place would go almost completely silent (except for the odd person cooing "PrAAAise god" while everyone waited with bated breath for the message to be interpreted.

 

Let me explain this better. It was felt in my church that when someone did this, god was essentially speaking through them and sending a message to the congregation via another language that god enables the tongue speaker to utter. I was told that the babbling was indeed a real language that was spoken somewhere on this planet. Every Pentecostal church has its stories of a tongue speaker who was sitting next to an African who understood the babbling perfectly in their native tongue. Anyway...

 

When this tongues message happens during a service, invariably someone will have the spirit come over them and they will stand up, raise their hands (Y shaped as all Charismatics do) and begin to "pretend" to interpret the message in tongues. It usually starts with, "I am the Lord they god..." and usually talks about repenting. Intrepetations vary.

 

That said... the PAOC and AOG have always maintained, as a matter of doctrine, that when the believer is "Baptized in the spirit", they will speak in tongues. So as an ajunct to the message in tongues, charismatics will simply babble some unintelligible words that sound like 'you know what' while they are praying or praising god in delirious inhibition. A favorite time for collective babbling is at the end of the service where everyone can come to the front and stand in the Y shape and babble, coo, chant and shout thanks and praise and pray very loud and fervently for god to make them a holy person.

 

If that leaves you thinking "WTF?" it would be a fairly rational thought however, next time you are pissing mad, just go for a walk and coo to yourself, "Waxamahonda Lord waxamahonda" about 350 times and let me know later on whether it calms you down.

 

On the other hand, I suggest a better alternative... go to the Montreal Jazz Festival (highly recommended) and get near the front of an African bandstand and prepare to jump and clap and otherwise exhaust yourself in frenetic dancing for about an hour. As I recall, I got a real kick out of some guy with a name something like Matamomba and the Matahallia Mommas. (A fun time, all without drugs or booze or fucking religion.)

 

Mongo

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Mongo, thank you! I've never seen it, either. I've seen a few video clips in my study of religion but that's all. Also I attended a charismatic Mennonite fellowship for a year and a half. But Mennonites are very tame when it comes to this kind of thing, not to mention that it was a small congregation and barely half the members were into the demonstrative stuff. I never saw any tongue-talking though a few of them said they could do it.

 

Alan, maybe you saw this thread in the Theology section. It discusses various aspects of tongue-talking that I found helpful in learning about it.

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so Holy Rollers arn't just mentally ill having fits of seizures, like I though they were having, when Borat went to a sermon, and they're all rolling around like being tazered, making ayayayayayayaayayayayeeee (sounds people make when they're being zapped, ie Jamie Briggs on Not Another Teen Movie). I just though someone spiked their punch with poison, and they were rolling around in agony, slowly dying.

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This reminds me of something I saw a few days ago on another site (and, of course, promptly saved).

 

For everyone else, here.....how about some FUN?

Some good ole fashioned TRUTH-testing for ya'll.

This Sunday, take yourself to one of those 'churches', ya know 'hands in the air', wailing, healer, demon casting, speaking in tongues 'churches'. LOL At least, 300+ congregation.

Position yourself in the middle; wait about 45 minutes, until the place is 'rocking' fairly well.

Out of the blue, stand up, hands in the air, eyes closed (pretend you're in a trance)

weave back and forth(front to back, NOT side to side) and repeat this pronunciation:

"sha ha la la el, shab ba, ha betty da aha feh, la sha bahebek, sha la el ha dah ah a, ana bah heb bah ah hal ni hine, holly sha la ah, owy sha ala sha ala la el"(or close to it) Say it 'fast'.

Sit (fall) back to your seat,....pretend to 'swoon' a bit. Wait 20 seconds........*winks*

 

I QUARANTEE you, someone from the other side of the aisle will stand (in the same form you did), and amazingly foolishly 'translate' into English what YOU JUST SAID......but as some famous bible versed BS prophetic warning speech of love.

 

But, here's the gist. LOL, and the TRUTH,

what you said is none other than a tribal slang dialect in Arabic from the Highlands of Egypt.

And you said, "Greetings, your god sucks the dick of Aladdin's goats, your god hates you, and you, and you, he loves you not, he loves goats, their dicks, your dicks he hates, he hates all of you, with much love".

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Growing up my parents dragged us to a pentecostal church every sunday, and without fail at some point during the service everyone would start speaking in tongues. Well everyone except for me that is. I thought my parents had gone completely fucking insane and I resented them for embarrassing me like that.

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i decided to leave the assembly of God church when i found myself feeling depressed after coming out from the service because of the repulsiveness of the people giving fake messages from God. i thought that if i had to tell my little kids after church, 'that message wasn't really from God', then i shouldnt be taking them there at all. also i would have felt ashamed to recommend my church to anyone else, so that told me i shouldnt be there, too. i went from that church to church of Christ. a few months later, the Toronto Blessing came to my town, and affected all the churches, well, all except the presbyterian. so all the churches accepted pentecostalism. after that i started going to a church in a different town. i came to believe that the signs and wonders stopped after the apostles died out. i thought people faked the whole t hing because they thought signs and wonders were meant to happen, so they tried to make them happen. i found t hat depressing because i thought christians should be honest.

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When I was a kid my sister-in-law used to speak in tongues all the time. But her views have changed now and she suddenly thinks that speaking in tongues isn't exactly christian, and perhaps even demonic. Yeah, try figuring *that* one out!

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Thank you very much Mongo for that thorough explanation of Speaking in Tongues. I have never witnessed it in person, only via television or movies. I went to a mainline Protestant Church until I was eight and then spent a couple of years with Mormons as a teenager; all of them would have been horrified to have someone do this during the sermon.

 

Let me explain this better. It was felt in my church that when someone did this, god was essentially speaking through them and sending a message to the congregation via another language that god enables the tongue speaker to utter. I was told that the babbling was indeed a real language that was spoken somewhere on this planet. Every Pentecostal church has its stories of a tongue speaker who was sitting next to an African who understood the babbling perfectly in their native tongue. Anyway...

 

I thought speaking in tongues was stupid before, but you have taken it to a whole new level. :fun:

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Someone I knew had a fit of "speaking in tongues". This happened not in a church, but at a house... She was a very mentally stable person, from what I knew. I wish I could explain how this happened, but I can't...

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Don't forget the "gift of discernment" or "word of wisdom". Usually bestowed upon nosey old women or men with authoratarian issues. Which somehow gives them the right to speak into someone's life in an intrusive way in "god's name" for manipulation, control, shits and giggles.

 

Ohhhh Madame... don't get me started on thoOOose asshats.

 

Mongo

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Someone I knew had a fit of "speaking in tongues". This happened not in a church, but at a house... She was a very mentally stable person, from what I knew. I wish I could explain how this happened, but I can't...

 

I can see this is possible but context is everything when looking at a single event.

 

For some perspective... I witnessed people going from room to room casting out demons before starting a prayer meeting. That same night, the asshat that was leading the session announced that while reading his bible god had recently showed him the name of a new demon, "the spirit of Absolom". (Apparently he knew the names of 10 or 15 demons by that time and was definitely enroute to learning more.)

 

So "breaking out in tongues" is rather tame to me but then again, context is everything.

 

Mongo

 

Ruby - if you're reading this, it ties into your mind control thread. If I remember correctly, the spirit of Absolom was one of defiance to athority. The bible study leader was making the point that we should not oppose god but submit to his authority and of course that of the bible. Of course, culturally that would naturally extend to god's shepards and elders et cetera, et cetera...

 

It is really a self-supporting structure.

 

I broke Free - You probably find the demon story even more bizaire. I'll understand if you stop believing me. :fun::fun::fun::fun:

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so Holy Rollers arn't just mentally ill

 

You might want to rethink that.

Churches have become a sanctuary for those in varying states of mental illness, and such phenomenon as "tongues" is a perfect example of it.

I always wanted to bust out laughing when I heard this goolash, and got out of that congregation quickly and permanently.

Not only is it pure googoo, it is a sign of mental disorder.

Religious Mania has many manifestations ranging from hearing voices to obsessive self mutilation, so tongues fit right in.

In fact someone as nutty as a bed bug is perfect for a member of these "flocks"; they aren't welcome anywhere else, need the church to avoid being Baker Act'd for public lunacy, and can be talked into giving you every penny they have.

 

The decline of Christianity began with these looneys showing up in churches - any decent halfway human people got the heck out.

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so Holy Rollers arn't just mentally ill

 

You might want to rethink that.

Churches have become a sanctuary for those in varying states of mental illness, and such phenomenon as "tongues" is a perfect example of it.

I always wanted to bust out laughing when I heard this goolash, and got out of that congregation quickly and permanently.

Not only is it pure googoo, it is a sign of mental disorder.

Religious Mania has many manifestations ranging from hearing voices to obsessive self mutilation, so tongues fit right in.

In fact someone as nutty as a bed bug is perfect for a member of these "flocks"; they aren't welcome anywhere else, need the church to avoid being Baker Act'd for public lunacy, and can be talked into giving you every penny they have.

 

The decline of Christianity began with these looneys showing up in churches - any decent halfway human people got the heck out.

 

While it may appear a very simple explaination to brand them all as mentally ill but defining 'mentally Ill' is exceedingly difficult.

 

They are not 'clinically ill' are they? So I'll suggest that you might be thinking of another definition of 'mentally ill' that would go beyond clinical limitations.

 

In doing that, and by creating broader definitions, you will very likely establish mental criteria that would entrap both of us.

 

I encourage you to go to the local library and check out the book "Mistakes were made, but not by me". It is a treasure trove of explanations of why we do a lot of dumb things. One of the basis' for the book is that human memory is far more faulty than we tend to think and in making that argument, casts a lot of doubt on the ability of the general public to think intelligently.

 

Most respectfully, I ask, are you and I the exceptions?

 

Mongo

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MMMMMM... I have to say that these modern churches are one of the few places where the mentally ill (civilly but not criminally insane) can really get somewhere in the world.

I don't speak lightly.

Of course I may see myself in others (and vice versa) but the difference is that I get clear of it, while they get deeper into it.

Just You and me? I'd say most of the folks here have come to their senses too.

Act crazy long enough and it stops being an act.

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many of you have seen this interview(1978) before where my employer explains how he can teach people to speak in tongues.

 

Positive Atheism website

 

In the 80s he would do the college lecture circuit demonstrating it. I have personally never seen it; he no longer has time to travel around showing audiences what is basically a mentalism/hypnosis trick.

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Guest proud agnostic
Ok, I am new to this whole idea of xtians speaking in tongues. Rather shamefully I admit that the first time I came accross it was in the Borat movie. Here in the UK, with the exception of the evangelical teeny church phenomenon, I have never seen a church service where anybody starts talking mush unless they are suffering from senile dementia (and that isn't just the congregation. I once heard a minister describe islam as a "threat to the kirk"), so how new is this phenomenon? Did Billy Graham have something to do with this?

 

 

 

No speaking in tongues isn't new at all it has been around especially in this country since the early 1900's or earlier. Speaking in tongues became a phenomenon here in the states from a man named William J Seymore. It even talks about speaking in tongues in the book of Acts.

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I became aware of the "speaking in tongues", "baptism in the holy spirit" thing when I was a kid. My father had a nervous breakdown and my mother was seeking help from anyone she could find. She went to a ladies bible study and, bam, she hit the floor and spoke in tongues without being prayed for or asking for it. We then started going to various charismatic churches. I went to a bible camp when I was 8 or so and went forward to get the baptism of the holy spirit. Like others have reported on various forum threads, it took a long time but I eventually started babbling. This was accompanied by feeling high. Since I've never done drugs, as I know my body is very sensitive to drugs of all kinds, it's the only high I've felt (well, besides some other natural highs *wink*). Anyway, this high lasted about a week.

 

It's true, what other posters here said, that in a church service, occasionally someone will give a "speaking in tongues" other than the praise and worship babble, and then someone else will give an "interpretation". One time, I was in my early 20s, I was at a prayer group and someone gave a "speaking in tongues". I suddenly felt a strong urging from within to give an interpretation. The first words that came to mind were "rise up, rise up, my people". I was shy and sort of scared so I kept my mouth shut. Soon the group leader gave an interpretation and it was different from mine. I don't know where that urging came from. It's the only time it happened to me and I attended a lot of charismatic services from the time I was a kid until my late 20s.

 

Paul writes about the "gifts of the spirit" in Corinthians and, if my memory serves correctly, talks about tongues during services though he advises someone giving an interpretation for fellow church attendees so they can benefit, otherwise to keep it low and quiet.

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I remember a study of Australian aborigines - medicine men.

These claimed they could bring snakes from their mouths to kill the disobedient. During exhibitions of this for field anthropologists the natives would see these snakes, but not the field observers, much to the chagrin of the medicine men.

It was later discovered that in earlier times any who failed to see these snakes were banished from the tribe.

The determination was that over the generations those not susceptible to suggestion had been bred out of the tribal populations.

 

The speakers in these episodes are those who are susceptible to suggestion - this is black magic of the worst kind being used by these church authorities. Contemptible.

 

Like your mother you are probably very susceptible to suggestion Evelyn. You probably have visions very easily too - but they aren't reliable. It is quite similar to the technique that spiritualists use to "read people" (and that detectives use to get confessions out of suspects).

 

Muy malo.

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