Speaking In Tongues

[Guest Shiva H. Vishnu]

The one place in the bible that actually describes what speaking in tongues is like.

 

Acts 2:1When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. 2Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. 3They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. 4All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.

 

5Now there were staying in Jerusalem God-fearing Jews from every nation under heaven. 6When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard them speaking in his own language. 7Utterly amazed, they asked: "Are not all these men who are speaking Galileans? 8Then how is it that each of us hears them in his own native language? 9Parthians, Medes and Elamites; residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome 11 (both Jews and converts to Judaism); Cretans and Arabs-we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues!" 12Amazed and perplexed, they asked one another, "What does this mean?"

 

Clearly the idea that tongues was some special gibberish language hadn't been developed at this point in the game. It was obviously clearly intelligible. It's also important to note that the very idea of "tongues" as something other than an earthly language seems to be primarily predicated on the continued use of the archaic term "tongues" where "languages" would serve as the more accurate and modern translation.

 

1 Cor 13 mentions the tongues of angels, but there's no reason to consider this anything more than a poetic hyperbole. He lists several impossibilities in those verses for effect.

 

1If I speak in the tongues[a] of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.

 

Does mean that he or anyone else actually speaks in an angel language? It wouldn't seem so when you consider the following verses.

 

2If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge

 

Item number 2 is obviously hyperbole. Even Jesus couldn't fathom all mysteries as he couldn't predict the day of his return.

 

, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.

 

To date, no mountain has ever moved due to anyone's faith, including Jesus'. Another obvious exaggeration to illustrate a point.

 

3If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.

 

Once again, a total extreme to make his point that love is the most important thing. I find it strange how this single mention of an angel language in the obvious context of a love poem can bolster as far reaching and insipidly insidious a doctrine as speaking like an epilaptic drunkard for the purposes of spiritual edification.

[Jubilant]

Clearly the idea that tongues was some special gibberish language hadn't been developed at this point in the game. It was obviously clearly intelligible. It's also important to note that the very idea of "tongues" as something other than an earthly language seems to be primarily predicated on the continued use of the archaic term "tongues" where "languages" would serve as the more accurate and modern translation.

 

I totally agree and would like to add that this was also a pagan congregation (if I'm remembering correctly) and so gibberish wouldn't be so out of the ordinary. So knowing that helps to see that that is probably why Paul emphasized an 'interpreter'. However, Paul's scriptures carry no more weight than do any other scriptures, they're all crap.

 

Actually, there are two more instances in Acts regarding tongues but I am having trouble finding them. One of them was done around a couple of Jewish people and I can't remember the other instance.

[SkepticOfBible]

This is most interesting

 

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14776c.htm

What today purports to be the "gift of tongues" at certain Protestant revivals is a fair reproduction of Corinthian glossolaly, and shows the need there was in the primitive Church of the Apostle's counsel to do all things "decently, and according to order" (40).

 

Faithful adherence to the text of Sacred Scripture makes it obligatory to reject those opinions which turn the charism of tongues into little more than infantile babbling (Eichhorn, Schmidt, Neander), incoherent exclamations (Meyer), pythonic utterances (Wiseler), or prophetic demonstrations of the archaic kind (see 1 Samuel 19:20, 24).

[Guest Shiva H. Vishnu]

All the conversion stories in acts have the converted speaking in tongues shortly after water baptism. The exception, besides the tongues of fire at pentacost, is the baptism of the first gentiles, whom the jews would not have seen fit to welcome into the fold absent some miraculous sign. The first gentile converts had the spirit descend upon them like at pentacost, and once the other disciples heard them speaking in tongues and prophesying, they said "fuck it, obviously god says they're okay so I guess we should baptise em".

[Amanda]

The Zen master Osho once said that doing gibberish is a great way to free yourself and put yourself in the moment.

 

"Gibberish is to get rid of the active mind, silence to get rid of the inactive mind and let-go is to enter into the transcendental."

 

“Remember, the first step of the meditation is Gibberish. Gibberish simply means throwing out your craziness, which is already there in the mind, piled up for centuries. As you throw it out you will find yourself becoming light, becoming more alive, just within two minutes." ~ Osho

 

Osho Zen

 

Kurari, thanks for this site!

 

I've been attempting to meditate for a long time... however, my impatience and run-away conscious flow of thinking has prevented any success. Hopefully, if I can ever attain a certain amount of this discipline, it will help me be more focused in my daily life. Thanks again!

[ricky18]

While still being a xtian it happended to me.I read benny hinns book anointing wich taught that the more time u sacrifice to god the more god will reveal to u.give u the anointing. we i had a cincere desire to give my all to god.Prayed for up to 3 hours sum days.Prayed for da annointing frequently.So, on a friday knight while praying,i prayed for an hour that night,after every prayer i would say Lord now and would wait for go to do somthing. I never had tongues on my mind eva.I always expected a electricty wave or sum form of goose bumps.That knight the moment i said know i began to utter words in a different language and i wouldnt stop.I was nt controlling it.I went on for 3 hours i think.The saterday,the moment i opened my eyes it started again.it only left the monday morning.GG was my throut sore. Thats how i had my experience.

 

so after that episode my doubt came in,got worse.i tried to repent for 2 years but failed every time. then i made da decision that that was it.hes nt answering my prayers. I concluded - He does miracles, - heals the sick cast out demons, but couldnt give me who loved him wit all my heart and soul the neccessary faith to serve him. Even if i didnt understand or comprehend his teachings i asked for faith in him. I never got it so maby his not god after all.

[Amanda]

 

Hi Ricky 18! That's an interesting experience of speaking in tongues!

 

I think we are all trying to sort all this out too. Perhaps you just hanging out here with the rest of us will bring some answers to your questions, and maybe you have answers to some of ours. You seem to have an open mind, which is always better than a closed one. :wink:

[freeday]

i couldn't agree with you more, just to clarify, no one in my family has ever spoken in tongues, i have a really good friend that goes to a church where every sunday they speak in tongues. it even freaks him out. my other buddy went to his church once and said it scared the hell out of him.

You should ask your buddy if he ever has had the thought as he watches everyone in that church spewing and sputtering forth in ecstatic languages, if it impresses him a some form of masturbation. I would be curious if he may have already said that, or privately has thought that but could say it? You should ask him if "spiritual masturbation” or "spiritual group-sex" would seem an appropriate, yet ironic way to call it?

 

BTW, I was in one of those churches and those were my thoughts about it.

 

well shit, that explains everything, i don't blame you for leaving the religion. that would bug me out.

[Epicurienne]

I once went to a church where "speaking in tongues" made you one of the Cool Kids. At that time, I felt like such a loser because I could never manage to do it.

 

Now, I just feel kind of ashamed...what a thing to aspire to!

[SwissMiss]

I once went to a church where "speaking in tongues" made you one of the Cool Kids. At that time, I felt like such a loser because I could never manage to do it.

 

Now, I just feel kind of ashamed...what a thing to aspire to!

 

Don't berate yourself for that, Epicurienne, I can totally empathise with you on that one. The pressure to be "blessed with the gifts of the spirit" can be enormous and not easily gainsaid. I remember thinking that there must be something inadequate about me that the holy spirit wouldn't allow me to speak in tongues like he had my preacher-kids friends. But because I've always been pretty good at picking up accents I listened and listened and before long learned how to do an authentic fabrication and so I could participate with the group gibberish alongside my more-favoured mates because, let's be honest, when you're a teenager fitting in is the number one priority. Deep down I knew I was faking it (oo-er) but, in a way, it started the sparks of independent thought in my mind: if I was faking it, who else was? So maybe it served its purpose, just not the intended purpose.

[Ouroboros]

I once went to a church where "speaking in tongues" made you one of the Cool Kids™. At that time, I felt like such a loser because I could never manage to do it.

 

Now, I just feel kind of ashamed...what a thing to aspire to!

I can teach you.

 

Say this out loud: chackabhaia ockomocko okaidaioko.

 

And then make up your own words and sentences. That's it.

 

With practice you can speak in tongues on queue. The problem is usually that you feel silly doing it. That what's holding you back, not the ability, but your self-image. If you can do it without feeling the shame of doing it, then you won't have any problems making up words and sentences. After a while you can even make up your own little language, and if you want to make your own definitions of what they mean.

[Crunk Bishop]

reflecting on my ex-fundie tongue speaking experiences... i find that people did alot of imitating of each other... spiritual teachers and preachers. "cool kid" syndrome, mentioned before.

 

probably comes from traditional African influence on evangelical Christianity.

 

anybody ever see "the Toronto blessing" or "holy laughter" as it is called?

[Ouroboros]

Holy Laughter... done it, several times.

 

Singing in tongues, many times.

 

Playing piano, inspired by the Holy Spirit... sure, done that too, many times. Funny though, that is just called improvisation when you do in in secular environments.

[Crunk Bishop]

yeah, gawd forbid that people could ever improvise anything on their own... often cited as proof of miraculous or the inspirational.

[NotBlinded]

yeah, gawd forbid that people could ever improvise anything on their own... often cited as proof of miraculous or the inspirational.

Then these guys are the true saviors!

 

 

I worship them.

[OnceConvinced]

That holy laughter thing always seemed like a total farce to me. Laughter is contagious. If one person starts laughing for no apparent reason, it starts other's off, then still more. It catches on like wildfire.

 

Actually I saw very little of it in my church. The only people I saw getting a touch of the holy laughter in church were weirdos anyway.

 

From what I heard from people in other churches where the holy laughter was rampant was that it would often happen at the most inappropriate times. Like while someone was praying, or during worship.

 

I once had a guy try to pull scriptures out of the bible to claim that the Holy laughter was biblical. All he could do was take them out of context and quote scriptures about God's people being "full of joy". That was his proof that holy laughter was mentioned in the bible. I said to him, "joy is a state of mind, it doesn't mean that the people were laughing." But he just couldn't see what I was saying, he was just so determined to make me believe Holy Laughter was something special. He even sat there and prayed aloud to God saying "Please, let my brother here get a dose of holy laughter before he leaves tonight.". Needless to say, it didn't happen.

[Gaura]

Help an ex-Catholic out here (Catholics are waaaay too staid to do "tongues" or anything like that)

 

Describe what the whole "speaking in tongues" part of a church service was like. Was it a special part of the service? Did they go to the altar? Did the priest bless them? Was it totally on the spur of the moment? I'm having trouble forming a mental picture I guess.

[Ouroboros]

Nah, during the prayer most people were chanting in their own tongue languages. Say for instance during "healing" prayer or during a worship prayer etc. It's totally optional to pray in tongues or not.

 

So for instance that during the beginning of the meeting there were announcement for someone that was sick and in hospital, and we'd pray for the poor chap, then the hole church stood up and prayed mostly in tongues, while the guy up front prayed in human language for the sick person. It's a so called "heavenly" language. Yeah right. Considering also that it's one of the signs that the Holy Spirit is within a person, I shouldn't be able to do that anymore... but I can, and many other ex-fundamentalists can testify to the same.

[OnceConvinced]

Yeah, much like that in the churches I went to. Often there would be some chorus sung and then at the end everyone would just start to shout and praise god and speak in tongues.

 

I haven't been to church regularly for well over a year now and can still speak tongues fluently.

[HuaiDan]

Fortunately I've never been witness to it. That would just totally freak me out.

When I was quite young my friend and I, for s&g's, would speak japanese, chinese, german, whatever;or at least some gibberish that had a fading resmblance to those languages. We got pretty good at it and could fool the local rubes into thinking we could actually speak those languages.

Kinda like speaking in tongues, I guess.

[Abiyoyo]

I was always curious about this. A couple friends of mine tried to get me to "speak in tongues" when I was a xian and of course they said, "you just need to receive the holy spirit to do it." I know its not real, but how do people "do it?"

 

 

Did it matter? Why?

[Amanda]

One thing I've seen about the mythology/fable, pertaining to laughter, is that it is supposedly of the promised 'seed' from Isaac, son of Abraham. Isaac, in Hebrew, means 'to laugh'. Laughter is the releasing of a building up of tension, it is also the pleasant surprise of an unexpected answer. Now... did that make you laugh?

[Ouroboros]

Amanda, you say something interesting there. Laughter is the releasing of a building up of tension... and I think that is the answer to many of these Holy Laughter sessions. I remember how it got more tense in expectation of starting to laugh. Basically, everyone wanted to laugh, but couldn't, and they got tense, and frustrated without showing it, and that frustration and tension then got released through... yes, laughter, or more accurately fake laughter. Because no one was doing it because it was funny, but because they wanted to be part of the group. Many things in chrunch, eh church, is happening because of mass hysteria and mass hypnosis. It's the old magical dance around the fire before the hunt, where the whole tribe goes into a trance and call down the gods. It's the same thing still in church, but now the trance is called holy spirit.

[Amanda]

Amanda, you say something interesting there. Laughter is the releasing of a building up of tension... and I think that is the answer to many of these Holy Laughter sessions. I remember how it got more tense in expectation of starting to laugh. Basically, everyone wanted to laugh, but couldn't, and they got tense, and frustrated without showing it, and that frustration and tension then got released through... yes, laughter, or more accurately fake laughter. Because no one was doing it because it was funny, but because they wanted to be part of the group.

 

HanSolo, I don't think fake laughter has any benefits. Real laughter, in and of itself may be considered holy, sacred, though. There have been studies done about the benefits of laughter to health. Dr. Bernie Segall (sp?) has shown where people have even been cured of cancer through laughter! I think that it has to be 'real' laughter, done anywhere, and NOT from issues of insecurity and low self esteem perpetrated by a "church".

 

Perhaps the benefit of joy has something to do with it?

[Ouroboros]

I guess it's hard to tell if even "fake laughter" have any benefits at all. Maybe it does? Just that no one have done a study the effects of the brain and the body chemicals when it's done. I guess it does release endorphins so you would get a high from it, and reduce pain to some extent. And could produce an aftereffect of joy...