How are we to understand tongue speaking? It is an irrational religious frenzy, an encounter with the unconscious, a gift of the Spirit, some of these, or something else? What world view would lie behind your response to these questions?
Tongue speaking is recognized in Scripture (I Corinthians, the ending of Mark, and Acts), and was practiced in the early church until about the third century. Then, with sporadic exceptions, it died out in the Western Church until the nineteenth century. Now, it is a world wide phenomena, particularly in association with the spectacular growth of the Pentecostal churches. The Eastern Church, with its strong mystical leanings, never fully lost the gift of tongues and made provision for its regulation and use.
Historical developments have led to several misconceptions regarding tongues. Science, Enlightenment, rationalism, gave rise to the idea that tongues speakers are irrational, neurotic, in a trance. This is not the case. Normally, tongue speaking is consciously willed speech, usually melodious, which is completely subject to the conscious control of the speaker although the speaker is usually unaware of its meaning. It may or may not entail emotion, but if Paul is any guide, it enables the speaker to relate to God in deep ways beyond the reach of ordinary modes of communication. Morton Kelsey, after a careful and scholarly review of the matter, concludes that tongues contributes to well being and integration when properly used and understood. Morton T. Kelsey, Tongue Speaking, chapter VII, pp. 218f.
Another misconception, often held by biblical literalists (rationalists of another sort), is that tongues and other "miraculous" matters were valid for the early church but not today. Others, in reaction to the presumed "sterile" religion of the mainline churches, claim that Scripture presents tongues as the only sure sign of receiving the Spirit. These two misconceptions are incompatible with Anglicanism with its strong emphasis on liturgical worship, its sense of continuity with the past, and its awareness of the breadth of scriptural teaching on the Spirit.
This really leaves us only with two alternatives. Either tongues is a gift of the Holy Spirit, or it is a strictly human phenomena, benign at best, neurotic and divisive at the worst. But more than tongues is at stake here. The same historical forces that led to the rejection of tongues undermined any sense of God whatsoever. Freud, Fuerbach, Hume, Marx, Ayer, and many more, formulated attacks on religion so comprehensive that no shred of the transcendent remained. The conventional thinking that denies tongues has already been applied to religion as a whole with far greater rigor and effect.
Tongue speaking is a very good gift of the Spirit, but it cannot replace the Eucharist as the manifestation of the risen Jesus and the church triumphant at God's table in the age to come. Nor is it equivalent to a living Word of Scripture that both comforts and confronts us as it did Luther. Nor is it a substitute for Christian love and all the varied gifts and ministries of an active Christian community. Once these realities are given their proper emphasis, as manifestations of God of considerable power and depth, tongues can become what it is, not an end in itself, but a gift of the Spirit that contributes to these greater things.
Paul doesn't seem to believe that God gives this gift to everyone, (I Cor. 12). It is, however, a good gift of God, and God could chose any one of us to receive it. For that matter, it is good for Christians to seek all God's gifts, including tongues. Like any gift, it affects the user and can be abused. It would be good to study the matter biblically and to seek the support and counsel of someone with experience and common sense.
The Rev. Robert J. Sanders, Ph.D.
March, 1995
