The life and work of St. Paul

54 THE LIFE AND WORK OP ST. PAUL.
lives the Apostles possessed the power of speaking languages which they
1
had not acquired.
But if we examine other passages where the same phenomenon is alluded
to or discussed, they will show us that this view of the matter is at least
questionable. In Mark xvi. 17 waiving all argument as to the genuineness
of the passage the word itcuvds, " new," is omitted in several uncials and
versions; 5 but if retained, it goes against the common notion, for it points
to strange utterances, not to foreign languages. In the other places of
the Acts 3 where tho gift of the Spirit is alluded to, no hint is given
of the use of unknown languages. In fact, that view of the subject has
chiefly been stereotyped in the popular conception by the interpolation of
the word " unknown " in 1 Cor. xiv.* The glossolalia, or " speaking with
a tongue," is connected with "prophesying" that is, exalted preaching
and magnifying God. The sole passage by which wo can hope to understand
it is the section of the First Epistle to the Corinthians to which
I have just alluded. 6
It is impossible for any one to examine that section
carefully without being forced to the conclusion that, at Corinth at any
rate, the gift of tongues had not the least connexion with foreign languages.
Of such a knowledge, if this single passage of the Acts be not an exception,
there is not the shadow of a trace in Scripture. That this passage is not
an exception seems to be clear from the fact that St. Peter, in rebutting
the coarse insinuation that the phenomenon was the result of drunkenness,
does not so much as make the most passing allusion to an evidence so
and that the passage of Joel of which he sees the fulfilment
unparalleled ;
in the outpouring of Pentecost, does not contain the remotest hint of
foreign languages. Hence the fancy that this was the immediate result
of Pentecost is unknown to the first two centuries, and only sprang up
when the true tradition had been obscured. The inference that the gift
of unlearnt languages was designed to help the Apostles in their future
preaching is one that unites a mass of misconceptions. In the first place,
such a gift would be quite alien to that law of God's Providence which
never bestows on man that which man can acquire by his own unaided
efforts. In the second place, owing to the universal dissemination at thac
time of Greek and Latin, there never was a period in which such a gif
1 Against this view (which, with the contrast with Babel. &o., is not found, I thinly
earlier than the Fathers of the fourth and fifth centuries), see Herder, Die Qabe rf.
Sprache ; Bunsen, Hippol. ii. 12 ; Ewald, Oesch. Isr. vi. 110 ; Neander, Planting, 13
14 ; De Wette, Einleit. 2737 ; Hilgenfeld, Einleit. 275 ; Reuss, Hist. Apost. 5055 ;
Olshausen, ad loc. ; De Pressense, Trois prem. Siicles, L 355 ; and almost every un
biassed modern commentator. Meyer (ad loc.) goes so far as to say that "the sudden
communication of the gift of speaking in foreign languages is neither logically possiblt
nor psychologically and morally conceivable."
3 0, L, A, Copt., Arm. Apart from these questions, the unlimited universality o'.
the promise leads us to believe that our Lord here, as elsewhere, is using the language
of spiritual metaphor. Many a great missionary and preacher has, in the highest
sense, spoken "with new tongues" who has yet found insuperable difficulty in the
acquisition of foreign languages.
3
x. 46 ; xix. 6 (cf. rf. 15). 1 Cor. xir. 4, 13, 14, 27.
* 1 Cor. xii. -xiv. 33.
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