Do any church fathers directly connect “speaking in tongues” with anything other than existing human languages?

Question

One of the arguments made by those who believe that the gift of speaking in tongues has ceased (cessationists) is that the "tongues" spoken of in both Acts and 1 Corinthians 12–14 are "real" human languages. For example, C. Norman Sellers, in Biblical Tongues, writes:

The New Testament references to tongues require that we understand them as referring to real languages [...] There is sufficient scriptural evidence to prove that the tongues in 1 Corinthians are the same as those in Acts chapter 2 and refer to real languages.

Charismatics will generally reject this analysis; J. Rodman Williams, for example, argues that "it would have been pointless to speak foreign languages" at Caesarea (Acts 10:45–46) and Ephesus (Acts 19:6) in Renewal Theology (II, p214).

In light of this disagreement, I wonder – did any church fathers clearly and specifically indicate that the "speaking in tongues" of either Acts or 1 Corinthians was not a "real" human language? Here are some clarifying parameters:

• I'm interested in church fathers as typically defined – those who followed the apostles up to John of Damascus. I'm fine with including Tertullian and Origen in this group.
  • From my reading I don't think any pre-Augustine authors clearly make this connection, so I'm asking about church fathers more broadly. But writings of the early fathers would be particularly interesting.
• By "clearly and specifically," I mean that the writer goes beyond the biblical text and indicates that the "tongues" were not human languages.
  • Charismatics might argue that the biblical text itself is clear on this point, and that therefore if a church father merely quotes the biblical text, it indicates that he believes that "tongues" were not exclusively human language. I want more than that.

Answer 1

To my knowledge, no Church Father ever connected "Speaking in Tongues" - Glossolalia - with anything other than existing human languages.

Dr. Nathan Busenitz wrote a very detailed paper comparing what the Church Fathers believed and wrote regarding glossolalia with contemporary Pentecostal beliefs. His conclusion was that there was no evidence that any Church Fathers ever held that glossolalia involved anything other than real human language.

One of the key "proof texts" that has been cited for use of unintelligible languages while speaking in tongues is 1 Corinthians 14:14-15:

For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays but my mind is unfruitful.What am I to do? I will pray with the spirit and I will pray with the mind also; I will sing with the spirit and I will sing with the mind also.

Church Father John Chrysostom (4th cent.) clearly understood that even here, Paul was speaking of real language:

Ask accordingly not to have the gift of tongues only, but also of interpretation, that thou mayest become useful unto all, and not shut up thy gift in thyself alone. “For if I pray in a tongue,” saith he, “my spirit prayeth, but my understanding is unfruitful.” Seest thou how by degrees bringing his argument to a point, he signifies that not to others only is such an one useless, but also to himself; if at least “his understanding is unfruitful?” For if a man should speak only in the Persian, or any other foreign tongue, and not understand what he saith, then of course to himself also will he be thenceforth a barbarian, not to another only, from not knowing the meaning of the sound. For there were of old many who had also a gift of prayer, together with a tongue; and they prayed, and the tongue spake, praying either in the Persian or Latin language, but their understanding knew not what was spoken. Wherefore also he said, “I’ll pray in a tongue, my spirit prayeth,” i.e., the gift which is given me and which moves my tongue, “but my understanding is unfruitful.”

What then may that be which is best in itself, and doth good? And how ought one to act, or what request of God? To pray, “both with the spirit,” i.e., the gift, and “with the understanding.” Wherefore also he said, “I will pray with the spirit, and I will pray with the understanding also: I will sing with the spirit, and I will sing with the understanding also.” He signifieth the same thing here also, that both the tongue may speak, and the understanding may not be ignorant of the things spoken (Homilies on First Corinthians, XXXV)

Within the contemporary Orthodox Church, two prevailing beliefs regarding glossolalia are:

1. Glossolalia appeared at the beginning of the Church, because it was intended as a gift to help the Apostles build the Church quickly from disparate nationalities. As Christianity spread throughout the word, the need for the gift declined, and so became less prevalent and seems to have disappeared today.

2. Those who utter incomprehensible sounds and believe themselves to be "speaking in tongues", inspired by the Holy Spirit, are victims of demonic delusion.

"Far from being given freely and spontaneously, without man's interference - as are the true gifts of the Holy Spirit - speaking in tongues can be caused to occur quite predictably," wrote the American monk Seraphim Rose,

... by a regular technique of concentrated group "prayer" accompanied by psychologically suggestive Protestant hymns ("He comes! He comes!"), culminating in a "laying on of hands," and sometimes involving such purely physical efforts as repeating a given phrase over and over again, or just making sounds with the mouth. One person admits that, like many others, after speaking in tongues, "I often did mouth nonsense syllables in an effort to start the flow of prayer-in-tongues"; and such efforts, far from being discouraged, are actually advocated by Pentecostals. "Making sounds with the mouth is not 'speaking-in-tongues,' but it may signify an honest act of faith, which the Holy Spirit will honor by giving that person the power to speak in another language". Another Protestant pastor says: "The initial hurdle to speaking in tongues, it seems, is simply the realization that you must 'speak forth'...The first syllables and words may sound strange to your ear... They may be halting and inarticulate. You may have the thought that you are just making it up. But as you continue to speak in faith... the Spirit will shape for you a language of prayer and praise". A Jesuit "theologian" tells how he put such advice into practice: "After breakfast I felt almost physically drawn to the chapel where I sat down to pray. Following Jim's description of his own reception of the gift of tongues, I began to say quietly to myself "la, la, la, la." To my immense consternation there ensued a rapid movement of tongue and lips accompanied by a tremendous feeling of inner devotion".

Hieromonk Seraphim Rose of Platina, "Charismatic Revival As a Sign of the Times"

Answer 2

Francis Gumerlock provides a survey of the views of church fathers in "Tongues in the Church Fathers." He concludes that "the early church had no such concept of the gift of tongues as unintelligible speech," but rather that they referred to the real human languages of the nations around the Apostles.

Citations [of church fathers], along with two accounts of alleged tongues miracles from the early church, will show that ancient Christians understood that the biblical gift of tongues was a miracle involving intelligible human languages.

Answer 3

This thread feels a bit like a straw man to me. Historically, Pentecostals have considered tongues to be...at least primarily... human languages. That was the belief of early Pentecostals. There are many accounts from early in the Pentecostal movement, from the Azusa Street revival and other meetings, of foreigners going into meetings and hearing their native languages 'in tongues' at Azusa. There are accounts of Japanese or Russian being spoken 'in tongues.'

Some of the early participants in the Pentecostal movement believed they would be able to do missions work without any language training. This was based on assumptions of how things worked, not taught in scripture. There is no indication that the disciples in Acts 2 could make the language they spoke be the language of an onlooker, and in I Corinthians, others present did not understand the tongues as their native language. We know the disciples were speaking of the wonderful works of God, not if they were preaching Christ or explaining salvation in tongues. The listeners were saved after hearing Peter preach the gospel, presumably in a common language rather than 'in tongues.'

Early in the Pentecostal movement, AG Garr went to India hoping that speaking in tongues would work out as an evangelistic language after someone had identified the tongue he spoke in as Bengali, but this did not happen again for him in India.

But still there have been many accounts of individuals understanding speaking in tongues in their own native language sense. I know there are many accounts of such things, and have been, among Assemblies of God missionaries. Charles Greenoway was a denominational official in the A/G in the 1980's and he had a testimony of someone preaching in tongues and the audience understanding. I know a missionary who spoke in tongues at an outreach to the Cherokee, and the people asked him how he knew their language. DennishBalcombe has told of hearing speaking in tongues 'in English' among Chinese villagers. I spoke with his daughter after a church meeting at a Chinese bilingual church and mentioned that, and she had heard a little grandma in a Chinese village speak what sounded like a psalm in English.

I am not sure where the idea of tongues a spiritual code language came in. I wonder if some of the academics, maybe mainline Protestant Charismatics and WOFers teach that, because I have encountered people who believe that way online and to a lesser degree in real life. But from what I have read, early Charismatics in the US-- I mean in the 1960's believed in tongues as real languages.

I say Pentecostals primarily believe in tongues as real languages because Paul writes, 'Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels.' Considering the context, it would not be reasonable to reject the idea that such a thing was possible. There was a contemporary Jewish belief that tongues spoke languages, which shows up in some of the apocrophyl or psuedapigraphil writings, references to Job's daughters being given a golden box with a cord that enabled them to speak in such languages. This argues against the idea that Paul was using the term to refer exclusively to Hebrew.

There are those who will insist that 'tongues of angels' are hyperbole and Paul did not really mean that, but if we look at the other parralel arguments he made, it is possible to give all to the poor, to give ones body to be burned. And whatever it means to move mountains whether a metaphor or literal, it is possible for a believer to do that by faith. Paul is listing 'extreme things', so there is no strong basis for saying tongues of angels could not possibly be spoken.

I cannot speak for all Pentecostals and Charismatics, but I suspect just about any Pentecostal who thought of tongues as real languages and came across this passage makes room for the idea of tongues of angels, especially since he doesn't have a motivation for explaining away the verse.