Speaking in Tongues: A Critical Historical Examination, Volume 2: Tongues through Church History

By Philip E. Blosser, Charles A. Sullivan and Randall B. Smith

In three carefully researched volumes, this ground-breaking study examines the gift of tongues through two thousand years of church history. Starting in the present and working back in time, these volumes consider (1) the modern redefinition of "tongues" as a private prayer language; (2) the church's perennial understanding of "tongues" as ordinary human languages; and (3) the Corinthian "tongues," which, in light of Jewish liturgical tradition, turn out to have been a Semitic liturgical language requiring bilingual interpreters.
This second volume tracks the perception and practice of tongues back through the first eighteen hundred years of church history, demonstrating that "tongue-speaking" was always active but puzzlingly different from today's glossolalia. From Pope Benedict XIV's detailed treatise in the 1700s, it works back through long-forgotten scholastic and patristic debates to the earliest Christian writers such as Irenaeus. No other resource on the subject approaches the depth and scope of the present volume.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Pickwick Publications
• Release date: Aug 21, 2023
• ISBN: 9781666797640

Philip E. Blosser

Philip E. Blosser is a professor of philosophy at Sacred Heart Major Seminary.

Book preview

Speaking in Tongues

A Critical Historical Examination

Volume 2: Tongues through Church History

Philip E. Blosser and Charles A. Sullivan

Foreword by Randall B. Smith

Speaking in Tongues: A Critical Historical Examination

Volume 2: Tongues through Church History

Copyright © 2023 Philip E. Blosser and Charles A. Sullivan. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical publications or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher. Write: Permissions, Wipf and Stock Publishers, 199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3, Eugene, OR 97401.

Pickwick Publications

An Imprint of Wipf and Stock Publishers

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www.wipfandstock.com

paperback isbn: 978-1-6667-3778-3

hardcover isbn: 978-1-6667-9763-3

ebook isbn: 978-1-6667-9764-0

Cataloguing-in-Publication data:

Names: Blosser, Philip [author]. | Sullivan, Charles A. [author] | Smith, Randall B. [foreword writer]

Title: Speaking in tongues: a critical historical examination : volume 2: tongues through church history / Philip E. Blosser and Charles A. Sullivan.

Description: Eugene, OR: Pickwick Publications, 2023 | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: isbn 978-1-6667-3778-3 (paperback) | isbn 978-1-6667-9763-3 (hardcover) | isbn 978-1-6667-9764-0 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Glossolalia. | Pentecostalism. | Church history. | Language and languages—Religious aspects—Christianity. | Gifts, spiritual.

Classification:

BT122.5 B56

2023 (paperback) |

BT122.5

(ebook)

02/10/23

Table of Contents

Title Page

Foreword

Acknowledgments

List of Abbreviations

Copyright Notices

Introduction: An Archeological Excavation Deeper into History

Chapter 1: The Francis Xavier Controversy and Pope Benedict XIV

Chapter 2: A Miracle of Speaking or Hearing?

Chapter 3: Two Major Scholastics

Chapter 4: Two Later Patristics

Chapter 5: Eight Early Patristics

Conclusion

Bibliography

To the fourth-century Church Father, Cyril of Jerusalem, whose observations on Pentecost first alerted us to the fact that there was much more on the subject of speaking in tongues yet to be discovered.

To those who are intellectually curious about the Christian doctrine of tongues but have not yet found a substantive answer; and to those experiential mystics who want to know the history behind speaking in tongues.

To the late Thomas M. Reid, former Master of Formation of the Community of Secular Discalced Carmelites at Assumption Grotto Parish, Detroit, and author of Carmelite Spirituality and the Charismatic Renewal (2009).

Foreword

Randall B. Smith, PhD

Professor of Theology, University of St. Thomas, Houston

I remember the first time I heard that sound.

I had recently been received into the Catholic Church and spent my first Easter as a Catholic celebrating Mass at the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris. Although my undergraduate major had been in Chemistry, I decided—being young and foolish—to go off idealistically, ill-prepared and dumb as a rock, to study my faith in the graduate program at the University of Dallas. How the Holy Spirit convinced them to accept me, I’ll never know. But there I was, in a devoted Catholic community with a host of students who, like me, enjoyed going to daily Mass.

And then one day, I heard the sound—something like a low buzzing of bees during a period of silent prayer. What was that? I asked a friend after Mass. Oh that’s just Roy, she said. He prays in tongues. There was, I was soon to discover, a very active Catholic Charismatic Community in Dallas. But a Catholic charismatic community was not something that I, as a newly-minted Catholic, had ever heard about.

Wait a minute, I said. "So they’re charismatic and Catholic? Sure, came the reply. They’re a very dedicated and spirit-filled community. They’d have to be, I said, to put up with that noise. I was young and foolish, with that element of snarky skepticism that young converts sometimes can’t quite shake when they enter the Church—that part of themselves that causes them to wonder with each new discovery of something they hadn’t experienced or expected, Oh boy, now what’s this thing?"

I had a similar guarded reaction when I first encountered the large number of saints’ relics in the churches I visited in France and Italy with my college class shortly after becoming Catholic. What was it with Catholics and the parts of dead people’s bodies? As a basically secular humanist kid raised nominally Methodist, these dramatic embodiments of believers’ passionate piety were a bit much for me—at first. Then I visited the wonderful History of Science Museum in Florence and saw there displayed, in a glass tube, the bony finger of Galileo, at which point I decided this was simply a cultural thing I needed to accept.

There would be other new discoveries. In Lourdes, I encountered serious devotion to Mary. As a secular Protestant, one worries about such things—rather needlessly as it turns out. Back in Dallas, I met pious young women of Latin American descent who loved the Virgin and were devoted to doing the rosary in ways I had never imagined. They spent hours on their knees in prayer. And yet, they didn’t seem unhinged or crazy. Quite the contrary; they were as kind and compassionate as anyone I had ever met. They became dear friends. Another friend invited me to something he called a Byzantine-rite Catholic liturgy one Sunday, which is how I found out there were multiple rites within the Catholic Church.

In those early years as Catholic, I was discovering that the Church was a lot bigger and more complex than I had ever imagined. What had I gotten myself into? Something strange and wonderful but also at times a bit frightening. But I knew I had to hang on like a shipwrecked man hangs onto the only life raft in a storm. This is the Church, I said to myself. "I’m no longer judging it by my standards; now it is setting the standards by which I judge everything else, including myself."

And I first heard that sound—someone praying in tongues. And like so many other things, after I had said to myself, Now what? I caught myself and said, Well, it’s the Catholic Church. What else would you expect except more things you wouldn’t expect?

I soon found out that this Catholic charismatic renewal people had been talking about was a real thing, a movement filled with good people serious about their faith and devoted to making real the gifts of the Holy Spirit in their lives and communities.

But there was still the question of that sound, the praying in tongues. It was not my preferred way of praying, but there were a lot of ways of praying as I had discovered since my entry into the Catholic fold: the rosary, the Liturgy of the Hours, lighting candles in front of images of Mary and the saints, the Jesus prayer, the divine chaplet, among a host of others. And there were even multiple liturgical rites: Latin, Byzantine, Alexandrian, Syriac, Armenian, Maronite, and Chaldean. It was truly a global, catholic Church.

The only thing that gave me pause was the claim that praying in tongues was a tradition that could be traced back to the early Church. It is not uncommon among those devoted to a spiritual cause in their eagerness and zeal to make somewhat extravagant claims for their beloved devotion. Was the Peace Prayer of Saint Francis written by St. Francis? No. It doesn’t seem to exist before the early twentieth century. But it is beautiful and profound nonetheless. The Liturgy of the Hours was formalized by St. Benedict in the sixth century and the rosary didn’t exist until the late-twelfth, early-thirteenth century, but both have been great gifts to the Church. Not everyone prays the Liturgy of the Hours or the rosary, but the Church is richer for having those prayers as living traditions available to her members.

So what was one to make of the claim that the modern practice of praying in tongues went back to the early Church? I admit to some skepticism on that specific question, but am open to the work of scholars. It has not been a burning question for me, however, for reasons I have suggested above. A devotion can be a valid devotion whether it goes back to the early Church or not, and there are many ways of praying.

But that leaves us with two different sorts of questions. The first is the scholarly question of how the modern practice of praying in tongues relates to what existed in the early Church, and the second is how that tradition has been seen and developed over the centuries by the Fathers and Doctors of the Church.

Another, separate and very different question has to do with the pros and cons of prayer in tongues, its benefits and its potential dangers. There are always pros and cons to any human endeavor of this sort. The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius should be done under spiritual direction lest the novice become morbid and lose himself spiritually putting himself in the place of those who crucified Jesus. I had a good friend who suffered horrible hallucinations this way. The rosary can sometimes be a little boring. When I taught at a Catholic boys’ high school run by a religious order, I would often drive them places in the school bus. The brothers would start a rosary soon after the boys got back on the bus after a few hours of hiking or soccer. Their high energy would dissipate within minutes, and nearly all were soon asleep. I am a fan of the Liturgy of the Hours, but not everyone is, and even I have to admit it takes time and breaks up the day in ways difficult for people who have busy schedules.

What about prayer in tongues? Some are devoted; others find it of doubtful authenticity and spiritually questionable. Is that sound really an echo of the Holy Spirit, or just someone mouthing nonsense? Whenever we as a Church experience confusions of whatever kind, it is a solid and healthy practice to look back to the wisdom we can gain from the Fathers and Doctors of the Church. They are wise guides that can help us orient ourselves in times of confusion. They help anchor us to Christ and the living tradition of the Church. They do not resolve all our questions, nor do they tell us what should be done now, but they provide us sound principles by which to judge. They help clear away the mists and the white noise that so often surround us so that we can look again at the issue with a new and better perspective. We all have our fears and prejudices; we all have things with which we are more accustomed and comfortable and those we are not. A liturgy or devotion different from our own is not necessarily something to be feared, nor is an exciting new thing always good.

For these reasons, among others, I am very pleased to see the publication of Speaking in Tongues: A Critical Historical Examination. We owe the authors an enormous debt of gratitude for taking the time and putting in the painstaking scholarly effort to provide us with this tremendous resource of theological reflection on the practice of speaking in tongues. Its balanced, respectful review of the wisdom of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church will deepen our understanding of this fascinating practice and help us correct any potential abuses or misunderstandings.

For this gift, and so many other blessings, let us continue to make a joyful sound unto the Lord—in all those ways the Church has in its wisdom determined are fruitful for opening us up to God’s Holy Spirit and our Father’s salvific will in and through His Son, Jesus Christ.

—Randall B. Smith, Thanksgiving, 2022

Acknowledgments

Philip E. Blosser: I wish to acknowledge a debt of gratitude to the following individuals who kindly offered assistance in varying ways in our project. Many thanks to Msgr. Todd Lajiness, former Rector of Sacred Heart Major Seminary, and Fr. Timothy Laboe, Academic Dean, for their generous grant of a sabbatical in 2020 for the completion of the present project, as well as Fr. Stephen Burr and Dean Laboe for their continued support; to Adrian Reimers for offering several corrections to our first volume; to Dale M. Coulter of Pentecostal Theological Seminary, for pointing out some helpful details in D. William Faupel’s Everlasting Gospel and Allen Anderson’s Introduction to Pentecostalism; Thomas M. Reid, former Master of Formation of the Community of Secular Discalced Carmelites at Assumption Grotto Parish, Detroit, for his monograph, Carmelite Spirituality and the Charismatic Renewal (2009); Chad Ripperger, exorcist for the Diocese of Denver, for his invaluable 808-page Introduction to the Science of Mental Health (2013) and for a telephone consultation concerning the difference between gratuitous grace (gratia gratis datae) and sanctifying grace (gratia gratum faciens); to Jim Likoudis for a number of good articles and insights concerning the Charismatic movement; to my colleagues at Sacred Heart Major Seminary, Dr. Edward Peters, for help in translating a Latin passage; Ruth Lapeyre, for numerous resources on Catholic covenant communities, including John Flaherty’s website on The Sword of the Spirit and related Charismatic covenant communities, as well as for calling our attention to the comprehensive work edited by Stanley M. Burgess and Eduard M. van der Maas, The New International Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements (2002); Mary Healy for calling our attention to Craig Keener’s Acts: An Exegetical Commentary, and George T. Montague’s book on the Holy Spirit; Victor Salas for his New Blackfriars article on Francisco Suárez and His Sources on the Gift of Tongues; Robert Fastiggi for answering numerous questions concerning Catholic doctrine and dogma; Ralph Martin for sharing a copy of his article, A New Pentecost? Catholic Theology and ‘Baptism in the Spirit,’ published in Logos: A Journal of Catholic Thought and Culture; Elizabeth Salas for calling our attention to resources in the Carmelite tradition of Catholic spirituality by her articles, Power Evangelization: A Catholic and Carmelite Perspective in Homiletic and Pastoral Review (May 31, 2019), and How to Personally Encounter God in Mosaic Magazine (Sacred Heart Major Seminary, April, 2017); Michael McCallion, for sharing several of his articles with us, such as Individualism and Community as Contested Rhetorics in the Catholic New Evangelization Movement, Review of Religious Research, 54 (2012) 291–310, and New Evangelization Practices? Devotional Prayer Meetings and Christian Service, Sociology and Anthropology, 5 (2017) 503–10; and calling our attention to the work of Thomas J. Csordas in the sociology of Charismatic spiritual culture; John Michael McDermott for valuable suggestions and for his article, Do Charismatic Healings Promote the New Evangelization? Part 1, Antiphon, 24 (2020) 85–123; and Part 2, 24 (2020) 205–32; Paco Gavriledes for lending me Patti Mansfield’s As By a New Pentecost (1992); Daniel Trapp, for several informative conversations and an amusing anecdote about prospective tongue-speakers priming the pump by repeating over-and-over phrases such as, Bought a Toyota, should’a bought a Honda; Robert Fastiggi, and Victor and Elizabeth Salas for their helpful suggestions and personal encouragement; and numerous other family members, friends, colleagues, and pastors for their steadfast support.

Charles A. Sullivan: I wish, in turn, to also offer my special thanks to many persons and institutions that have helped further my research over the years—to Calvary Temple, one of the earliest churches in Canada to form after the great outpourings in Chicago and Azusa Street, for making available their library resources; to The Canadian Pentecostal Research Network and the many members of its Facebook group, whose level of intellectual activity and sincerity shatters many stereotypes of the Pentecostal world; to Alex Poulos who completed his PhD at the Catholic University of America, for his encouragement and linguistic contributions and suggestions; to Ryan Clevenger, who recently finished his doctorate at the Wheaton Center for Early Christian Studies, for his early input into the Gift of Tongues Project; to George Vasalmis (at ellopos.net) for his helpful solutions to various Greek problems; to Clif Payne, a fellow Hebrew University student from Alabama and Jewish Roots pastor and teacher; to Bruce Edminster, for his constructive communication and feedback over the years; and to my good friend and neighbor, Gary Andres, a graduate of Fuller Theological Seminary, for his ongoing friendship and support.

List of Abbreviations

AB Analecta Bollandiana. Vol. 16. Bruxelles: Polleunis, 1897.

ANF Ante-Nicene Fathers: Translations of the Writings of the Fathers Down to A.D. 325. Edited by Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson. 10 vols. 1885–87. Reprint, Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1994.

CCC Catechism of the Catholic Church. 2nd ed. Vatican: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2012.

CE The Catholic Encyclopedia. Edited by Charles G. Herbermann et al. https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/.

CST Commentaria in Summam Theologiae. By Thomas Cajetan. Commentary in Sancti Thomae Aquinatis Opera omnia, 4–12. Editio Leonina. Rome, 1888–1906.

DRB Douay-Rheims Bible. American ed. Baltimore: Murphy, 1899.

ICCRS International Catholic Charismatic Renewal Services

ISBE International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. Edited by James Orr et al. Chicago: Howard-Severance, 1915.

ISBE2 International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. Edited by Geoffrey W. Bromily et al. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1988.

KJV The Authorized (King James) Version

LCL Loeb Classical Library

LXX Septuagint

MX Monumenta Xaveriana ex autographis vel ex antiquioribus exemplis collecta, 2: Scripta varia de sancto Xavierco Xaverio. Matriti: Typis Gabrielis Lopez de Horno, 1912.

NASB The New American Standard Bible

NCE New Catholic Encyclopedia. 19 vols. (incl. 4 supplements). Edited by William J. McDonald et al. Washington, DC: Catholic University of America, 1967–96.

NCE2 New Catholic Encyclopedia. 15 vols. (incl. 10 supplements). 2nd ed. Washington, DC: Catholic University of America, 2003.

NPNF A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church. Edited by Philip Schaff and Henry Wace. 28 vols. 1886–89. Reprint, Peabody: Hendrickson, 1994.

NIV New International Version

ODCC The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church. Edited by F. L. Cross and E. A. Livingstone. 3rd rev. ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005

PG Patrologia Gaeca. Edited by Jacques Paul Migne. 162 vols. Paris, 1857–66.

PL Patrologia Latina. Edited by Jacques Paul Migne. 221 vols. Paris, 1844–64.

RSV Revised Standard Version

SCG Summa contra Gentiles. By Thomas Aquinas. Sancti Thomae Aquinatis Opera omnia 13–15. Editio Leonina. Rome, 1918–30.

ST Summa Theologiae. By Thomas Aquinas. Sancti Thomae Aquinatis Opera Omnia 4–12. Editio Leonina. Rome, 1888–1906.

Translated by Fathers of the English Dominican Province. 5 vols. New York: Benziger, 1948.

TDG Tractatus de Gratia Dei seu de Deo Salvatore. By R. P. Francisci Suárez. Opera Omnia 7. Paris: Ludovicum Vivès, 1857.

TDNT Theological Dictionary of the New Testament. 10 vols. Edited by Gerhard Kittell and Gerhard Friedrich. Translated by Geoffrey W. Bromiley. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964–76, 1981.

WSA21 The Works of Saint Augustine: A Translation for the 21st Century. Edited by John E. Rotelle et al. Translated by Edmund Hill et al. Hyde Park, NY: New City, 1990–2015.

Copyright Notices

Scripture quotations marked (DRB) are taken from the 1899 Douay-Rheims Bible, public domain.

Scripture quotations marked (KJV) are from The Authorized (King James) Version. Rights in the Authorized Version in the United Kingdom are vested in the Crown. Reproduced by permission of the Crown’s patentee, Cambridge University Press.

Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright ©2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. www.lockman.org

Scripture quotes marked (NIV) are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version.® Copyright © 2011 by Biblica, Inc.TM . Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The NIV and New International Version are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.®

Scriptures marked (RSV) are taken from the Revised Standard Version, copyright © 1946, 1952, and 1971 National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Introduction

An Archeological Excavation Deeper into History

Philip E. Blosser with Charles A. Sullivan

This volume uncovers the rich history of the Christian doctrine of tongues from the mid-1700s back to the time of the Apostles. The subject is one that never went dormant, as people sometimes suppose, but was always very much alive, as attested by a backstory full of twists and turns, linguistics and ethnography, politics and rivalry, disputes and power struggles, eccentric and remarkable personalities, engaging some of the greatest minds of all history. It is hard to believe how only eight hundred words or so in the book of Acts and a small sampling of passages from 1 Corinthians could have impacted millions of people over centuries as massively as they have. The social and political contributions of the doctrine of tongues to Western history are immeasurable. The discoveries detailed in this book are the results of decades of research—locating, collating, translating, and analyzing countless source texts. The present volume is the result of long and arduous efforts, and there is currently available in print no equivalent to the historical data amassed in it or to its comprehensive analysis and carefully weighed thesis.

As noted in our first volume, speaking in tongues is a phenomenon of great importance to many of those involved in the Pentecostal-Charismatic movement.¹ It is often tacitly treated not only as a badge of authentication and membership in the movement, but as a spiritual emblem of singular importance, as an indication of the Holy Spirit’s direct and personal action in members’ lives. Already during earlier generations of the Holiness and Pentecostal movements, the gift of tongues was referred to as initial evidence of having been baptized in the Spirit, even though the details of these claims remained controversial even as to what they meant within the Holiness and Pentecostal movements.²

From our research, we have discovered that throughout Church history, the miracle of tongues at Pentecost recounted in Acts 2 has been generally regarded as a miracle of speaking foreign languages previously unknown to the speakers. Some Church fathers, nevertheless, have allowed that the gift could also have been a miracle of hearing in which the Apostles, speaking in their own language, were heard in various other languages by the devout Jewish pilgrims in Jerusalem from every nation under heaven (Acts 2:5 RSV).³ This interpretation of tongues as a miracle of hearing has been bolstered to some degree by the interpretation of the tongues of Corinth (in 1 Cor 12–14) in some Pentecostal and Charismatic circles as a humanly unintelligible heavenly language, which could only be properly interpreted in the Spirit by someone anointed with the gift of prophetic interpretation. This view, shored up by the scholarly prestige of the nineteenth-century German Higher Critical theories of glossolalia as a mysterious ecstatic language, led to seemingly credible arguments for interpreting the tongues of Pentecost (of Luke-Acts) in light of the more mysterious tongues of Corinth (Paul). As we noted in the previous volume, this view looks plausible on its face.⁴

But the problem with this supposition—the elephant in the room, as we called it—is that this interpretation is utterly alien to Church history. The patristic, medieval, and Reformation-era research supplied throughout this work overwhelmingly suggest something else. Anything resembling glossolalia, heavenly prayer language, or a personal language of prayer and praise was completely unknown in ecclesiastical writings before the nineteenth century. It was not until the nineteenth century that German Higher Critics first introduced the theory of glossolalia as unintelligible ecstatic vocalizations. Outside of the manic utterances of the second-century Montanist prophetesses and several modern sects of spiritual enthusiasts such as the Jansenist convulsionaries, Camisards, Ranters, Shakers, and Mormons, this glossolalic view of tongues is completely alien to the traditions of the Catholic Church and of the original Lutheran, Calvinist, Anglican reformers, and their proximate successors.⁵ Even the Irvingites and first Pentecostals, as we noted in the previous volume, originally believed that their tongues represented the miraculous gift of speaking previously unlearned foreign human languages.

No debate can be found in Church history prior to the nineteenth century over whether tongues involved humanly unintelligible word-like vocalizations, interpreted as some sort of heavenly language, spiritual language, or personal language of prayer and praise. The unanimous ecclesiastical understanding was that tongues were simply human languages. The only debate was whether the gift of tongues was a gift of speaking or hearing—a debate sparked by a translator’s misreading, as we shall see, of the Pentecost Oration of Gregory of Nazianzus in the fourth century. This debate lasted upwards of a millennium. Yet on either side of the debate, ecclesiastical writers were unanimous in their view that tongues referred to nothing other than ordinary human languages. To our knowledge, no theologian prior to the nineteenth century has ever questioned this view.

We realize that these conclusions will seem very bold to most of our readers. This is to be expected. The rest of this book will provide, however, a deep excavation into previously little-known sources and facts that overwhelmingly confirm these conclusions. The research will speak for itself as it unfolds in the following chapters.

The only other relevant question to surface in Church history was whether the tongues referenced by Paul in 1 Corinthians 12–14 were miraculous or not! As we shall see in the present volume, early Church Fathers who addressed this question clearly state that the tongues of Corinth were not miraculous. In their view, the controversy over tongues in Corinth simply involved the challenge of finding interpreters for a sacred liturgical language (Aramaic or Hebrew) that many in the Greek-speaking congregation did not understand. This issue will be addressed more substantially in our final, third volume: The Tongues of Corinth.⁶

Charles Sullivan, co-author of this book, first approached the ancient Church writers intending to prove that the Charismatic experience of tongues was authentic. He discovered, however, that his experience and doctrine did not align with the historical facts, and he therefore had to change his thesis for consistency with the historical record. The present series of monographs is a record of this attempt to stick with the facts by utilizing a historical-theological method. The evolution in Sullivan’s understanding of the doctrine of tongues summarized above did not come easily for him.

The reader is advised, furthermore, that this work is in some ways a study of the perception of Christian tongues through history. Perceptions do not always necessarily coincide with reality. The accounts of various events and of persons experiencing a divinely bestowed linguistic ability are not empirically verifiable and may or may not have happened precisely as related. Either way, we can make good use of historical perceptions to accurately trace the development of historical understandings of the nature and definition of the doctrine of tongues.

We wish to reiterate here our previous concession that the findings related in this work should not be taken as necessarily discrediting the spiritual significance currently attached to the particular practice of speaking, praying, and singing in tongues as found in the Pentecostal-Charismatic movement. As we said previously, the Holy Spirit works in the interiority of human hearts in ways that cannot always be easily discerned. Nor do these findings discredit the good Christian work of evangelism, catechesis, scholarship or the spiritual integrity of countless Pentecostals and Charismatics striving to live faithful Christian lives and carry out the Great Commission (Matt 28:16–20).

Nevertheless, these finding do unequivocally underscore the fact that the current Pentecostal-Charismatic practice of speaking, praying, and singing in tongues has no antecedents in Church history before the nineteenth century. They also call into question the Pentecostal-Charismatic claims that these current practices are rooted in ancient Church history. There is nothing surprising about the fact that phenomena such as shouts of joy, tears, groanings, and other emotive affects are to be found throughout Church history. These phenomena are perfectly natural and unexceptional expressions of the human psyche. There is utterly no ecclesiastical precedent, however, for supposing that any of these sorts