Is the pendulum swinging in a different direction?

There is no evidence at all that Paul meant anything other than languages--at a minimum he knew Hebrew, Greek, Aramaic, Latin. In the research I have done, I have never found a secular passage (certainly not a bible passage) where he Greek word glossa, used here, meant unarguably anything other than known languages.

I challenge you to find a secular Greek source or author where glossa means some kind of ecstatic prayer language--perhaps in the Greek mystery religions?

 

Actually, the Charismatic movement produces very few genuine scholars (Grudem is the exception, and he's Vineyard--so no tongues), because when you view the tongues passages in Greek the way Tom has done, and the historic evidence, you have to realize that ecstatic tongues is a modern phenomenon not covered in the Bible, and not found in church history. I teach church history, and have yet to uncover unknown tongues even among the Montanists of the 2nd century.

 

You then have a lot of non Baptists in the SBC.

"While the majority of Southern Baptist leaders do not practice or accept charismatic practices, Baptists are split on the issue and SBC president Frank Page also recognized and let stand the varying interpretations within the denomination.

"because I do believe there are varying interpretations, I believe it is okay to believe one way or the other," said Page."

Fortunately Frank Page says you don't get to decide who is and who is not a Baptist, well a Southern Baptist anyway.

 

I don't think Charismatics wrote the notes in the Nelson NKJV study Bible, or the Holman KJV study Bible, and probably not the Life application study Bible.

 

The Charismatics are not usually the goto scholars in evangelicalism. As an academic I'm familiar with who is writing in the academic journals, etc. The leaders of evangelical scholarship, with the exception of Wayne Grudem, are not Charismatics. And Grudem, as noted above, is a Vineyard guy, and they do not emphasize tongues.

 

International Mission Board Drops Ban on Speaking in Tongues

 

A Greek scholar friend of mine just shot me a note about Chrysostom's (347-407) comments on 1 Cor. 12-14. He plainly stated that it was difficult to teach on tongues since that ended long ago.

So, in the 2-5th centuries there were no tongues speaking churches. Either the early Christians knew better than the modern Pentecostals and Charismatics, or somehow the Church has been messed up for 19 centuries, missing out on tongues.

If anyone doubts what I'm saying, here's a great article on it: A Critical Look at Tongues and Montanism. The author makes the great point that Eusebius does not use the term glossa, which is the term used in the Bible. So very obviously--to me--the babblings of the Montanists was not like modern tongues, but just speaking stupid things.

 

That's a huge mistake. Tongues speakers are causing devastation among Baptist churches on the mission fields of the world, including Japan (where tongues speakers attacked my church 3 times) and Africa, where I've been.

 

You have hit the nail squarely on the head! Man, have we read some stupid things here. :Biggrin

 

Very sad. And this story has been repeated over and over in countless churches.

I have a little book, I Once Spoke in Tongues, by ex-Pentecostal preacher Wayne Robinson. He tells the story who was pastoring a church of 600 members. Only 150 spoke in tongues, so he split the church and started a new one with them. "When the group leader queried him about his responsibility to the rest of the church, he answered that he was sorry, but they were resisting the work of the Holy Spirit" (p. 71).

 

I refer you to Tom's excellent answer. I have to go meet my son at the airport now. Toodleoo.

 

The perfect revelation is not the canon of scripture as Paul was not addressing textual revelation. The perfect revelation is Jesus himself.
The canon is a reach at best.

 

I am not arguing in favor of an unknown language. I have always considered the gift of tongues to be the miraculous ability to communicate with an unreached people group for the function of glorifying God by revealing Jesus as Redeemer.

 

Indeed, context, context, context...and the canon was not even established or considered by Paul in this context. Therefore your theory must be wrong.