Kosh

I always speak in toungues with my wife. But she always interprets it the same! "Oh God.... yeah.....right......THERE!"

I'll be here till friday.

NOGO

Paul disagree with that since he thought of himself as much an apostle as anybody including Peter. The idea that the twelve somehow received somthing which others didn't is totally foreign to Paul.

Acts clearly says that the Spirit comes to anybody who believes that Jesus resurrected. For example read the story of Cornelius.

Acts 10:44-46
No sooner were these words out of Peter's mouth than the Holy Spirit came on the listeners. The believing Jews who had come with Peter couldn't believe it, couldn't believe that the gift of the Holy Spirit was poured out on "outsider" Gentiles, but there it was--they heard them speaking in tongues, heard them praising God.
Then Peter said, "Do I hear any objections to baptizing these friends with water? They've received the Holy Spirit exactly as we did."

Note the text in bold.
So much for the uniqueness of the day of the Pentacost
Nothing here suggests that speaking in Tongues agrees with what Paul says.
That would be strange considering that the same author wrote Acts 2 where speaking in tongues is very different to what Paul says.

CX

entirely too flippant. We here in BC&H do not have a sense of humor that we are aware of. Crap! Now I'm going to have to moderate myself for contentless oneline posts!

Amos

It's the least of the gifts and therefore the beginning. Nothing wrong with it as it teaches us to blank out our conscious mind and go directly to God (via Mary, of course, lol). In glosslalia our stream of words flow over our voice box where reason is interjected into our stream of words according to convention.

Mageth

The Babel account is obviously a myth meant to explain the origin of diversity in languages/cultures. As such, I don't find the myth itself "ridiculous", as long as one understands that it is a myth. What I do find rather problematic is when people interpret what is obviously a myth as literal history. The same goes for the Genesis creation myths and the Flood myths as well (both the creation and the flood myths are actually two different versions of the myths merged into one).

And I find it interesting that you brought up the Tower of Babel. Reading the earlier posts in this thread, I was thinking about the Acts Pentecost account and how it might be viewed in light of the Babel myth. One could view Pentecost as itself a myth of how God restored or is restoring common language, or common understanding among people, that he took away at Babel.

An interesting way to look at it, anyway.

apocalypsecow

I went to a fundy, tongues-speaking church, and it is exactly like it's been described. One day, my friend at the church told me that some guy had come to this other guy's church and stood in the back and said that the people were REALLY speaking Aramaic languages. "Wow!" I said. I *pretended* to, at least once.



And the Babel/Pentecost connection is very obvious, I think.

Gary Hudson

Speaking in tongues, which is a rapid repetition of approximately 10 hard sounding syllables, is an ancient practice used in the purification of the throat or voice center. That center is considered the throne of Satan or evil.

It is not exclusive to Christianity and is similar to the 10,000 syllable mantra of Tibetan Buddhism.

The practice actually dissociates speech from habitual thought (egoic) patterns and is most effective when coupled with a heavenly (top of the head, as dead) eye roll movement.

Gary

Atticus_Finch

Sorry if I was not clear. The part of Pentecost which I was suggesting was exceptional was the part about everyone hearing their own language. I agree that Paul taught that the Holy Spirit was available and for all believers.

Regards,

Finch

NOGO

Yes and on what basis can you claim this?

Since the everybody receives the same Holy Spirit and with it the power to speak in tongues why then did would Pentacost be unique?

The author of Acts and Paul simply do not have the same view of speaking in tongues.

Atticus_Finch

I have not done a search, but off the top of my head I am not aware of any other portion of scripture talking about people hearing their own language when people spoke in tongues. If that is correct then the passage itself shows that it was exceptional.

You have not responded to my point that the discription of tongues in Acts 10 and 14 are consistent with those described in Paul's writings. If you are going to say the author of Acts and Paul had a different concept of tongues you need to address the latter references to tongues in Acts as well.

Regards,

Finch