Jubilation And Speaking In Tongues

Both the tongues or glossolalia of the New Testament and the jubilation of tradition were wordless sounds. Both were a response, an entering into the gospel in ways deeper than conceptual language would allow. There is every reason to assume that jubilation and tongues—ancient and modern—refer to the same phenomenon.

A question arises whether the tongues of Scripture, the tongues of present-day charismatic renewal, and the jubilation tradition are in fact the same experience. Was jubilation the same as glossolalia, a continuation of the tongues of the New Testament? Tongues in the New Testament The issue of New Testament glossolalia has been dealt with by a number of biblical scholars. In general, most do not consider the glossolalia of the New Testament to be foreign languages but, rather, "ecstatic utterance," a speaking forth of wordless sounds as an expression of spiritual fervor. Richard Kugelman writes:

The gift of tongues was an extraordinary manifestation of the Spirit's presence and activity (Acts 2:4–6; 10:46; 19:6). The precise nature of the gift remains obscure. Many exegetes think that it consisted in incoherent shouting; seized by a religious emotionalism under the impulse of the Spirit, a Christian would begin to shout in a fervid improvisation the praises of God. ("The First Letter to the Corinthians," The Jerome Biblical Commentary, 272)

It must be added that present-day glossolalia is usually a spontaneous liturgical response rather than fervent emotionalism; still, this description has much in common with Egeria's comments on the church in Jerusalem in the fifth century and Augustine's account of the spontaneous worship in Hippo.

The tongues passages in Acts seem to indicate ecstatic utterance. Malcolm Cornwell summarizes the opinion of biblical scholars on the matter: Accordingly, nearly all commentators today regard the references to tongues in Acts to be similar to the experience of the believers at Corinth. This view would provide a description of glossolalia as the utterance of unknown words or sounds as a consequence of the exuberance of a newly acquired faith of Jesus. (The Gift of Tongues Today [1975], 21) Tongues in the Contemporary Church Modern-day glossolalia has come under the scrutiny of linguists such as William Samarin. Samarin says that glossolalia as practiced in the present time is not language, although it has many of the features of language. The sounds are taken, for the most part, from the native language of the speaker. He concludes: "When the full apparatus of linguistic science comes to bear on glossolalia, this turns out to be only a facade of language-although at times a very good one indeed (Tongues of Men and Angels [1972], 127-128). According to Samarin, glossolalia bears close similarity to chant, mimicry, jingles, and nonsense or baby-talk. In other words, it is similar to other created speech patterns. Augustine and the other church fathers saw a kinship between jubilation and the yodels and wordless sounds of the broader culture. The work of modern linguists points to the same correlation between normal wordless expressions in the culture and present-day glossolalia. The Continuity of Jubilation from Apostolic Times Indications are that jubilation is a continuation of the glossolalia of the New Testament. For one thing, descriptions of the two practices are similar. Also, the first references to jubilation are from the fourth century, an early date. Before this period the church was persecuted and often worshiped in private. Little is known either of the daily worship and life of ordinary Christians or of their liturgy until the fourth century. During the period of the persecutions only the extraordinary and controversial received note. The lack of mention of glossolalia during this period may indicate that it was not controversial but an ordinary part of the fabric of Christian life. Scholars of music history suggest that jubilation was a continuation of New Testament and apostolic practice. L'encyclopédie des musiques sacres contains this comment:

That which concerned the Fathers, just as it had the apostles, was that one sing "in the spirit" ("with one's heart"). This is the advice St. Paul repeated to the Corinthians (1 Cor. 14:15)—"I will sing a song with the spirit"—and to the Ephesians (Eph. 5:18–19)—"Sing in the Spirit … from your fullness. Recite psalms and hymns among yourselves, and inspired songs; sing and praise the Lord with all your heart." To the Colossians he said: "Sing to God with all your heart." St. Jerome recalled this long tradition when he wrote about the jubilus, saying: "By the term jubilus we understand that which neither in words nor syllables nor letters nor speech is it possible to comprehend how much man ought to praise God." (L'encyclopédie des musiques sacres [1968–1970], vol. 2, p. 26)

This point of view is confirmed by George Chambers, who states:

It is a life of "rapture" which the apostle looks for, quite possibly acquired through the ecstatic medium of the "jubilation." … It may also be well to refer to the incident in Acts 16:25 when Paul and Silas, chained in prison, were "praying and singing to God," and apparently amazing phenomena followed from their action. (Folksong-Plainsong [1956], 11)

The New Catholic Encyclopedia (1967) concurs: "The improvised, charismatic song—associated especially with the Alleluia—continued in Christian worship" (vol. 10, pp. 105–106). Werner Meyer, a German scholar, suggests that plainsong and the musical parts of the liturgy emerged from the early practice of glossolalia:

The glossolalia of the early Eastern Church, as the original musical event, represents the germ cell or the original form of sung liturgical prayer.… In the sublime levitation and inter-weaving of the old church tones, and even in Gregorian chant to some extent, we are greeted by an element that has its profound roots in glossolalia. (Der erste Korintherbrief: Prophezei [1945], vol. 2, pp. 122ff)

The church fathers, however, did not see their experience as "tongues" or relate it to the New Testament phenomenon. They were either confused by the relevant passages in the New Testament or interpreted them to mean speaking in languages that one had not learned.

On the other hand, they did see a profound relationship between their experience of jubilation and the Scripture. The strongest correlation for them was with the jubilate Deo passages in the psalms. It appears that they understood the use of the word jubilus in the psalms to refer to wordless singing similar to their own. Because jubilation was non-controversial and devotional, the mystical tradition saw a number of scriptural images in it: the festivity of the father upon the return of the prodigal son, the joy of the bridegroom in the Song of Songs, and imagery from Job, to name a few instances. The question must be asked why the church fathers and the tradition fail to connect their experience with that of tongues. There is no clear answer. Perhaps the problem is primarily one of semantics. The terminology used in the church to describe glossolalia was different from that used in the Bible. Accepted folk-piety often has fluid and evolving terminology. Already in the New Testament there are several terms that seem to be used synonymously to describe the experience, such as "praying with the Spirit," "blessing with the Spirit," and "singing with the Spirit" (1 Cor. 14). The Ephesians (5:19) and Colossians (3:16) passages concerning "spiritual song" may well refer to glossolalia, as may Paul's reference to the sighs or groans of the Spirit in Romans 8:26. Thus we see varied terminology developing within the New Testament itself. The jubilation tradition of the church is harmonious with the view of modern biblical exegetes that New Testament glossolalia was an expression of spiritual response to the gospel. The church fathers and the tradition conceived of jubilation in the same way. The "sighs and groans" of the Jerusalem church which Egeria describes were a response to the reading of the gospel during the liturgical celebration, just as the tongues of Acts were a response to the word about Jesus. During the first millennium of the church, the liturgical jubilation came just before the reading of the gospel during Mass and served as a preparation for the Gospel.