Book Review: Blosser & Sullivan "Speaking in Tongues" Volume 2

Back in 2023 I reviewed Speaking in Tongues: A Critical Historical Examination by Phil Blosser and Charles Sullivan and published by Pickwick Publications. It was an excellent book and an ecumenical venture of the best kind (Blosser is Catholic and Sullivan a Protestant), tackling the Charismatic subculture within both Protestantism and Catholicism with a detailed study of how the Charismatic conception of tongues developed out of the British Irvingite movement of the 19th century, developing into modern Pentecostalism in the aftermath of the Tongues Missionary Crisis of 1906-1909.

This summer I read Volume 2 in the series, subtitled "Tongues Through Church History." Whereas Volume 1 focused on how we got to the modern conception of tongues as a "personal language of prayer and praise," Volume 2 focuses on medieval and patristic sources to shed light on how Christians prior to the 19th century viewed the miracle of tongues. Along the way Blosser and Sullivan meticulously guide the reader through the lives and writings of Francis Xavier, Francisco Suarez, Thomas Aquinas, Augustine, John Chrysostom, Basil, Bede, Nazianzen, Origen, and many others in an attempt to tease out what these ecclesiastical luminaries thought about the gift of tongues.

The overarching question behind these character studies is whether anyone in Church history believed that the gift of tongues consisted in a miraculous "heavenly" prayer language that was indiscernible to human reason, akin to how it is conceived of and practiced in Charismatic circles today. The answer is a resounding no. Blosser and Sullivan's study demonstrates beyond any doubt that the consensus of Christian tradition is that the miracle of tongues was always conceived of as rationally speaking a previously unlearned human language, not as a personal language of prayer and praise that is rationally indiscernible to the hearer. In fact, in the authors' wide study of medieval and patristic sources, we do not find so much as one father, doctor, or saint who holds anything close to the Charismatic-Pentecostal view of tongues. All sources East and West unanimously agree that the miracles of tongues consists in speaking previously unlearned human languages.

That's not to say there was always unanimity on every point. Among the sources consulted, Blosser and Sullivan reveal an interesting subdiscussion on whether tongues was a miracle of speaking or hearing. If you are not aware of the distinction, here is an illustration using the occasion of the tongues of Pentecost as an example:

Miracle of Speaking: On Pentecost, the disciples miraculously spoke languages they had not previously learned. The subject of the miracle is the speaker.

Miracle of Hearing: On Pentecost, the disciples all spoke in their own language (Aramaic), but their hearers miraculously heard and understood the words in their own languages. The subject of the mirace is the hearer.

While the majority of interpreters have favored tongues as a miracle of speaking, the miracle of hearing position also has some partisans, while a few have opined that both are possible. This question of speaking vs. hearing is one of the interesting points of contention that has characterized the story of tongues throughout Catholic history.

The character studies in the book introduce us to all manner of fascinating details about the history of tongues. For example, while I'd always known that St. Francis Xavier was known for speaking in tongues on his missionary journeys, I had no idea how controversial these claims were, even within Xavier's own day. At the time of Xavier's canonization (1622), there was considerable disagreement over whether he had truly spoken in tongues or whether these stories were pious exaggerations. Skeptics of Xavier's tongues were heavily influenced by Protestant apologists, who denied the continued existence of tongues prima facie, as the existence of tongues within the Catholic fold would undermine Protestant claims that the Catholic Church had apostasized. Even some Catholic scholars questioned Xavier's tongues, however, and the matter became heavily disputed among the Roman congregations in the days leading up to Xavier's canonization. In the end, the tongues of Xavier were meticulously verified and eventually passed muster, a process thoroughly documented by the authors. The investigation into Xavier's tongues became a case study in ecclesiastical miracle investigations and was referenced by Prospero Lambertini (Benedict XIV) in his famous De servorum Dei beatificatione.

Another fascinating nugget was how a certain 5th century translator named Tyrannius Rufinus mistranslated texts from Sts. Gregory Nazianzen and Pachomius from Greek into Latin, giving rise to a millennium-worth of disagreement over the nature of the tongues of Pentecost and accounting for the dispute about whether the tongues of Acts 2 could have been a miracle of hearing.

Though the book takes us through plenty of juicy side adventures, each chapter returns to the fundamental point—the gift of tongues has always been understood as the miraculous, rational speaking of other human languages.There is no precedent in Church history for understanding it as a "personal prayer language," as one is accustomed to hearing in charismatic churches today. 

Despite this conclusion, one would be mistaken to consider this a polemical work against Charismatic Christians. Its tone is entirely scholarly (when I say scholarly, I mean there are multiple pages about how to translate specific Greek verb); and as in Volume 1, the authors insist that the work is not an "attack" on Charismatics, nor is it suggestive that the modern day charismatic experience does not have positive value for those who engage in it. Blosser and Sullivan are, however, insistent on the point that what passes for tongues today is certainly not how tongues was understood by the medievals and patristics.

The next volume in the series will be about the tongues of Corinth mentioned in 1 Corinthians 14, but Dr. Blosser has informed me that the next installment (which has already been completed) will be broken into two more books, so we will be getting a Volume 3 and 4 in the near future. 

Blosser and Sullivan's work is an fantastic resource for anyone interested in the history of tongues. Their scholarship is so comprehensive that I dare say this series will be the definitive work on the subject for years to come. I highly recommend Speaking in Tongues: Tongues through Church History as a valuable collection to your library.