The critic of Pentecostals will point out that in Acts 2, authentic human languages were used when speaking in tongues (γλῶσσα: glossa). Although this is true, it does not follow that every time someone speaks in tongues in Scripture, it is automatically a human language, nor do we believe tongues are an ecstatic speech, tongues of angels, or gibberish. Tongues may either be a human language or a spiritual language, depending on the context.

While γλῶσσα (glossa) is not lexically restricted to human language, any extension beyond ordinary human speech must be explicitly supplied by context. Paul’s phrase “tongues of humans and of angels” (1 Cor 13:1) illustrates this principle: the qualifier (“of angels”) specifies a speaker domain without altering the lexical substance of γλῶσσα as language. Whether this phrase is read rhetorically or hypothetically, its intelligibility depends on γλῶσσα already denoting language rather than non-semantic sound.¹

This methodological distinction is essential for avoiding two common errors:

(1) redefining γλῶσσα as “ecstatic speech” on the basis of Greco-Roman religious analogy, and

(2) restricting γλῶσσα to known human languages by importing later doctrinal assumptions into the lexicon.

The Angelic Language Problem

1. “Tongues of angels” in 1 Corinthians 13:1 is rhetorical hyperbole.

Paul also says, “if I understood all mysteries and all knowledge” and possessed “all faith” (13:2). These are deliberately maximal expressions. He is not claiming to speak angelic languages, but he emphasizes that even the greatest imaginable speech is worthless without love.

2. Scripture never identifies speaking in tongues as angelic speech.

Whenever biblical angels speak, they communicate intelligibly in ordinary human language. No passage states that the gift of tongues enables believers to speak the native languages of angels – if there is such a thing. Scripture does not identify how angels communicate with one another.

3. Would Angels speak to each other in multiple languages?

The enormous diversity of modern tongue-speech creates an additional difficulty for the angelic-language theory. If these varied utterances are all actual angelic languages, the theory must assume—without biblical evidence—that angels possess numerous languages or dialects. This makes no sense. The reason there are so many human languages was a sign of God’s judgment upon man at the Tower of Babel. Scripture neither teaches such linguistic diversity among angels nor identifies speaking in tongues as participation in angelic speech.

Given that γλῶσσα (glossa) lexically denotes language and the speaker domain is supplied by context, Acts 8, 10, and Acts 19 legitimately allow the inference that the tongues there function as Spirit-directed (“spiritual”) language rather than human-directed language, because Luke omits any human comprehension and foregrounds divine reception. Paul explicates this pattern didactically (“speaks not to humans but to God,” 1 Cor 14:2), yielding a coherent Luke–Paul convergence without redefining γλῶσσα (glossa)

We believe that speaking in tongues can be a human or spiritual language, depending upon context, but it is primarily spiritual one, according to what Scripture emphasizes.

1. 1. LSJ, s.v. γλῶσσα:
   “γλῶσσα, ης, ἡ: the tongue; … the organ of speech; … language, speech; … a foreign tongue; … an obsolete, provincial, or poetic word requiring explanation.”
   Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, and Henry Stuart Jones, A Greek–English Lexicon, rev. ed. (Oxford: Clarendon, 1996).
   2. LSJ, ibid.; contrast vocabulary for non-semantic or ecstatic sound is listed separately under entries such as μανία and ἀλαλαγμός, not under γλῶσσα.
   3.  BDAG, s.v. γλῶσσα:
   “① the tongue as an organ of speech … ② a language, esp. as spoken by a people group … ③ a special utterance requiring interpretation, as in glossolalia.”
   Walter Bauer, Frederick W. Danker, William F. Arndt, and F. Wilbur Gingrich, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, 3rd ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000).
   BDAG immediately connects this usage with ἑρμηνεία, presupposing meaningful speech.
   4.  BDAG, ibid., on 1 Cor 13:1, treats “tongues of angels” as a rhetorical extension without creating a new lexical sense. ↩︎