Christians filled with Holy Spirit would speak in unknown language. It can be claimed that they are speaking Angelic language known to God. Other who may not want to make that claim but say that they are speaking in tongue. None can understand unless someone who claim that he can interpret tongue. Of course, God is omnipotent they believe and he surely can give any kind of tongue to people he loves or he want to save. Anyway, it would be good if anyone can trace what was the language spoken before that was varied. How wonderful if anyone can speak the language spoken by the Angels. Or we may say that angels do not converse like the humans. It is done by mind wave. If that is the case, humans must learn that art again to communicate. Language is too varied and confusing until strangely English has become widely spoken and written. I thought that is it. What do you say? By the number of language spoken, Chinese language may be included in the consideration? Do you think so?
2006-12-03 05:38:58 · 14 answers · asked by Ptuan 3 in Society & Culture ➔ Languages
There are several things I'd like to point out about this question:
1. The Babel story is not factual. It is a piece of folklore created to explain the diversity of languages that have existed for as long as human beings have been speaking.
2. Assuming that there was, at one time, a single language that all human beings spoke, that language is long dead. It was not written down, and so we will never know exactly what it was. It was not, however, any language existing today. Languages are not constant entities. They are continually changing, splitting off and dying out, changing form, etc. So, it's fallacious reasoning to assume that a modern language would be the original language; every language spoken today is a daughter language of a first tongue (if it was only one, which is probable but by no means certain).
3. People "speaking in tongues" are not speaking language. Speaking in tongues, or glossolalia, is not well understood, but linguists analyzing glossolalic speech have generally determined that it is not language in the truest sense, since it is unpatterned, and the phonemes (sounds) are the same as the native language of the person speaking in tongues.
2006-12-03 20:24:07 · answer #1 · answered by desiroka 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
The point of the Bible passage about the tower of Babel is that people all spoke one language and then God broke them up into numerous different languages, meaning that no ONE language was still the same, therefore, even if there was a universal language at that time, it would not exist anymore in any shape or form because all people were given a different language to speak.
2006-12-03 05:53:18 · answer #2 · answered by cocoxnznz 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
In Genesis 10, verse 31 says:
These are the sons of Shem, after their families, after their tongues, in their lands, after their nations.
Then right after that in Genesis 11, verse 1 says:
And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech.
What gives? The bible gives no explanation why after men have been speaking in "tongues", they all ended up with just one, only to to have the Lord:
...confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech.
This mythological story is meant to explain why there would be a muttiplicity of languages, and people have always needed stories like this in an effort to make sense of the world around them. There are many excellent books and resources on paleolinguistics, or early languages, and no serious scholar in linguistics believe that at one time all men spoke one language. Here's one link you can check out regarding this story and probable history of languages at the time this story is supposed to have happened:
2006-12-03 06:00:28 · answer #3 · answered by Scythian1950 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
English derives from a linguist group which derives from another linguist group so I highly doubt that in might have been some Indo-Semetic since they are the most widley spoken languages.
2006-12-03 05:42:40 · answer #4 · answered by Borinke 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Hebrew
2006-12-03 05:50:03 · answer #5 · answered by Freesia 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Aramaic
2006-12-03 05:41:59 · answer #6 · answered by devora k 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Def English
Jesus spoke English
2006-12-03 05:40:47 · answer #7 · answered by mr america 2 · 0⤊ 3⤋
You're asking a practical question about a piece of folklore. That doesn't make sense.
2006-12-03 05:41:47 · answer #8 · answered by nevisgent 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
If there was only one language, it wouldn't have had a name. Just like there's only one sky, so it doesn't have a name.
2006-12-03 06:04:58 · answer #9 · answered by Goddess of Grammar 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
English! yeah, right. ;)
and just like Star Trek, all aliens speak English, too! ;)
2006-12-03 05:41:35 · answer #10 · answered by kent_shakespear 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋