ONE LANGUAGE, ONE PEOPLE
Genesis 11:1-9, Acts 2:1-13 (Pentecost)
May 27, 2007
Betty Berghaus
Obviously, we are talking about language today, and language is essential to human existence. Look at Genesis 1: “In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth…God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light.” God used language, or as the Gospel of John reminds us, the Word, the Logos, to create. The Word is powerful. Words can also be destructive. In order to live in community, we need words. We need language to communicate.
To read Genesis 11, the whole world spoke at first in one language, and so everyone understood one another. The people became afraid that they would be scattered. And the people were also perhaps a bit arrogant, as they decided to build a wonderful tower in order to “make a name” for themselves. According to the story, God saw this, and scattered the people and confused their language so that they no longer all understood one another.
So is the story true? Was there only one language up until this time? And did God then divide the language in order to divide the people? Remember that the Bible is not a history or a science book. And the literature of the Bible reflects the literature of the times in which the books were written. And in a pre-scientific world, there were many stories in ancient literature to explain the mysteries of the earth. This is such a story, a folk tale perhaps, or an etiology, written, at least in part, to explain why there are so many languages and diverse cultures on this earth.
This scattering of people and languages has often been interpreted as punishment by God to an arrogant people. But Walter Brueggeman reminds us that God created humankind “to be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth” (Gen. 1:28; 9:3). This scattering may have been God’s way of fulfilling God’s purpose. The people were afraid, and did not want to be scattered. (We are often afraid to do what God wants us to do!) But even with this scattering, the Bible tells us that God still desires unity. Isaiah (2:2-4) and Micah (4:1-4) talk of the Lord’s house established high so that all nations stream to it, and the Lord arbitrates between the nations so that they “beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.” (Oh, how we yearn for such days of unity and peace on our earth!)
Yet we are increasingly becoming a more diverse and scattered world. It is difficult to determine how many languages there are in the world today, because there can be several variations even of one language. But it is estimated that there are between 3000 and 5000 world languages. When I was growing up (one of those statements that shows you are aging!), the languages offered, besides English, of course, were French, Spanish, and German, with Latin and perhaps Greek as ancient languages. My Jewish friends took Hebrew, and a few people took Russian. But that was about it. Now, with all the resources available especially by web (which has its own language!), one can learn Afrikaan, Albanian, Bengali, Berber, Icelandic, Japanese, Javanese, Kurdi, Lakota, Macedonian, Slovak, Urdu, Zapotee, Zulu, or many more. The most spoken language in the world today is Mandarin Chinese, spoken by over 885 million people. Spanish is next, English is 3rd on the list, Bengali is 4th, and Hindi is 5th. And the 10th most spoken language in the world is Wu, spoken by 77 million. So, after God scattered the language of the people, language and people became very widely scattered.
There are even sub-cultural languages within one language that others may not understand. When my nurse friends get together, they start talking about procedures and meds and diseases that make no sense to my ear, and so I kind of tune out. I am sure that when theologians start talking about justification by faith and the seven theories of atonement many tune us out. Perhaps the most difficult division of the language lately comes from our on-line and cell phone usage. There is a commercial between a mom and daughter that goes so fast that I cannot follow their text message language (also called chatspeak, or SMS, text languaging). So I looked these up:
143 means I love you. 2G2BT = too good to be true.
404 = I don’t know. AFK = away from keyboard. AAK = asleep at keyboard. BBL = be back later. BTDT = been there, done that.
ROFL = rolling on floor laughing. OTL = out to lunch. OTW = off to work. PPL = people. PXT = please explain that. THNQ = thank you. UW = you’re welcome.
The Mom on this commercial may have known these abbreviations, but most of us probably do not. No wonder we have “a failure to communicate” these days! Barbara Brown Taylor, one of the world’s best English preachers, says that we have so many words thrown at us on a daily basis that we cannot really communicate with God anymore. She says that consumerism cheapens language, with ads full of words chosen not necessarily for truthfulness but to draw us in, and giving us promises that may not be kept (When God Is Silent, p. 9). Journalism, through papers, magazines, news shows, on-line news, barrages us with words that can shock or bore or numb us. And the language changes almost daily. Again showing that I am aging, I remember when a blackberry was just a fruit, a hit was something you did to someone or something; only spiders built websites; and on-line was there my Mother hung the laundry to dry!
In the midst of all these words, says Barbara Brown Taylor, there is a famine of words from God. We have quit listening to God and we hear instead all the other voices. Taylor reminds us of how the Word grew silent for three days, and then broke forth by rising again, and came to entrust the Word to us (p.47). In that sense, we are the ones who must carry forth God’s Word into a world full of chatter!
So then we come to the Pentecost story! The disciples were doing what the risen Jesus had told them to do. They were gathered together, waiting. Jesus had said, “you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8). And though the disciples may not have known what to expect, they had almost a full body experience! The text tells us that suddenly there was a great sound like the rush of a big wind filling the whole house. Then “divided tongues, as of fire” appeared and rested on each one of them, and they began to speak in other languages. And yet the crowd gathered all heard and understood what was being said in their own languages, and some were amazed, while others just assumed the disciples must have been drinking. But then Peter spoke up to deny this, and to witness to the story and power of Jesus Christ, just as Jesus had told him to do.
Many people see this story as the reversal of the Babel story. But, look, the text shows that the first gift of the Holy Spirit is “other languages!” Again, God desires for all to know the one God, with each understanding in their own native language! Scholars have tried to explain this miraculous feat through the years with such theories as: (1) Most of the crowd spoke at least some Greek or Aramaic, so they could get the essence of what was being said; (2) The apostles used enough idiomatic foreign phrases that anyone could understand; (3) There was such a close spiritual rapport between speakers and hearers that they understood what was being said; (4) This was simply a story concocted by Luke (or someone else) to tell how the church began so quickly; etc..
It is hard for us as analytical, logical people, and perhaps especially as learned Presbyterians, to accept a story of a miracle. Pentecost reminds us, says Barbara Brown Taylor, that “there is another side to God’s Spirit – one that can set us on fire, transform our lives, turn the world upside down” (Bread of Angels, p.69) The first chapters of Acts deal with the creation of the Christian church, just as the first chapters of Genesis deal with the creation of the world! Both are creations of our sovereign God! The Bible relates our relationship to God, and what God wants us to know and to do. In a world full of “Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia,” in a world that speaks Mandarin and Bengali, Hindi and Portugese and Wu, we, as disciples of our Lord, must strive to find a common language to relay the miracle of God’s great love as given to us in Jesus Christ.
I remember going on the mission trip of adults to Mexico in February 2003. The young ladies that Don Wehmeyer was teaching met very early each morning with Don for worship, usually based on the Psalms. Once or twice I got up to sit in worship with them, though I speak little or no Spanish. We also went to two Presbyterian churches while we were there, and sat through worship services at each that lasted for 2 hours. I admit to you that there were times that I was bored or sleepy. But when the Bible passages were read, in a language that I do now know, I felt an awe that could perhaps be attributed only to the Holy Spirit. I remember thinking, “This is the same Bible that we read. This is the Word of God.” Though I could not understand them, I knew that the words were good and holy. At one of the churches, we were invited to stand in a circle and share communion with the congregation. As we passed the elements to one another, we understood one another even though our languages were different. “This is the body of Christ, broken for you. This is the blood of Christ, shed for you.” (If there had been a baptism that day, we would have understood what was happening and what was being said.)
There are ways, even with the diversity of people and languages, to share the love of Christ with all around us. St. Francis of Assisi is credited with saying, “Preach the Gospel at all times. If necessary, use words.” With 3000 to 5000 languages and 8.3 billion people in the world, there is the common language of the love of God. What we call God may differ, but there is one God. That very God is community, three-in-one, in a way that we cannot fully understand, but that we strive to emulate by being community with one another in church, in family, in community, and in the world. Living in the love of God unites. It does not divide, and if it does, then we must be doing it wrong! When American Presbyterians cannot even speak a uniting language, we are in trouble. And that is the state of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) today. We are a divided people, arguing over who can or cannot be ordained, over who can or cannot sit in our pews. Christians argue with Jews and Hindus and others about how to live and worship. We even fight wars and kill one another based on our differing beliefs. How sad! I do not think this division is what God intended for us by scattering us into all the world!
On this Pentecost Sunday we are reminded that God gives us the gift of language, and that God gives us the gift of understanding. What we may be missing most are ears to listen to God. Our world is filled with languages and noises, and we take very little time to stop, and to be quiet, and to listen to what God may be saying to us. Listen for God and listen to God. Read the Bible, pray, take long walks (without Walkmans in your ears!), sit on the beach and meditate (but not on Sunday mornings, of course, because then you will be in church, right?)! And when You hear God’s Word for you, share it! Spread the Good News of the love of God as seen in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ our Lord! In everything you do or say, proclaim the marvelous and miraculous Word of God to a world full of words, but starving for The Word!
AMEN
CHARGE AND BENEDICTION:
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it….And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of truth and glory” (John 1:1-5, 14)
Go out and spread the good Word!
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Brueggeman, Walter, Genesis (Interpretation Commentaries) (John Knox Press, GA, 1982)
Taylor, Barbara Brown, Bread of Angels (Cowley Pub., Mass., 1997)
Taylor, Barbara Brown, When God Is Silent (Cowley Pub., Mass., 1998)
Walasky, Paul, Acts (Westminster Bible Companion) (Westminster/John Knox Press, KY, 1998)
Willimon, William H., Acts (Interpretation Commentaries) (John Knox Press, GA, 1987)