Craig, would you please share with us some documentation showing tongues "in the spirit of Pentecostalism" occurred long ago, historically?
Remember what Dr. Bob said about misunderstanding old writings where revivals were full of the Holy-Spirit and other such statements. This does NOT mean that they were speaking in tongues.
Phillip,
I do not have the time to research this for you right now, nor do I want to derail this thread, but here is a tad bit of documentation of speaking in tongues (where speaking in tongues is specifically mentioned):
Irenaeus wrote,
"In like manner do we also hear many brethren in the Church who possess prophetic gifts, and who through the Spirit speak all kinds of language and bring to light for the general benefit the hidden things of men and declare the mysteries of God, whom also the apostles term spiritual "
Tertullian wrote,
"Let him exhibit prophets such as have spoken, not by human sense but with the Spirit of God, such as have predicted things to come, and have made manifest the secrets of the heart; let him produce a psalm, a vision a prayer, only let it be by the Spirit in an ecstasy, that is, in a rapture, whenever an interpretation of tongues has occurred to him "
Saint Augustine wrote:
"We still do what the apostles did when they laid hands on the Samaritans and called down the Holy Spirit on them by the laying on of hands. It is expected that converts should speak with new tongues.”
Later in church history we find this phenomenon reported among the following:
Saint Hildengard in the twelfth century
The mendicant friars of the thirteenth century, the most notable of which was Saint Vincent Ferrer
In the first half of the sixteenth century we find it reported about the two Catholic saints, Saint Francis Xavier and Saint Louis Bertrand. In the bull by which Bertrand was canonized for his success in missionary work we read, "to facilitate the work of converting the natives, the apostle was miraculously endowed with the gift of tongues."
In Sourer’s History of the Christian Church we read, “It is stated that, Dr. Martin Luther was a prophet, evangelist, speaker in tongues, and interpreter, in one person, endowed with all the gifts of the Holy Spirit."
The Jansenists in the early 1700’s
The Cevennes of the same period
In the Encyclopedia Britannica we read of tongues "among the converts of Wesley and Whitefield," and that John Wesley wrote a protest against a Dr. Middleton who wrote "after the Apostolic time, there is not, in all history, one instance...of any person who had even exercised that gift (tongues)." Wesley replied, "Sir, your memory fails you again, it has been heard more than once no further off than the valleys of Dauphiny."(14)
The Society of Friends or Quakers in the seventeenth century,
"While waiting upon the Lord in silence, as often we did for many hours together, we received often the pouring down of the Spirit upon us, and our hearts were glad and our tongues loosed and our mouth opened, and we spake with new tongues as the Lord gave us utterance, and as His Spirit led us, which was poured down upon us, on sons and daughters, and the glory of the Father was revealed. And then began we to sing praise to the Lord God Almighty and to the Lamb forever "(16)
The Shakers in the eighteenth century,
“Some who attended confessed their sins aloud, crying for mercy; some went into a trance-like state in which they saw visions and received prophecies of Christ's imminent second coming. Others shouted and danced for joy because they believed that the day was at hand for wars to cease and God's kingdom on earth to begin."
The Irvingites in the early nineteenth century among whom speaking in tongues during church services was the norm.
In 1830 Mary Campbell was reported to have spoken in tongues and prophesized.
Among those to whom Dwight L. Moody ministered,
Dr. R. Boyd wrote in 1873:
“When I got to the rooms of the Young Men's Christian Association in Victoria Hall, London, I found the meeting on fire: The young men were speaking in tongues, prophesying. What on earth did it mean? Only that Moody had been addressing them that afternoon”
In 1875 R.B. Swan wrote that he and others spoke in tongues.
In 1879 we read of W.J. Walthall receiving the baptism of the Holy Spirit and speaking in tongues.
In 1880 in Kara Kara, Armenia a Pentecostal movement broke out with speaking in tongues.
Also in 1880 speaking in tongues was reported in Switzerland.
. But of course that is the precise opposite of good translation ethics and practices.
