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believer who hankers after the special spiritual thrill of the separate "baptism of the
Spirit". When one grows spiritually, feelings give way to absolute trust in what the Lord
is in Himself and this is changeless.
We should know too, that glossalia can be psychologically induced and therefore is no
proof whatsoever of the Holy Spirit's work. A Christian psychiatrist writes:
"The product of our analysis is the demonstration of the very natural mechanisms
which produced glossalia. As a psychological phenomenon, glossalia is easy to produce
and readily understandable."
(E. Mansell Pattison, "Speaking in Tongues and about Tongues").
The Encyclopaedia Britannica has this to say:
"The gift of tongues and their interpretation was not peculiar to the Christian Church,
but was a repetition in it of a phase common in ancient religions. The very phrase glosais
lalein, `to speak with tongues', was not invented by the New Testament writers, but
borrowed from ordinary speech. Virgil (Acn. 6: 46,97) draws a life-like picture of the
ancient prophetess `speaking with tongues' . . . . . the same morbid and abnormal trance
utterances occur in Christian revivals of every age, e.g. among the mendicant friars of the
13th century, among the Jansenites, the early Quakers, the converts of Wesley and
Whitefield, the persecuted Protestants of the Cevennes, the Irvingites and the revivalists
of Wales and America. Oracular possession of the kind above described is also common
among savages and people of lower culture . . . . ." (pp. 288, 289, 1963 edition).
No wonder then Satan can use tongue speaking in order to deceive! With regard to
the Irvingite movement which was the beginning of modern Pentecostalism, Sir Robert
Anderson gives a detailed account in his Spirit Manifestations and the Gift of Tongues.
Edward Irving (1792-1834), a pastor of a London church, founded the Catholic
Apostolic Church and began to introduce tongue speaking into his ministry. Sir Robert
Anderson shows the excesses to which this finally led. Richard Baxter, a lawyer, first
took an active part in the movement, but when prophecies made failed to be fulfilled, his
eyes were opened and he broke away after telling Irving "we had all been speaking by a
lying spirit and not by the Spirit of the Lord". Scores of people were deceived by this
`angel of light' teaching.
Irving relates that the power of the Holy Spirit came upon him irresistibly, so much so
that he was compelled to put his handkerchief into his mouth to stop the sound so that he
should not alarm others. This in itself should have been a warning to him for "the spirits
of the prophets are subject to the prophets" (I Cor. 14: 32); in other words the power is
controllable by the prophet. The Holy Spirit does not force people or lead to such
excesses that have occurred from time to time in Pentecostal meetings.
One of the great dangers of such Pentecostal teaching is that it exalts the Holy Spirit at
the expense of Christ, so that the Lord Jesus in effect is subordinated to the Holy Spirit.
The Saviour said:
"He shall not speak of Himself . . . . . He shall glorify me: for He shall receive of
mine: and shall show it unto you" (John 16: 13, 14).