F
fred_conty
Guest
Have you every wondered about whether singing was worth the effort? Sometimes it seems like a lot of bother when we could just recite the prayers at Mass. And I’ve notices how many people just do not sing during Mass, and so maybe they feel like singing really isn’t necessay at all.
This is Pentecost Sunday and I thought it very much to the point since it speaks of both singing and the gift of tongues and how they are kissing cousins. The post is interesting and so I would like to share it with you and hope you will tell us about your singing experiences or how important you may think singing is or isn’t.
Here is the article.
forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=588851&highlight=Poirier
Speaking tongues
I just opened the Bible after reading this thread and guess what? It fell open randomely at Corithians 14, the part where Paul discusses tongues in gthe context of a worship service!
I would suggest YS that you reflect deeply and prayerfully opver this section of Corinthians. My eyes were drawn particularly to this verse: “If I pray in a tongue my spirit prays but my mind is unproductive” (Corinth. 14.15)
Paul tells us above that “speaking in tongues” can be a genuine charism of the Holy Spirit which does not come from the mind, but is totally instantaneous and out with the control of the individual. Obviously you will get fakers, but rest assured in your case I would say that it truly was the spirit and not just your mind playing tricks on you.
You ask about tongues and “gibberish talk”. Well there are actually TWO kinds of tongues in the NT:
1 Corinthians 13.1-If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels
Angels do not have physical speech with words. But continually praise God and sing to him with ALL THEIR BEING. To speak then in the tongue of angels is to be so ecstatic with prayer that one moves beyonds words - which bring God down to the artificial human level of concepts and thoughts. God is so far above our understanding and so sometimes we move beyond language all together and just praise him with all of our being, which manifests itself in a gibberish-sounding language that is quite wordless and apparently unintelligible because it comes from the heart and not from the rational mind.
Episodes of this are related by the Fathers. They called this “Jubilation” or in Latin the Jubilus, which came to refer in High Church Gregorian Chant to the moment when the monks singing stop saying actual words and lapse into an eerie sounding “Ahh-ah-ahh” you know what i mean, those heavenly-like elongated “a’s” - wordless but heartfelt praise.
St. Jerome (347-420 A.D.) writes:
By the term jubilus we understand that which neither in words, nor syllables, nor letters, nor speech, is it possible to express or comprehend, namely, how much man ought to praise God. (Ps. xxxii.3)
And St Augustine comments on this phenomenon:
What is jubilation? Joy that cannot be expressed in words. Yet the voice expresses what is conceived in the heart and cannot be explained in words. This is jubilation…Where speech does not suffice… To manifest his joy, the man does not use words that can be pronounced or understood, but bursts forth into sounds of exaltation without words…they break out into singing on vowel sounds, that through this means the feeling of the soul may be expressed, words failing to explain the heart’s conceptions. - St. Augustine (Commentary on Psalms, See this site.)
In his book, “Tongues of Angels: Concept of Angelic Languages in Classical Jewish and Christian Texts”, Poirier points out that in the ancient Jewish pseudepigraphal books there are references to a liturgical jubilations - wordless, gibberish singings of praise like the one you experienced. This jubilus reflected the esoteric tongues of angels rather than human languages, which are word-based rather than heart-based. St. Jerome was known to have interacted with Jewish believers in Antioch and lived near Bethlehem. It appears to me that one can make a strong case that the jubilus he describes, coincides with the description of metaphorical angelic tongues described in Jewish pseudepigraphical writings and also mentioned by the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 13.
We know that this practice of jubilation was widespread in the early church and continued for centuries. For example, the Benedictine theologian Rupert of Deutz (1075-1130 A.D.), spoke of the devotional prayer practice of jubilation that continued in his day:
We jubilate rather than sing, and extend a short syllable over several neums or groups of neums, in order that the spirit may be moved by the beautiful sounds
The standard form in Catholicism to express this “jubilation” became Gregorian Chant, which truly is angelic. Just listen to this:
youtube.com/watch?v=_MbDqc3x97k
See wikipedia: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossolalia
This is Pentecost Sunday and I thought it very much to the point since it speaks of both singing and the gift of tongues and how they are kissing cousins. The post is interesting and so I would like to share it with you and hope you will tell us about your singing experiences or how important you may think singing is or isn’t.
Here is the article.
forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=588851&highlight=Poirier
Speaking tongues
I just opened the Bible after reading this thread and guess what? It fell open randomely at Corithians 14, the part where Paul discusses tongues in gthe context of a worship service!
I would suggest YS that you reflect deeply and prayerfully opver this section of Corinthians. My eyes were drawn particularly to this verse: “If I pray in a tongue my spirit prays but my mind is unproductive” (Corinth. 14.15)
Paul tells us above that “speaking in tongues” can be a genuine charism of the Holy Spirit which does not come from the mind, but is totally instantaneous and out with the control of the individual. Obviously you will get fakers, but rest assured in your case I would say that it truly was the spirit and not just your mind playing tricks on you.
You ask about tongues and “gibberish talk”. Well there are actually TWO kinds of tongues in the NT:
- Tongues of Mortals: Gift of speaking in other languages which was necessary so that the Early Church could expand but which became defunct after the Apostolic times
- Tongues of Angels: Speech that goes beyond words and sounds almost gibberish. This has existed post-apostolic times and seems to be a recurrent gift
1 Corinthians 13.1-If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels
Angels do not have physical speech with words. But continually praise God and sing to him with ALL THEIR BEING. To speak then in the tongue of angels is to be so ecstatic with prayer that one moves beyonds words - which bring God down to the artificial human level of concepts and thoughts. God is so far above our understanding and so sometimes we move beyond language all together and just praise him with all of our being, which manifests itself in a gibberish-sounding language that is quite wordless and apparently unintelligible because it comes from the heart and not from the rational mind.
Episodes of this are related by the Fathers. They called this “Jubilation” or in Latin the Jubilus, which came to refer in High Church Gregorian Chant to the moment when the monks singing stop saying actual words and lapse into an eerie sounding “Ahh-ah-ahh” you know what i mean, those heavenly-like elongated “a’s” - wordless but heartfelt praise.
St. Jerome (347-420 A.D.) writes:
By the term jubilus we understand that which neither in words, nor syllables, nor letters, nor speech, is it possible to express or comprehend, namely, how much man ought to praise God. (Ps. xxxii.3)
And St Augustine comments on this phenomenon:
What is jubilation? Joy that cannot be expressed in words. Yet the voice expresses what is conceived in the heart and cannot be explained in words. This is jubilation…Where speech does not suffice… To manifest his joy, the man does not use words that can be pronounced or understood, but bursts forth into sounds of exaltation without words…they break out into singing on vowel sounds, that through this means the feeling of the soul may be expressed, words failing to explain the heart’s conceptions. - St. Augustine (Commentary on Psalms, See this site.)
In his book, “Tongues of Angels: Concept of Angelic Languages in Classical Jewish and Christian Texts”, Poirier points out that in the ancient Jewish pseudepigraphal books there are references to a liturgical jubilations - wordless, gibberish singings of praise like the one you experienced. This jubilus reflected the esoteric tongues of angels rather than human languages, which are word-based rather than heart-based. St. Jerome was known to have interacted with Jewish believers in Antioch and lived near Bethlehem. It appears to me that one can make a strong case that the jubilus he describes, coincides with the description of metaphorical angelic tongues described in Jewish pseudepigraphical writings and also mentioned by the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 13.
We know that this practice of jubilation was widespread in the early church and continued for centuries. For example, the Benedictine theologian Rupert of Deutz (1075-1130 A.D.), spoke of the devotional prayer practice of jubilation that continued in his day:
We jubilate rather than sing, and extend a short syllable over several neums or groups of neums, in order that the spirit may be moved by the beautiful sounds
The standard form in Catholicism to express this “jubilation” became Gregorian Chant, which truly is angelic. Just listen to this:
youtube.com/watch?v=_MbDqc3x97k
See wikipedia: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossolalia
