exaggeration being "language of angels"?
Correct – that’s the hyperbolic part. That whole section of the letter is filled with hyperboles.
Second part of that, yes, the emphasis definitely is on ‘love’.
Tongues is a language – Tongues are known languages to someone somewhere but not known to the person speaking
How can tongues be a known language to someone somewhere?? If that were the case (tongues are known languages….), each tongue could be easily identified as such and such a language. That is definitely not the case – anywhere.
Apparently - one is done without understanding and one is done with understanding.
Not sure I follow – whether he is singing or praying, he understands what’s coming out of his mouth. This second part about the singing may in fact strengthen the argument that “unfruitful” refers to others, in the sense of my understand is unfruitful (i.e. to others, not one’s self).
I agree – that certainly would have been the more obvious way to state it, but I might argue that, assuming the phrase was written down in idiomatic Greek, it’s quite possible, to one reading it, that meaning (i.e. ‘others’ was meant, not ‘self’) was obvious and didn’t require further clarification.
these unlearned and ignorant men; fishermen, carpenters; blue collar workers - spoke in tongues on the day of Pentecost - languages that they did not know nor had learned -
There were Jews from two different places gathered there at Shavuot; one could classify them as “locals”, i.e. people from Jerusalem and the environs as well as Jews from other places in Judea (let’s call this ‘Group 1’), and Jews of the Diaspora – the Diasporan Jews could be subdivided into two groups: those from the Western Diaspora (Let’s call these guys ‘Group 2’) and those of the Eastern Diaspora (let’s say ‘Group 3’).
Jews from Group 1 would have spoken Aramaic as their mother tongue. Some of these (especially if they lived in a large city, such as Jerusalem) may have grown up with Greek as their mother tongue.
Jews from Group 2, though they were from different lands and countries, would have all spoken Greek as their mother tongue. This area of the world had been heavily Hellenized for centuries and Greek had long replaced any indigenous language(s).
So far we have a good percentage of the total population of Jews present, but only two languages: Greek and Aramaic.
Jews from Group 3 seem at first to be a bit more problematic – they lived in places where people did speak indigenous languages. They were however, first and foremost, Jews. As a minority ethnic, and more importantly, religious group in a foreign country, as with most ethnic groups even today, they wished to preserve their distinct Jewish identity. One main way ethnic groups do this is to retain their language as part of their cultural identity. Though they may have certainly learned the language(s) spoken where they lived, these were never their mother tongues. Jews in these places, from what little accounts still exist, retained Aramaic as their mother tongue. This is one of the things that gave them their identity as a Jewish people and connected them to their past. The mother tongue of Group 3 was Aramaic.
So, again, Jews from “all over the world”, actually the list further down in Acts tells us exactly where they were from – it’s a list of the lands of the Diaspora, not a list of languages. It says nothing about any linguistic diversity, but speaks volumes in indicating that the first apostolic mission was predominately to the Jewish nation as a whole, diaspora included.
We have quite a few people in Jerusalem for Shavuot, but still only two languages; Greek and Aramaic – the apostles, being Hellenized Jews, would have spoken both.
People were bewildered, amazed, perplexed. Some even accused them of being drunk – Why? It’s because in this situation, the people would have expected Hebrew to have been used as the language of teaching, instructing, prophesying. Jewish custom dictated that in situations such as this, Hebrew was the socially and religiously correct language to use, not “inferior” languages like Aramaic and Greek- what the apostles were doing was totally unexpected and rather shocking to most people; it went against Jewish custom and tradition of the time; it was something you just didn’t do (in a public setting anyways).
So where does that leave the ‘tongues’ of Acts? There’s no language miracle happening; it’s not a miracle of speaking, nor is it one of hearing. The miracle was perhaps one of strength to go out and teach/preach to the people despite being in fear of one’s life (they were, as we read, “in fear of the Jews”) and to do it using common everyday language as opposed to some culturally correct standard (Hebrew) which no longer adequately functioned for this purpose.
Admittedly, a rather radical way to look at Acts perhaps, but I believe it’s a more accurate representation of what occurred.
