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“Filled with the Holy Spirit”: The Roots of Pentecostalism

David W. Kling

in The Bible in History: How the Texts Have Shaped the Times

This chapter focuses on the origins of Pentecostalism, giving special attention to its early twentieth-century historical and theological roots and its biblical basis in the Book of Acts.

Pentecost!

Roger Glenn Robins

in A. J. Tomlinson: Plainfolk Modernist

On January 11, 1907, the General Assembly of Tomlinson’s Union Grove congregation decided to call themselves the “Church of God”. By this time, Tomlinson had accepted the principle of Pentecostal ... More

On January 11, 1907, the General Assembly of Tomlinson’s Union Grove congregation decided to call themselves the “Church of God”. By this time, Tomlinson had accepted the principle of Pentecostal baptism and began orienting his services more specifically along “pentecostal lines”. Pentecostalism had only begun to coalesce, evolving from an amorphous subculture within holiness into a nascent movement of its own distinguished by speaking in other tongues and the meaning it attributed to that experience. Glossolalia had become the catalyst and differentiating feature of an aggressive new force in American life.Less

The Opera of Speech: Glossolalias

Michel de Certeau, Luce Giard, and Michael B. Smith

in The Mystic Fable, Volume Two: The Sixteenth And Seventeenth Centuries

Setting out from two definitions of glossolalia, Certeau radicalizes that concept by contrast with statements of meaning. “Noises,” sounds themselves, detached from meaning, characterize glossolalia. ... More

Setting out from two definitions of glossolalia, Certeau radicalizes that concept by contrast with statements of meaning. “Noises,” sounds themselves, detached from meaning, characterize glossolalia. It is an “atopia” of language, outside the walls of language, a saying that is not a saying of anything. Is it the voice of the spirit? John of the Cross calls the spirit “el que habla,” that which speaks. Certeau distinguishes two glossolalic types: a primary type (religious) that moves from a not-being-able-to-say to a being-able-to-say via a being-able-not-to-say; and a secondary type (poetic, playful, sometimes pathological) that deconstructs articulate speech in favor of a sonorous freedom. The former type has a kinship with tears, a non-discursive expressivity; the latter with laughter. Pfister’s psychoanalytic and Saussure’s linguistic approach both take the bait of glossolalia: luring reason into its own mania of “making sense.” Glossolalia is origin and end, a before and an after discourse.Less

On Tongues and Ears: Divine Voices in the Modern Metropolis

James Grande

in London Voices, 1820-1840: Vocal Performers, Practices, Histories

In accounts of voice and vocality in early nineteenth-century London, two dominant narratives emerge. If one concerns political representation—having, or finding, a voice, in an age of petitions, ... More

In accounts of voice and vocality in early nineteenth-century London, two dominant narratives emerge. If one concerns political representation—having, or finding, a voice, in an age of petitions, protests, and parliamentary reform—the other revolves around a new set of claims that were being made for the idealized voices of high art. This chapter, however, focuses on some alternative accounts of listening and speaking, which disrupt the narratives of Romanticism and reform and challenge our sense of London’s nineteenth-century modernity. It takes its cue from Charles Lamb’s 1821 essay “A Chapter on Ears,” an anguished response to new attitudes towards musical listening which reflects Lamb’s background in the culture of Protestant dissent. It then turns to the 1822 arrival of the celebrity preacher Edward Irving, who quickly became one of the most talked about, listened to, captivating voices in London. The two are linked through the figure of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, a submerged presence in Lamb’s essay and a close friend and mentor to Irving. These heterodox histories, of frustrated listening, charismatic oratory, and—finally—of inspired speech, or glossolalia, suggest the persistence of some residual regimes of voice, which now seem strangely proleptic of our own religious present.Less

The final reformation

Lionel Laborie

in Enlightening Enthusiasm: Prophecy and religious experience in early eighteenth-century England

Chapter 3 explores the French Prophets’ system of beliefs against the backdrop of contemporary denominations in an attempt to understand their spiritual appeal to an English audience. It explores ... More

Chapter 3 explores the French Prophets’ system of beliefs against the backdrop of contemporary denominations in an attempt to understand their spiritual appeal to an English audience. It explores England’s long millenarian tradition before the Camisards found refuge in London. Their emphasis on religious experience (spirit possession, prophecy, gift of tongues, miracles, dreams and visions) over doctrinal boundaries enabled the French Prophets, and enthusiasts more generally, to appeal to all denominations alike. Their ecumenical ambition to reconcile Judaeo-Christian denominations into a Universal Church has been misunderstood as a form of sectarianism. This chapter argues on the contrary, that enthusiasm, as a religious experience, was ecumenical and irenic, that is the opposite of religious dissent.Less

I Artaud BwO: The Uses of Artaud's To have done with the judgement of god

Edward Scheer

in Deleuze and Performance

This chapter focuses on Gilles Deleuze's concept of body without organs (BWO), the Deleuzian idea which resonates most powerfully as a concept for and of performance. It provides a detailed retelling ... More

This chapter focuses on Gilles Deleuze's concept of body without organs (BWO), the Deleuzian idea which resonates most powerfully as a concept for and of performance. It provides a detailed retelling of the radio program To have done with the judgement of God, from which Deleuze borrowed the notion of BWO, and suggests that this work and Antonin Artaud's oeuvre as a whole, should not be interpreted as merely symptomatic of schizophrenic experience. It contends that Artaud actively develops a glossolalia beyond everyday language in order to destratify the bodies of his listeners.Less

Trance States: Tongues Speaking and the Anointing

Ralph W. Hood Jr. and W. Paul Williamson

in Them That Believe: The Power and Meaning of the Christian Serpent-Handling Tradition

This chapter focuses on the socio psychological dynamics of trance states that have been long associated with the practice of various Pentecostal signs—including glossolalia and serpent handling. ... More

This chapter focuses on the socio psychological dynamics of trance states that have been long associated with the practice of various Pentecostal signs—including glossolalia and serpent handling. Trance states are necessary for those who handle either by “faith” or by “anointing.” The major efforts to explain trance states have been physiological. Trance states were found to involve an increased heart rate lowered levels of adrenaline, noradrenaline, and cortisol; and higher levels of beta-endorphins that persisted even after the trance experience ended. Studies focusing on trance states among serpent-handling churches have been limited; there is an abundance of research on Pentecostal groups that link trance with tongues speaking. The combination of contextual cues and physiological dissociation that is likely to interact to explain tongues speaking is also likely to interact to explain handlingLess

We Walked: (ca. 1842–1843)

Quincy D. Newell

in Your Sister in the Gospel: The Life of Jane Manning James, a Nineteenth-Century Black Mormon

Jane Manning experienced the gift of tongues shortly after her conversion, an event she took as a confirmation of her decision to join the Mormons. The rest of the Manning family appears to have ... More

Jane Manning experienced the gift of tongues shortly after her conversion, an event she took as a confirmation of her decision to join the Mormons. The rest of the Manning family appears to have converted to Mormonism after her and, together with white converts from the area, they all left Connecticut for Nauvoo, Illinois, under the direction of LDS missionary Charles Wesley Wandell. The practice of racial segregation on boats and railways meant that for much, if not all, of their journey from Connecticut to New York City and then up the Hudson River and west on the Erie Canal, the black and white members of the group were separated from one another. At some point during the trip, the black members of the group were refused further passage, so the Mannings walked the rest of the way. Jane’s memory of this portion of the journey emphasized God’s providence. When they arrived in Nauvoo, they found a bustling city that was struggling to accommodate newly arrived converts, many of whom were poor and vulnerable to the diseases that plagued the city.Less

The Pentecostals Ultimate Conservative Christians

in The Truth about Conservative Christians: What They Think and What They Believe

There are many different varieties of Conservative Christians, some of them often locked in combat with others. Perhaps the largest of the subgroups are the Pentecostals whose distinguishing ... More

There are many different varieties of Conservative Christians, some of them often locked in combat with others. Perhaps the largest of the subgroups are the Pentecostals whose distinguishing characteristic is their emphasis on direct contact with the Holy Spirit and resulting glossolalia—speaking in tongues often in a state of trance or quasi trance. This chapter examines whether the charismatic experience itself or the greater belief in the Bible among the Pentecostals—or perhaps some combination thereof—will explain why the Pentecostals seem to be the super-Conservative Christians.Less

Tongues

Ashon T. Crawley

in Blackpentecostal Breath: The Aesthetics of Possibility

This chapter analyses a distinction within theological studies between xenolalia and glossolalia. The distinction is important to consider because one—xenolalia—operates through settler colonial ... More

This chapter analyses a distinction within theological studies between xenolalia and glossolalia. The distinction is important to consider because one—xenolalia—operates through settler colonial logics, discarding the noise of the Other. Written in the service of privileging glossolalia, the chapter explicates how the university—a space of pedagogy—needs to radically reorient itself in terms of relations to objects of knowledge.Less

Necrofiliation: Antonin Artaud

Laurence A. Rickels

in Aberrations of Mourning

This chapter discusses Antonin Artaud’s idea of modern hieroglyphics. For Artaud, the object of departure of the whole magical and philosophical system of ancient Egypt, on which he bases his ... More

This chapter discusses Antonin Artaud’s idea of modern hieroglyphics. For Artaud, the object of departure of the whole magical and philosophical system of ancient Egypt, on which he bases his conception of a new, hieroglyphic theater of cruelty, was that niche in which the pharaoh’s corpse rested, just as the very condition for this entire system was the corpse itself. The global system of waste products to which Artaud succumbed was for him a vast hieroglyphic system in which he was the cornerstone corpse whose antechamber was the asylum. Artaud’s own late poetry is inscribed within a syllabic sign system he identifies as hieroglyphics. He introduced a language of sheer stammer, a language of invented words, which was actually recognizable only as the product of glossolalia.Less

On Language and Its Profanation: Beyond Representation in the Poetic Theory of Giorgio Agamben

Colby Dickinson

in Words Fail: Theology, Poetry, and the Challenge of Representation

The third chapter, in many ways, extends this trajectory of thought into a dialogue with the work of the Italian theorist Giorgio Agamben. Beginning with his characterization of a “scission” within ... More

The third chapter, in many ways, extends this trajectory of thought into a dialogue with the work of the Italian theorist Giorgio Agamben. Beginning with his characterization of a “scission” within language that posits philosophy as that which can know its object without possessing it and poetry as that which can possess it without knowing it, this chapter demonstrates how his earlier work on poetry maintains a necessary correlation with his later philosophical and theo-political writings. In this context, I explore his development of a poetic “atheology” that is a sort of materialist metaphysics, the potential last refuge of meaning in an otherwise nihilistic world—one that contains dire implications for the fields of poetry, philosophy, and theology. The establishment of poetry as a last refuge of meaning over and against the “destruction of experience” in the modern era is a bold claim to be sure, expressing Agamben’s attempt to reformulate the possibility for meaning to emerge beyond its inscription in language, as well as the conditions under which theology could be understood as a profane endeavor that tries to speak to this situation of human existence.Less

The Body, Tongues, Healing, and Deliverance

Jon Bialecki

in Diagram for Fire: Miracles and Variation in an American Charismatic Movement

This chapter transitions from language to concerns about embodiment and bodily boundaries, as it ethnographically depicts and addresses speaking in tongues (also known as glossolalia), healing, and ... More

This chapter transitions from language to concerns about embodiment and bodily boundaries, as it ethnographically depicts and addresses speaking in tongues (also known as glossolalia), healing, and demonic attack as instances of the diagrammatic miraculous. It concludes by arguing that demonic attack is a potential involution of the charismatic diagram, where the relation between constituent elements of the diagram become indistinct, and where the force of surprised becomes associated with willful or unwilling forces, instead of catalyzing willing forces.Less

Spirit Baptism and Spiritual Transformation: An Exercise in Socio-Theology

Margaret M. Poloma and John C. Green

in The Assemblies of God: Godly Love and the Revitalization of American Pentecostalism

This chapter discusses Pentecostal spiritual transformation with a focus on Spirit baptism and speaking/praying in tongues. In the Assemblies of God (AG), Spirit baptism with the initial physical ... More

This chapter discusses Pentecostal spiritual transformation with a focus on Spirit baptism and speaking/praying in tongues. In the Assemblies of God (AG), Spirit baptism with the initial physical evidence of speaking in tongues, is the key transformative experience and is central to Pentecostal identity. Scholarly research on glossolalia and AG congregational data are used to explore the meaning and practice of speaking in tongues for congregants and its relationship to other embodied religious experiences found in revivals. Of particular significance is the relationship of embodied experiences, including glossolalia, and the experience of Godly Love. It is shown that Spirit baptism is more than simply a one-time experience of speaking in tongues. Rather it is an ongoing process of spiritual transformation intertwined with other charismata.Less

Speaking in Tongues

Mae G. Henderson

in Speaking in Tongues and Dancing Diaspora: Black Women Writing and Performing

To overcome the assumption of internal identity(homogeneity) and repression of internal differences (heterogeneity) in reading black women’s literature, this chapter proposes a theory of ... More

To overcome the assumption of internal identity(homogeneity) and repression of internal differences (heterogeneity) in reading black women’s literature, this chapter proposes a theory of interpretation based on the “simultaneity of discourse” and “discursive diversity”— signifying the unique ability of black women writers to enter into contestorial and testimonial and discourse with black men, white women, white men, and black women. This tradition is dialogic and interlocutory in that it privileges “otherness” by giving voice to the Other(s) within the Self. Drawing on Bakhtin and Gadamer, the chapter develops the notions of discursive difference (heteroglossia) and identity (glossolalia) while reconstructing the scriptural notion of “speaking in tongues,” a term specifically linked with the practices of the black Holiness Sanctified Church, as a theoretical concept that is culturally specific to a black and female literary tradition. The chapter concludes by proposing that black feminist critics are charged with the hermeneutical task of interpreting tongues.Less

Charismatic Life-Cycle Rituals and a Life Plan

Savio Abreu

in Heaven's Gates and Hell's Flames: A Sociological Study of New Christian Movements in Contemporary Goa

This chapter analyses life-cycle rituals of the neo-Pentecostals such as birth, marriage, priesthood, and death in the light of notions of the Born-Again Christian community being elevated to a ... More

This chapter analyses life-cycle rituals of the neo-Pentecostals such as birth, marriage, priesthood, and death in the light of notions of the Born-Again Christian community being elevated to a spiritual community of believers, elevated from its biological and kinship moorings. The creation of a distinct Charismatic habitus has led to the life-cycle rituals differing from the biological clock and from other religious traditions. The rite of baptism that includes water baptism, baptism in the Spirit, and the practice of glossolalia is explained as a bridge-burning act for the new convert, who severs all ties with his or her old community and publicly declares allegiance to the new faith. The neo-Pentecostals connect birth with death through the notion of baptism being a funeral service. Priesthood in both the Catholic Charismatic Renewal (CCR) and neo-Pentecostalism is based on the patriarchal notion of only men becoming pastors and is supported with scriptural sanction.Less

The Egyptian Bible and the Cosmic Order

Samuel Morris Brown

in Joseph Smith's Translation

The Latter-day Saint Book of Abraham is an excellent test case for understanding Smith’s complementary modes of translation. Both insiders and outsiders have used a narrow linguistic model to ... More

The Latter-day Saint Book of Abraham is an excellent test case for understanding Smith’s complementary modes of translation. Both insiders and outsiders have used a narrow linguistic model to understand Smith’s encounter with ancient Egyptian papyri he purchased in Ohio in 1835. But, according to the logic of early Mormon thought, the translation problems at hand were metaphysical as well as linguistic. The written texts of Smith’s Egyptian project were a subset of the spiritual gift of glossolalia, in this case graphic glossolalia. This spiritual gift generated an Egyptian Bible that became central to the Nauvoo temple liturgy, which served as the ritual infrastructure of Smith’s Chain of Belonging (his recasting of the traditional Chain of Being). The Egyptian Bible was thus an important example of the metaphysics of translation and the connective tissue between Smith’s early scriptures and the ultimate ritual system that merged humans and texts.Less

Spiritual Gifts

Terryl L. Givens

in Feeding the Flock: The Foundations of Mormon Thought: Church and Praxis

Mormons believe that spiritual gifts must be in evidence in the true church and cited them frequently as evidence of a divinely sanctioned “restoration” of the gospel. Even many contemporary ... More

Mormons believe that spiritual gifts must be in evidence in the true church and cited them frequently as evidence of a divinely sanctioned “restoration” of the gospel. Even many contemporary Restorationists broke with Mormons on the question of cessationism. Early Mormon charismata were tamed by revelation urging rational standards. Mormons continue to hold revelation—direct communication from God—as a fundamental tenet, with the institutional and the personal sometimes in tension. Visions and prophecies are affirmed in principle but less frequent in the modern church. Healing has largely been relegated to a priesthood ordinance. Speaking in unknown tongues (glossolalia) is almost unheard of today, and xenoglossia is interpreted as a spiritual assist to missionaries in foreign lands. Discernment is similarly understood in non-charismatic ways, and exorcism has largely faded.Less

The Holy Ghost Is About to Fall

Matt Tomlinson

in Ritual Textuality: Pattern and Motion in Performance

This chapter discusses “performative paths,” sequences whose interconnections are designed to shape ritual participants’ expectations of ritual efficacy. The core example comes from a Pentecostal ... More

This chapter discusses “performative paths,” sequences whose interconnections are designed to shape ritual participants’ expectations of ritual efficacy. The core example comes from a Pentecostal “crusade” held in Fiji in 2008. The performer who led the service, a preacher from Texas, wove a regular rhetorical pattern of entextualization during his sermon and “altar call” (when people were asked to invite the Holy Spirit to flow through their bodies, making them speak in tongues). He regularly moved from making simple declarations to offering promises, questions, and statements about the future, and then commanding people to act. In looping through this sequence of text again and again, he sought to generate an ecstatic response from his audience, who would repent of their sins and rock their bodies in exuberant, divine deliverance.Less