Signs and Wonders - Only Males Speaking in Tongues

No man ever spoke in tongues outside of the presence of an apostle. No woman ever spoke in tongues in the New Testament record. You have never heard what I am about to say. You can take it, add it to your data bank and think about it -- or not.

An e-mail demands that speaking in tongues is a sign to all believers that they have already been saved. To them, Speaking in tongues is a continuing act of worship in order to come into the presence of God. We have no evidence that any of the tongue speakers ever repeated the sign and, indeed, if the record of the inspiring Spirit has any meaning, they could not do so unless they kept an apostle with them.

Moses doubted that he could feed 600,000 footman (perhaps 3,000,000 people). Not even if he killed all of the cattle or caught all of the fish of the sea he could he feed them.

And the Lord said unto Moses, Is the Lords hand waxed short? thou shalt see now whether my word shall come to pass unto thee or not. Numbers 11:23

And Moses went out, and told the people the words of the Lord, and gathered the seventy men of the elders of the people, and set them round about the tabernacle. Numbers 11:24

Then the Lord came down in the cloud, and spoke to him, and took of the Spirit that was upon him, and placed the same upon the seventy elders; and it happened, when the Spirit rested upon them,

that they prophesied, although they never did so again. Numbers 11:25

Two of the seventy were not immediately present but they too prophesied. When a young boy saw this as unbecoming of an elder,

And Moses said unto him, Enviest thou for my sake? would God that all the Lords people were prophets, and that the Lord would put his spirit upon them Numbers 11:29

Immediately, God began to feed the people Himself. The one-time prophesying or speaking in tongues was a supernatural sign of the first-level leadership that they didn't have to depend upon Moses or themselves. This thrilled Moses and he would be happy if the sign extended to all 3,000,000 people forever. However, it happened to seventy elders (males) and did not do so again.

The New Testament sign

Our goal is to show that speaking in tongues was a similar outpouring of signs and wonders to confirm the truth of the Apostolic preaching. Paul said that the signs would cease when the Word was confirmed. And we have no evidence that a single male tongue speaker (prophesier) ever did so again.

To be a sign of confirmation as opposed to a sign of madness, there had to be a "double blind" test which we will examine in another article.

There had to be a radical difference betwen the "one time" speaking in tongues under the direct influence of an apostle and the common charismatic speaking in tongues of the pagan women.

To that end, only unsusceptible and unsuspecting males were caused to speak in tongues but only in an apostle's presence.

For instance, a Roman warrior could not fall into speaking in tongues because of his character and training. It was just not the manly thing to do.

And the young lad in Numbers thought that it was pretty outrageous for Israelite elders to prophesy and he demanded that Moses stop them.

Therefore, the sign was not a sign of superiority but a sign that God through Moses would be the literal and spiritual Feeder of the flock.

Ultimately, this was a sign to unbelievers that they did not trust God to take care of them in the wilderness.

On the other hand, because effeminate clergy and pagan women were highly susceptible to charismatic frenzy and could "speak in tongues" even under the influence of a pagan flute,

the male apostles never caused a female woman to speak in tongues. The classical evidence is that a "team" of women could be destabilized and they, in turn, could turn men charismatic. It would have no value as a sign.

Therefore, the signs and wonders were never related to women. From memory, you will recall that when Miriam pretended that God would speak through her because she was a "prophetess" or poetically gifted, she was struck with leprosy.

Again, it was usually female singers, chanters or dancers who caused effeminate and insecure males to spread the contagion. Women, in turn, had no other "exciting" outlet:

"Religion was the major source of women's participation in public life. It has been said that festivals were probably the only legitimate reason that women had to leave their homes. The festivals gave the women an opportunity to obtain external support from other women with regard to personal problems and concerns. By attending religious festivals, women were also given an alternative to their normal lives in the home. The festivals provided them with respite from their domestic duties such as caring for children and weaving. Lynne Aftuck

Tongue speaking or charismatic ecstasy was the line in the sand between rational, "in the spirit" worship and irrational, in the body worship.

"God in the Cow Pen, pictures an old-time camp meeting, with the local prostitute plying her trade in the woods adjacent. There is a relation between sex and the emotional and mystical aspects of religion that deserves a saner and more sympathetic study than it has yet received. Most mystics have been women and many were unmarried or experienced an abnormal sex life. Of the four hundred cases of stigmatization on record, over three hundred were women and all but twenty were unmarried. The language and imagery of the mystics are often extremely erotic" (These are "examples of persons in whom sexual abnormality and mysticism blended." Clark, Elmer T., The Small Sects in America, p. 90n, Abingdon)

See Frances Trollope on Frontier Revivalism.

Why Only Men Spoke in Tongues

When God came in human form, His purpose was to save the common believers from the clergy who made a career out of keeping people out of the kingdom of God by taking away the keys to knowledge. The burden they laid upon people was "anxiety created by religious ritual." Jesus came to lead His people beside still waters. God confirmed this when He refused to "perform" for the effeminate prophesiers of Baal and Asherah and later told Elijah that He speaks in the "voice of a whispered silence" according to Karen Armstrong.

The Jewish clergy flocked around Jesus at first believing that He was Dionysus or Bacchus. By piping to force Him to go Charismatic and join the feminine or effeminate chorus or circular dancing they could give Jesus the test. See Also the Dionysus confusion with Jesus.

Jesus asked them whether they came out to see John "dressed in soft clothing." This word shows that they hoped that John was the typical performer who wore the clothing of a catamite -- a male homosexual.

But what went ye out for to see? A man clothed in soft raiment? behold, they that wear soft clothing are in kings houses. Mat 11:8

Soft is from the Greek but it was also a Jewish practice in Jerusalem prior to Josiah:

Malakos (g3120) mal-ak-os'; of uncert. affin.; soft, i.e. fine (clothing); fig. a catamite (male prostitute): - effeminate, soft. (g3119 means soft or diseased)

Informing us about the "speakers in tongues" who sought to get their gods to act through singing, dancing, playing instruments and cutting themselves, Jesus leads us directly into the parallel between the battle between Elijah and the false prophesiers and John the Baptist and the Jewish clergy.

"Asherah (symbolized by erect poles with fertility symbols pouring out the top): She is the Queen of Heaven, in other languages and ages identified as Ashtoreth, Athirat, Astarte, and Ishtar. Yahweh, the Hebrew God elevated to become the sole deity , was Her consort.

Her "male" priestesses were known as kelabim, the faithful "dogs" of the Goddess,

"who practiced divinatory arts, danced in processions, and served as hierodules, qedeshim, in the company of other priestesses. Elements of the goddess worship were largely erased in a cultural purge c. 630 BCE by King Yosiah, at the behest of Yahweh's priests, who required supremacy.

"I would argue that in Greek tragedy the cross-dressed actor was crucial, a sign of the conventional nature of the drama. Male playing female is inevitably distanced from the role and makes it clear that the role of the woman is an idealization, not a realization. In addition the male playing female indicates a possible relevance of the form to Dionysus,

a god associated with masks and characterized by softness, woman's curls and dress (Bacchae)

and worshipped with transvestite ceremonies at the Oschophoria (Seaford; Segal 1982: 10-20, 158- 68, 214). For more details.

Jesus refused to sing or dance in the Oschophoria!

But whereunto shall I liken this generation? It is like unto children sitting in the markets, and calling unto their fellows, Matthew 11:16

And saying, We have piped unto you, and ye have not danced; we have mourned unto you, and ye have not lamented (drummed upon or tabreted the breast). Matthew 11:17

The dance was the Greek, Dionysus ring dance:

Orcheomai (g3738) or-kheh'-om-ahee; (a row or ring); to dance (from the ranklike or regular motion): - dance

The mourning was a wailing lament or a sign of being defeated. When forced it was:

Thriambeuo (g2358) three-am-byoo'-o; from a prol. comp. of the base of 2360 and a der. of 680 (mean. a noisy iambus, sung in honor of Bacchus); to make an acclamatory procession, i.e. (fig.) to conquer or (by Hebr.) to give victory: - (cause) to triumph (over).

Turning Jesus into the effeminate prophesying or falling into charismatic ecstasy would be the triumph over (with instruments denounced in Numbers 10:7) which Judas and his team would try on Jesus but fail (Psalm 41).

On the day of Pentecost, the people did not see them as inspired. Rather, it was common for the performing clergy to pronounce nonesense as "street preachrs" who then and now would be considered drunk.

As another sign, the Apostle's "tongues" were understood as speaking a language which they should not have, as fishermen, have known.

Fertility Rituals in Jerusalem

From most ancient times, music and witchcraft was the domain of women like the witch of Endor. However, much earlier the male priesthood of soothsayers or speakers in tongues were effective only if they were emotionally and sexually abnormal. Like the castrates of early Catholic music, only women could do the job to stimulate the proper emotion, but only males could serve as clergy. When Israel "fired" God in order to worship like the nations, the musical guilds had foreign names and dominant roles which, up to this time, were performed by women. The "ephod" which David stripped off to go naked with the servant girls was originally a woman's garment.

They often wore the garments of women who were, also by definition, most effective in their clergy roles as prostitutes:

"Awed by the mysteries of his own spirit no less than by those of nature,

primitive man was likely to attribute to divine influence

any abnormal emotional state, whether above or below the usual level.

Medicine men customarily went into states of trance in which they were believed to be in communication with the gods,

and many tribes supposed lunatics and sexual deviants to be divinely possessed.

In most early societies, moreover, men evolved techniques for deliberatly inducing the abnormal forms of consciousness in which they supposed themselves to achieve union with divine power, sometimes by the use of drugs and other physiological stimuli,

sometimes by hypnotic dances and music.

The wild utterances to which they gave vent on such occasions were regarded as the words of a god and were interpreted as divine commands or predictions of future events." (Parkes, Henry Bamford, Gods and Men, p. 32-33).

Normal males simply never had the ambivalent gender nature to perform these procedures or to go into charismatic ecstasy. Even among modern musicians a small, skinny, ugly, diseased man with little vocal talent can be worshiped by both men and women if he is or appears to be sexually ambivalent. This is the definition of "Charismatic."

Of the common Greek religion at the time of Christ:

Women were often charismatic and their frenzy was like speaking in tongues. They had the power to make the event contagious usually with a drug like LSD.

"In the Eleusian mysteries, the wine was not noted for its alcohol but for drugs perhaps from fermented barley (ergot) or from mushrooms used to bring on the exhilaration. Of the priest, it is said that:

"As he performed the service, he intoned ancient chants in a falsetto voice,

for his role in the Mystery was asexual, a male who had sacrificed his gender to the Great Goddess. (See the modern ZOE movement)

The New Winskin religion is quite identical: