SPEAKING IN TONGUES
It was New Year’s Day, 1901, and the place was Topeka, Kansas. Like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, a young woman named Agnes Ozman was about to be transported to a strange and wondrous place—not by a tornado, but through a “born-again” experience. She asked her teacher, Charles Parham, to lay his hands upon her and pray, and when he did, she began to speak in a language no one had ever heard before. Some of the bible students thought she was babbling, and others thought she was speaking Chinese, but they all agreed that she had been touched by the Holy Spirit and given the gift of “speaking in tongues.” On that day, the Pentecostal movement was born, which would transform Christianity throughout the world.
Parham and a handful of charismatic converts stirred up tornados of revivalism that whipped across the country. Imbued with the power of gospel music, this evangelical revival quickly gained support among the disenfranchised people of the world. But other Christians saw the movement as speaking the devil’s tongue. Today, the controversy still rages, and although the Pentecostal movement rapidly diverged into competing theological groups, speaking in tongues is still considered a meaningful sign that the person has given herself to God.
References to speaking in tongues—or glossolalia, as it is technically called—can be found in the Old and New Testament, but until the 20th Century, only brief references have been made. Forms of glossolalia have also been reported in the shamanic rituals of many tribal groups throughout the world, but in the Pentecostal movement, it is considered the most important sign that a person has fully accepted the apostolic faith of the New Testament. Pentecostals believe that they when they become divinely empowered, they will be given the “gifts of the Holy Spirit,” which includes the ability to prophesize the future and heal others through prayer and touch.
In March, 2005, my laboratory was given the opportunity to conduct, for the first time in the world, brain scans on a group of people while they were in the act of speaking in tongues. I was approached by a production crew from National Geographic who were creating a documentary about people who claimed to have been possessed by evil spirits.
At first, I did not want to participate, as my work focused on the positive aspects of religious practice, and not on demonology. In spite of my reluctance to get involved with anything that would even be remotely related to possession states, National Geographic persisted. As I thought about it, I remembered a conversation I had had with some colleagues about the religious revival movements during the Great Depression. It suddenly occurred to me that speaking in tongues might be considered a positive form of possession, because the individual believes he or she is taken over by the Holy Spirit. National Geographic took a few days to track down a proficient practitioner who was willing to be scanned, and they filmed her in our lab (the program, entitled “Exorcism,” aired on the National Geographic Channel in 2006 as part of their “Is It Real?” series). . . .
Our scans of Pentecostal practitioners showed that there was increased activity in the thalamus, which was also activated in our studies with the Buddhist practitioners and nuns. Because this structure is involved in the transfer of sensory information from the world to different parts of the brain and the body, I have argued that it plays a significant role in making spiritual experiences real.
We also found significant increases of activity in the temporal lobes, which contain the limbic areas that monitor our emotions. In other studies, the temporal lobes appear to play an important role in eliciting spiritual experiences. Other researchers have suggested some individuals have a form of temporal lobe “sensitivity,” and that these people are more prone to having visions, hearing voices, and experiencing hallucinations.
Furthermore, such individuals are more inclined to hold paranormal and spiritual beliefs. In particular, sensed presences are associated with alterations in temporal lobe and hemispheric activity. This may help to explain why only half of the membership in Pentecostal churches has had glossolalic experiences; their brains may not built in a way that allows such spiritual experiences to occur. . . .
Parham and a handful of charismatic converts stirred up tornados of revivalism that whipped across the country. Imbued with the power of gospel music, this evangelical revival quickly gained support among the disenfranchised people of the world. But other Christians saw the movement as speaking the devil’s tongue. Today, the controversy still rages, and although the Pentecostal movement rapidly diverged into competing theological groups, speaking in tongues is still considered a meaningful sign that the person has given herself to God.
References to speaking in tongues—or glossolalia, as it is technically called—can be found in the Old and New Testament, but until the 20th Century, only brief references have been made. Forms of glossolalia have also been reported in the shamanic rituals of many tribal groups throughout the world, but in the Pentecostal movement, it is considered the most important sign that a person has fully accepted the apostolic faith of the New Testament. Pentecostals believe that they when they become divinely empowered, they will be given the “gifts of the Holy Spirit,” which includes the ability to prophesize the future and heal others through prayer and touch.
In March, 2005, my laboratory was given the opportunity to conduct, for the first time in the world, brain scans on a group of people while they were in the act of speaking in tongues. I was approached by a production crew from National Geographic who were creating a documentary about people who claimed to have been possessed by evil spirits.
At first, I did not want to participate, as my work focused on the positive aspects of religious practice, and not on demonology. In spite of my reluctance to get involved with anything that would even be remotely related to possession states, National Geographic persisted. As I thought about it, I remembered a conversation I had had with some colleagues about the religious revival movements during the Great Depression. It suddenly occurred to me that speaking in tongues might be considered a positive form of possession, because the individual believes he or she is taken over by the Holy Spirit. National Geographic took a few days to track down a proficient practitioner who was willing to be scanned, and they filmed her in our lab (the program, entitled “Exorcism,” aired on the National Geographic Channel in 2006 as part of their “Is It Real?” series). . . .
Our scans of Pentecostal practitioners showed that there was increased activity in the thalamus, which was also activated in our studies with the Buddhist practitioners and nuns. Because this structure is involved in the transfer of sensory information from the world to different parts of the brain and the body, I have argued that it plays a significant role in making spiritual experiences real.
We also found significant increases of activity in the temporal lobes, which contain the limbic areas that monitor our emotions. In other studies, the temporal lobes appear to play an important role in eliciting spiritual experiences. Other researchers have suggested some individuals have a form of temporal lobe “sensitivity,” and that these people are more prone to having visions, hearing voices, and experiencing hallucinations.
Furthermore, such individuals are more inclined to hold paranormal and spiritual beliefs. In particular, sensed presences are associated with alterations in temporal lobe and hemispheric activity. This may help to explain why only half of the membership in Pentecostal churches has had glossolalic experiences; their brains may not built in a way that allows such spiritual experiences to occur. . . .
