Lux Lucet

The Origin of Different Languages

Just as the origin of language itself is an impenetrable mystery to those who deny the Word of God, so too is the origin of the multitude of languages that now, and for some time past, exist in the world.  That some languages are related to one another more closely than others is evident.  For example, there are many cognate words between English and German.  On the other hand, some languages have nothing in common, compare Chinese and English for one such example.

Where do all these languages come from?  As the Newsweek article “Why Are There So Many Different Languages in the World?” conceded, secular linguists struggle to answer this question.  “Why is it that humans speak so many languages?  And why are they so unevenly spread across the planet?,” asks the article.  As Newsweek puts it, “we have few clear answers to these fundamental questions about how humanity communicates.”

Now if the author of the Newsweek article had said, “I have few clear answers to these fundamental questions,” then this would have been a true statement.  But such is not the case for everyone.  For some of us know very well the origin of the multitude of languages that are spoken in the world.  But the establishment intellectuals of our day will not hear it. 

As with all other knowledge, Christians know the origin of the multitude of languages because it is, as all other knowledge, revealed to them in the Word of God.  In Genesis 11 we read God’s account of the origin of the multitude of language, that it was punishment for the disobedience of the men who built the Tower of Babel.     

Of course, if one were to present this argument in an academic setting, he would be immediately denounced as a quack and a fool and given the bum’s rush out of the ivory tower.  I remember one of my Latin professors in college dismissing the Tower of Babel preemptively before anyone even brought it up in class.  He was a brilliant man and gifted teacher, holding a Ph.D. from Cambridge.  But on this fundamental question about language, not only did he not know the truth, but he was actively hostile to it.

As Christians, we need not be embarrassed of the truth revealed to us in the Scriptures.  As Paul wrote, “But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty.”  There was a time in the West when arguing from the Scriptures was respected among academics.  Not anymore.  There’s probably no way to be dismissed faster by academe than by accepting the Bible as inerrant and true.  But then, that’s the world’s problem, not the Christian’s. 

Our Words Matter   

Somewhere in one of his lectures, I don’t have the reference handy, John Robbins made the point that people today tend to dismiss words as unimportant.  Indeed, they do.  One can see this in the way many politicians breath lies as easily as most of us breathe air, or in the crude insults some people wield so casually on social media platforms. 

But the Bible says our words, the words you and I use, matter in eternity.  This may seem shocking to some, focused as we are in our time on actions and material things rather than words.  But given that it was words that created the material things around us, and not material things that created words, it should come as no surprise that words matter to God. 

Said Jesus, “But I say to you that for every idle word that men may speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment.  For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned” (Matthew 12:36-37).  Why is this?  Because our words show what we are in our hearts.  In another place Jesus said, “A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart brings forth evil.  For out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks (Luke 6:45). Our words are revealers of who we are.  They show whether we are wise men or fools. Whether we are saved or lost. 

God prohibits lying and went so far as to list bearing false witness as one of the Ten Commandments.  Wrote Bevin,

God’s abhorrence of lying makes sense because when God speaks, He describes or creates reality, and when people speak, God commands that human language should express the truth. God did not capriciously decide that human beings should not lie; He objects to lying because He is Truth itself, and His own use of language is truthful. If anyone fails to understand the pragmatics of first-words-then-things in Genesis 1, the significance of “Thus says the Lord” and God’s abhorrence of lying might also be missed (“Linguistics”).

Jesus told his hearers that liars have the devil as their father.  “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do.  He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him.  When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it” (John 8:44). 

Words matter.  It was words that God used to create the heavens and the earth.  It is our words, spoken and unspoken, by which we will be judged.  Let us take care to respect the power of words, both those of others and our own.  

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