Praying in the Spirit: Just What Is the Nature of the Prayer Language?
A similar argument is based on I Corinthians 14:21: “In the Law it is written: ‘Through men of strange tongues and through the lips of foreigners I will speak to this people, but even then they will not listen to me,’ says the Lord.” Here, also, Paul uses a different word than he has been using to refer to tongues. The anti-charismatic position, however, asks us to see a definite parallel between tongues-speaking and Paul’s reference to Isaiah 28:11-12. The problem is apparent: carried to its logical conclusion, such a view mandates that tongues be of the Assyrian dialect spoken by native Assyrians! Obviously, Paul’s reference is to be understood in a more general sense.
Numerous non-Pentecostal New Testament scholars and commentaries reject the view that tongues in the New Testament were always foreign languages.
Nowhere does Scripture mandate that tongues-speaking must be a foreign language. There are indications, however, that the nature of tongues is unintelligible, transcendent, and without natural counterpart. Certain verses in 1 Corinthians 14 simply make better sense if tongues are understood in this way. For example, 1 Corinthians 14:2: “Anyone who speaks in a tongue does not speak to men but to God. Indeed, no one understands him; he utters mysteries with his spirit.” Without divine intervention, in other words, no one can understand an utterance in tongues. Yet if it were a foreign language, would not the utterance be recognizable by native speakers? “The interpretation of tongues demands a special gift of the Spirit … not a nationality” (Goudge, p. 134).
Additionally, non-Pentecostal C. R. Smith notes that the foreign language interpretation of this verse (“For anyone who speaks in a language does not speak to men…”) is contradictory, since “speaking to men” is what human language is for. On the other hand, the Pentecostal-charismatic (and the majority of non-Pentecostal) interpretation of this verse (“For anyone who speaks in a spiritual language speaks not to men but to God”) is not contradictory, but reasonable (p. 31).