1 Corinthians 14:15

The question: What is it then? invites the readers to find the conclusion for themselves. What will it be? To exclude ecstasy and speaking in tongues? By no means, but to complete the pneumatic transport by the exercise of the understanding: to pray in the spirit, there is the tongue; to pray in full self - possession, there is the interpretation. The understanding here fills, in a manner, in relation to the tongue, the part of the prophet, when, in the heathen world, he interpreted the mysterious oracles given forth by the Pythia.

The reading προσεύξωμαι, let me pray, would express an encouragement addressed by the apostle to himself; which is wholly out of place. As Edwards says, the best MSS. often confound ο and ω; and if this were an exhortation, it would require to be in the plural.

We here find two of the principal forms of glossolalia described from the standpoint of their contents: prayer, προσευχή, intense aspiration after the fulness of the blessings assured to faith; and singing, ψαλμός (comp. 1 Corinthians 14:26), the joyful celebration of all the favours already received. The verb ψάλλειν (from ψάω) strictly signifies to touch the chord of the instrument, hence to sing with accompaniment. The singing of improvised hymns was therefore one of the principal forms of speaking in tongues. Edwards, agreeably to the strict sense of ψάλλειν, thinks that the singing might be accompanied in public worship with the sound of the harp; comp. Ephesians 5:19, where ψάλλοντες is distinguished from ἄδοντες.

Benediction, εὐλογία, or thanksgiving, εὐχαριστία (1 Corinthians 14:16), is closely related to this form, from which it differs only by the absence of singing. Pliny says of the Christians, in his letter to Trajan, that in their worship they are accustomed Christo quasi deo carmen dicere; but this expression refers to the hymns of the whole Church (Colossians 3:16; Ephesians 5:18-20), and not at all to the singing of the glossolaletes.

From the unfruitfulness of glossolalia, when not followed by interpretation, there arises for the Church a situation, the awkwardness of which the apostle expresses in the words which follow, 1 Corinthians 14:16-19.