Divine scattering

(Note: this text is a precis of two homilies, one given bi-lingually in an abbreviated form, on Pentecost Sunday 2013)


Pentecost 2013
(text: Genesis 11)

Here’s a quote: “Nun la tuta tero estis uno lingvo kaj uno parolmaneiro. Kaj dum ili migris el oriento, ili trovis valon en la lando SXinar kaj tie eklogis.”

Can you translate it? As Gandalf said in The Lord Of The Rings, “there are few who can.”

It is Esperanto. Esperanto was the creation of a very bright and well-intentioned scholar in the 19th Century. He wanted to create a world-wide, neutral second language for diplomacy, trade, and understanding.

It simply did not work. At least, not so far. At best, according to Wikipedia, 2,000,000 people speak Esperanto or have studied it to any degree. It’s more a hobby language and a special-usage tool.

Paul Ricouer, 20th Century Christian philosopher, said “We do not create language. Language creates us.” And, I would add, language re-creates us as we engage with one another, with our experience and with our classic texts, in search of meaning. We are our language; we are shaped by speech.

The Esperanto quote is the first two verses of our Genesis reading: “Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. And as they migrated from the east, they came upon a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there.” It is the famed “Tower of Babel” tale. For years I thought that this brief fragment was nothing more than a parable of why there are so many languages in the world. I now think it is much more. It is a vital and core tale of Pentecost itself—what is speech? and how is God’s freedom is embodied in speech?

In Genesis, people are “scattered” by God throughout the world. Scattering means variety, diversity, change according to journeys and challenges and the life one lives in common with others.

But the divine scattering stopped in that valley, with one language and one building project.

I cannot read this text and imagine a harmonious and co-operative effort to build some Middle Eastern ziggurat. Building projects in the ancient world were for the most part slave-projects, forced and brutal. One language is needed by masters and slaves, in order to tell the slaves who they are and what they are to do.

One language. Throughout history efforts to enforce one language is the prerogative of empire, of conquerors. After Alexander the Great’s conquests, the language was Greek. When the Romans held sway, Latin spread, as an “official” language in the West for law and scholarship and proclamation and religion. In colonial times it was French, and to this day French appears next to English in our passports. English functions as a universal second language today, a blunt tribute to American economic and military power and the all-pervasive impact of American popular culture, God help us. In time, perhaps it will be Mandarin.

Dominant cultures conduct “monologues”, one-sided speech in their own language that everyone is supposed to listen to and obey. The languages of non-dominant culture people are demeaned or ignored or actively suppressed. “Why can’t they just learn English?” “It’s better for them; it will equip them to function in ‘society.’”

Monolingual societies are almost always oppressive. So are monolingual churches. Years ago Jessie Jackson remarked that Sunday morning is “the most segregated hour in America.” He’s still right.

Monolingual societies are not a good idea according to Genesis 11. They result in labor for dubious ends that use up people. They involve one voice dominating the conversation.

It is the divine wisdom and the divine mischief that undoes the tower-building machine with one creative stroke. “Come, let us go down and confuse their language...” And with that, the pointless tower-project was abandoned, the overseers could no longer be understood by the workers (read “slaves”), and the divine scattering could continue.

Pentecost does not undo either the variety of languages or the divine scattering. Here we do not re-erect the Tower of Babel. Here we gather by divine gift. We bring the results of our divine scattering, the rich diversity of our lives and our experience. And we bring our languages, the delight and insight and savor of each tongue as rich as the smell of tamales con salsa verde or Aunt Imelda’s kielbasa and sauerkraut. Remember than on the day of Pentecost, in the Acts reading we did not hear, each person present heard God’s works proclaimed in their own language.

What speech shall shape us? A monologue? Or the scattered diversity?

Saints Peter and Paul is not Babel. The divine mischief and the divine mercy instead has brought us together in a Pentecost. We have two distinct languages represented among the membership (although many dialects), and two distinct cultural groups (although many cultures among each). There is really no such thing as “Latino culture”; there are Latino cultures plural. And there is really no such thing as “white culture”; there is great variety. It’s when things get homogenous and monolingual that there is trouble. The gift of Pentecost is to be gathered, not to attempt a monologue and unanimity, but in our very diversity. Here God is praised, in the very beautiful and mischievous diversity of languages and cultures. Here we share one bread, one cup, united not by monologue or imposition but by a free Lord who is praised by all, each in the language that they speak and understand.