First things first, I'm not actually an expert.
In any case, I did a bit of reading and poking about in a few lexicons (
Perseus is useful), and I'll try to add something useful. The question I was directly asked about is whether or not 1 Cor 14:18 intends to say that Paul speaks more human languages (meaning languages that really exist) or that he engages in glossolalia more than his audience. I'll deal with that in a moment, but I think to some extent the question shouldn't be answered without trying to understand the entire chapter and what it means by "speaking in tongues." On that, I think there is enough ambiguity in the language that it's not clear to me that it can be settled purely by an appeal to the plain Greek. So before dealing with verse 18, a few thoughts on the meaning of "tongues":
γλῶσσα is the noun for "tongue". First as in the actual organ of the body, and then metaphorically it is used to indicate speech, language, talking, and other such usages. It can certainly sometimes mean actual spoken languages or dialects of language, as in Acts 2:4-8:
καὶ ἐπλήσθησαν πάντες πνεύματος ἁγίου, καὶ ἤρξαντο λαλεῖν ἑτέραις γλώσσαις καθὼς τὸ πνεῦμα ἐδίδου ἀποφθέγγεσθαι αὐτοῖς. Ἦσαν δὲ ἐν Ἰερουσαλὴμ κατοικοῦντες Ἰουδαῖοι, ἄνδρες εὐλαβεῖς ἀπὸ παντὸς ἔθνους τῶν ὑπὸ τὸν οὐρανόν· γενομένης δὲ τῆς φωνῆς ταύτης συνῆλθε τὸ πλῆθος καὶ συνεχύθη, ὅτι ἤκουον εἷς ἕκαστος τῇ ἰδίᾳ διαλέκτῳ λαλούντων αὐτῶν· ἐξίσταντο δὲ καὶ ἐθαύμαζον λέγοντες· Οὐχ ἰδοὺ πάντες οὗτοί εἰσιν οἱ λαλοῦντες Γαλιλαῖοι; 8 καὶ πῶς ἡμεῖς ἀκούομεν ἕκαστος τῇ ἰδίᾳ διαλέκτῳ ἡμῶν ἐν ᾗ ἐγεννήθημεν;
"And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance. Now there were dwelling in Jerusalem Jews, devout men from every nation under heaven. And at this sound the multitude came together, and they were bewildered, because each one was hearing them speak in his own language. And they were amazed and astonished, saying, “Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? And how is it that we hear, each of us in his own native language?" (ESV)
The author of Acts uses the word διαλέκτος (dialektos) in a way that certainly indicates -- from both the context and also the word choice -- an actual spoken language and not glossolalia, but he also uses γλῶσσαις (a plural form) synonymously when describing the apostles "speaking in other tongues." Outside of Acts, forms of διαλέκτος don't appear. So it's at least possible that in 1 Cor. 14 Paul uses γλῶσσα to mean an actual language, but the context is not as clear as in Acts.
Beginning in 1 Cor 14:2:
ὁ γὰρ λαλῶν γλώσσῃ οὐκ ἀνθρώποις λαλεῖ ἀλλὰ θεῷ, οὐδεὶς γὰρ ἀκούει, πνεύματι δὲ λαλεῖ μυστήρια·
"For the one who speaks in a tongue does not speak to men but to God, for no one hears, but he speaks mysteries in the spirit." (a fairly literal translation)
"For one who speaks in a tongue speaks not to men but to God; for no one understands him, but he utters mysteries in the Spirit." (ESV)
First we could ask about ἀκούει
, which means literally to hear (same root as acoustic in english), but metaphorically to understand. Does Paul mean
(a) that literally no one hears the person speaking in a tongue because there's no one around, i.e they are just "speaking to God" in private?
(b) that no one understands because the one speaking is not using a real language? i.e glossolalia?
(c) that a real language is being spoken but no one understands because they don't speak that particular language?
The word choice by itself doesn't supply a direct answer. Because the rest of the chapter draws a contrast between prophecy and teaching (which is understood by the audience) and the form of "speaking in tongues" being practiced, and especially because it's focused on practice that occurs in public (see v. 16), it seems the answer has to be (b) or (c), and that's why the ESV translates ἀκούει as "understands", but throughout the rest of the chapter it's hard to distinguish (b) and (c) as options.
In verse 4:
θέλω δὲ πάντας ὑμᾶς λαλεῖν γλώσσαις, μᾶλλον δὲ ἵνα προφητεύητε· μείζων δὲ ὁ προφητεύων ἢ ὁ λαλῶν γλώσσαις, ἐκτὸς εἰ μὴ διερμηνεύῃ, ἵνα ἡ ἐκκλησία οἰκοδομὴν λάβῃ.
"Now I want you all to speak in tongues, but even more to prophesy. The one who prophesies is greater than the one who speaks in tongues, unless someone interprets, so that the church may be built up. (ESV)"
Is there anything here that indicates whether "speak in tongues" means to speak an actual (but unknown to the audience) language or glossolalia? The only possible answer would seem to be in the phrase "unless someone interprets" (ἐκτὸς εἰ μὴ διερμηνεύῃ), but the verb for "interpret", is still ambiguous. It is formed from the prefix διὰ and the verb ἑρμηνεύω, from which we get the word hermeneutics. It can mean to translate (in the sense of an actual language), but the more primary meaning involves interpretation and explanation. It doesn't really help us.
Verse 10 might seem to yield a clue:
τοσαῦτα εἰ τύχοι γένη φωνῶν εἰσιν ἐν κόσμῳ, καὶ οὐδὲν ἄφωνον· ἐὰν οὖν μὴ εἰδῶ τὴν δύναμιν τῆς φωνῆς, ἔσομαι τῷ λαλοῦντι βάρβαρος καὶ ὁ λαλῶν ἐν ἐμοὶ βάρβαρος.
"There are doubtless many different languages in the world, and none is without meaning, but if I do not know the meaning of the language, I will be a foreigner to the speaker and the speaker a foreigner to me. (ESV)
The fact that he's bringing up languages in the world might be taken to mean that the previous discussion of speaking in tongues refers to speaking actual languages that are merely unknown to the listener, but there are two potential issues I see: the first is that "many different languages" actually doesn't use the word γλῶσσα
, but φωνη, literally "sound" or "voice". Again potentially metaphorically synonymous, but it's not clear what the change of word choice indicates. I think it may indicate that Paul is just drawing an analogy and means the previous usages of "speaking in tongues" not to mean the speaking of some actual language but really glossolalia. I'm not especially confident in that conclusion though. My feeling is the distinction between (b) and (c) is difficult to be certain of, whereas it's very clear that in either case Paul doesn't think the activity is useful unless someone can "interpret" or "translate" what is said and render it meaningful.
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So, finally then we arrive at verse 18, which is the one I was actually asked about:
εὐχαριστῶ τῷ θεῷ, πάντων ὑμῶν μᾶλλον γλώσσαις λαλῶ·
"I thank God that I speak in tongues more than all of you." (ESV)
The ESV, NASB, and NIV all render the passage in a way that suggests a comparative of degree ("I speak in tongues more than all of you") rather than indicating directly the quantity of languages ("I speak more languages than all of you"), but it's not entirely clear to me that this is demanded by the Greek. This is where you might need an actual expert.
The problem is trying to decide whether μᾶλλον, which never changes forms in the way other Greek words change to indicate their grammatical usage, is intended as part of an implied prepositional phrase with γλώσσαις or not. Part of the problem is the preposition is left out of the actual Greek. γλώσσαις is in a form called the dative, which implies the word "in", that is "I speak
in tongues" instead of just "I speak tongues". If it were possible for μᾶλλον to change forms and also be in the dative, we could be sure it meant "I speak in more languages" and not "I speak in languages more", but μᾶλλον can't change forms to tell us. Alternatively, if the preposition ἐν (in) was actually included in the sentence, λαλῶ ἐν μᾶλλον γλῶσσαις, then I would also feel more confident from the word order that "I speak in more languages" was a better rendering.
Because the Greek doesn't give us any help, I think there is at least some ambiguity. It may be the case that the ESV, NASB, and NIV all favor the comparative of degree, and thus agree with Windwalker, as much because they think the glossolalia reading of the entire chapter makes more sense as because they think the Greek demands it. Or, they may reason that μᾶλλον more frequently is used to denote comparison of degree than comparison of quantity. Along those lines, they may be making some assessment about the use of μᾶλλον as an adverb instead of some form of πλείων which would more directly indicate quantity (but the sentence would have to be written differently I think). Another wrinkle is that according to the apparatus of the Nestle Aland Greek test (which is what ESV uses), there are some manuscripts which make "tongues" singular, γλώσσῃ instead of γλώσσαις. In other words, those manuscripts have "I thank God that I speak in tongue more than all of you." It would be hard to argue that this rendering indicates a greater quantity of languages since "language" is no longer pluralized.
So, based on all of the above, I would probably favor Windwalker's reading of that particular verse, but I'd allow room for uncertainty. I also think that it's significant that all of ESV, NASB, and NIV use that translation. They would know better than I do.
