Below is my translation of the first part of opusculum 74, from Paul Gautier’s edition of Michael Psellos’s Theologica. I’m not sure how much of this I’ll translate, but I wanted to at least deal with the portion directly pertaining to our passage in Gregory. Interestingly, Psellos claims that many people disagree with Gregory’s analysis of Pentecost. Psellos lays out both sides of the argument in pretty good detail here. The Greek text of Gautier’s edition is in the TLG, which I have posted beneath for convenience.
English Translation
On the passage, “The apostles were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in different tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.”
There are many who think this miracle happened in a manner different than the one Gregory the Theologian set out when he examined the tongues of fire. “How is it,” they say, “not a miracle if from one and the same voice many languages resounded forth? It might work just as wheat-flowers, barbs, husks and sheaths all come from one wheat stalk. One man, who had visited many cities and learned many languages, could translate the languages spoken into the native language of the audience. Even here in our city we now see many who speak Arabic, or Egyptian or Phoenician, and these same ones translate for Persians, Iberians, Galatians, and Assyrians. When someone speaks all of the languages with fluency, we marvel, but even this great feat we do not consider a sign of the Holy Spirit’s appearance. But if someone speaks one speech for all languages, such that an Assyrian can understand, along with a Scythian or Ethiopian, we certainly understand this man as participating in divine language.”
But the great father has marveled at the opposite of this. He says that all of the languages were spoken at once by the apostles, and he gives this reason. If the apostles spoke in one language, but those present heard in their various languages, then one would reasonably think that the miracle belonged to the audience, that they have translated the one language into their own. But if a Jew, who just prior knew only the tongue of the Jews, immediately began speaking to Assyrians in the Assyrian language, and then again to Medes, and after this to Babylonians, whose words before he didn’t even know very well, this man alone would testify to the divine breath, since the Spirit always appears in various forms, and from one source he divides himself to many springs. This is why the great man thinks this option more worthy of the Spirit’s appearance than the first.
Greek Text
Εἰς τὸ ‘ἐπλήσθησαν οἱ ἀπόστολοι πνεύματος ἁγίου καὶ ἤρξαντο λαλεῖν ἑτέραις γλώσσαις, καθὼς τὸ πνεῦμα ἐδίδου αὐτοῖς ἀποφθέγγεσθαι’
Πολλοὶ τὸ ἐναντίον, οὗ περὶ τῶν πυρίνων γλωσσῶν ἡ θεολόγος φωνὴ διηρμήνευκε, θαυμάσιον ἥγηνται· καὶ πῶς γάρ, φασίν, οὐ παράδοξον, εἰ ἀπὸ μιᾶς καὶ τῆς αὐτῆς φωνῆς πολλαὶ διάλεκτοι ἀνεβλάστανον; ὥσπερ γὰρ ἀπὸ μιᾶς καλάμης τοῦ στάχυος ἀνθέρικές τε καὶ ἀκίδες καὶ θῆκαι καὶ λέμματα. τὸ δὲ μεταλλάττειν τὰς διαλέκτους πρὸς τὴν τῶν ἀκουόντων οἰκείαν φωνήν, τοῦτο καὶ ἀνὴρ πολλαῖς ἐπιπλανηθεὶς πόλεσι καὶ πλείσταις γλώσσαις ἐνωμιληκὼς ποιήσειε. καὶ ἡμεῖς δὲ τεθεάμεθα πολλοὺς τῶν καθ’ ἡμᾶς νῦν μὲν Ἀράβιον ἀφιέντας φωνήν, νῦν δὲ κατὰ Φοίνικας ἢ Αἰγυπτίους διαλεγομένους, οἱ δ’ αὐτοὶ καὶ Πέρσαις καὶ Ἴβηρσι καὶ Γαλάταις καὶ Ἀσσυρίοις τὴν γλῶτταν διαμερίζουσιν, οὓς δὴ τῆς μὲν εὐγλωττίας, ὡς ἄν τις εἴπῃ, θαυμάζομεν, οὐ μὴν δὲ τὴν πολλὴν ταύτην φωνὴν σημεῖον θεοφανείας ποιούμεθα. εἰ δέ τις τὴν μίαν διάλεκτον πολλαῖς γλώσσαις διαμερίζοι, ὡς καὶ τὸν Φοίνικα ταύτης συνιέναι καὶ τὸν Ἀσσύριον καὶ τὸν Σκύθην καὶ τὸν Αἰθίοπα, τοῦτον ἂν εἰκότως ἐν μετουσίᾳ λογισώμεθα.
Ἀλλ’ ὁ μέγας πατὴρ τὸ ἐναντίον τούτου τεθαύμακε, καὶ πάσας ὁμοῦ τὰς διαλέκτους αὐτομάτως τοῖς ἀποστόλοις ἐπιμαρτυρήσας ἄριστα καὶ τὴν αἰτίαν προσθείς. εἰ μὲν γὰρ ἐκεῖνοι μιᾷ διελέγοντο γλώττῃ, πολυμερῶς δὲ ταύτης οἱ παρόντες ἀντελαμβάνοντο, ἐκείνων ἂν εἰκότως τὸ θαῦμα τῆς ἀντιλήψεως δόξειε, περισπώντων εἰς ἑαυτοὺς τὴν μίαν διάλεκτον κατὰ τὴν οἰκείαν γλῶτταν· εἰ δ’ ὁ πρὸ μικροῦ Ἰουδαῖος μόνον καὶ τὴν Ἰουδαίων μεμαθηκὼς μόνην φωνὴν αὖθις Ἀσσυρίοις τε ὁμιλεῖ κατὰ τὴν ἐκείνων γλῶτταν καὶ πάλιν Μήδοις καὶ μετὰ ταῦτα Βαβυλωνίοις, ὧν οὐδὲ τὰ ὀνόματα πάνυ σαφῶς ἠπίστατο, τούτῳ ἂν εἰκότως μόνῳ ἡ θεία προσμαρτυρηθείη ἐπίπνοια, ὡς πολυειδεῖ ἀθρόον ἀναφανέντι καὶ ἀπὸ μιᾶς πηγῆς πολλοὺς διαμεριζομένῳ τοὺς ὀχετούς. διὰ ταῦτα ὁ μέγας οὗτος ἀνὴρ τοῦτο μᾶλλον ἢ ἐκεῖνο θεοφανείας ἠξίωσε.
ἐν αὐτῷ,
ΜΑΘΠ
Update: I have corrected formatting problems in the Greek text. Thanks to Charles Sullivan for catching them.
Alex Poulos, PhD 