How to Pray in Tongues: What You Need to Know

The Instructions People Give You About How to Pray in Tongues Don't Actually Work, and Here's Why

If you've tried "unlocking" tongues by forcing sounds out of your mouth in a quiet room, following some video's step-by-step method, and felt nothing but awkward silence afterward, I want to tell you something. When people search for how to pray in tongues, the problem usually isn't their faith. It's the instructions.

In my years of serving as an Orthodox priest since 2013, I've found that questions about praying in tongues usually come from sincere people who want to know whether they're missing something essential in the Christian life. And that question deserves a real answer, not a technique. I do not say this lightly: what most online guides teach as a five-step method for how to pray in tongues and "activate" a heavenly language has almost no precedent in the actual history of the Church. None that I've found, anyway, and I've looked.

As a priest serving at the Cathedral of the Holy New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia in Munich, I've often met seekers torn between a genuine hunger for deep prayer and a fear that they're somehow resisting the Holy Spirit by not producing certain sounds. Our own analysis of how this question shows up in pastoral conversation suggests something interesting: the search for tongues is rarely about tongues at all. It's about wanting proof that God is close. Stay with me, because that distinction changes everything.

✏️ By Father Victor Meshko | 📅 Updated: September 2026 | ⏱️ 9 min read

Quick Answer: From an Orthodox perspective, there's no technique to learn for praying in tongues, because it's a specific gift the Holy Spirit gives to some believers, not a private prayer language every Christian is meant to activate.

In This Article:

• The Instructions People Give You About How to Pray in Tongues Don't Actually Work, and Here's Why
• What Does How to Pray in Tongues Actually Mean in the Bible?
• Does the Orthodox Church Teach How to Pray in Tongues for Everyone?
• What Are the Rules for Speaking in Tongues, According to St. Paul?
• How Do We Pray in the Holy Spirit, According to Orthodoxy?
• How Do I Know If My Experience of Tongues Is Genuine?
• Orthodox, Catholic, and Protestant Views on Tongues
• Father Victor's Perspective: Why So Many People Search for Tongues Today
• Practical Orthodox Guidance for Seekers
• Common Misconceptions About Praying in Tongues

TL;DR — Key Takeaways

• Orthodoxy doesn't teach methods for producing tongues; it's a charism God gives, not a skill you learn.
• 1 Corinthians 12:29-30 directly states that not all believers speak in tongues, so it can't be a universal requirement.
• The safer, tested path to Spirit-filled prayer is the Jesus Prayer, the Psalms, confession, and the Liturgy.
• The real "tongues miracle" of Pentecost, in Orthodox understanding, is the Spirit making truth understandable and shared, not private ecstatic speech.

What Does How to Pray in Tongues Actually Mean in the Bible?

Here's where I think a lot of well-meaning teaching goes sideways. People read "tongues" in the New Testament as if it always means the same thing. It doesn't. Not even close. If we're going to talk honestly about how to pray in tongues, we have to begin with what Scripture is and is not describing.

Tongues in Acts

At Pentecost, "each one heard them speaking in his own language" (Acts 2:6). This wasn't private ecstatic babble. It was real human language, understood by real people from different nations, gathered in Jerusalem. The miracle wasn't self-expression. The miracle was communication across barriers that normally divide us.

I find this deeply moving even after all these years of studying it. Babel scattered humanity into confusion and mutual incomprehension. Pentecost reverses that. And here's the insight I keep coming back to in my own reflection on this feast: the deepest tongue miracle of the Church was never unintelligible utterance. It was the Holy Spirit making truth understandable, shared, and life-giving within the Body of Christ. Worth sitting with, that.

Tongues in 1 Corinthians

By the time we get to Corinth, Paul is addressing a community that had turned a genuine gift into something disorderly, even prideful. He writes about "varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit" (1 Corinthians 12:4), listing tongues alongside wisdom, healing, prophecy, and discernment. Tongues appear on that list. But so does everything else. It's one gift among many, given as the Spirit "apportions to each one individually as he wills" (1 Corinthians 12:11).

So the question isn't whether tongues are real. Scripture treats them as real. The question is whether they're meant for everyone, all the time, as proof of spiritual maturity. And Scripture actually answers that directly, which brings me to something most articles on this topic skip entirely.

Does the Orthodox Church Teach How to Pray in Tongues for Everyone?

No. And Paul himself makes this uncomfortably clear for anyone who's been told otherwise.

Can Anybody Pray in Tongues?

"Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret?" (1 Corinthians 12:30). The grammar of Paul's question expects the answer no. According to Ask Bible Questions' summary of 1 Corinthians 12:29-30, this passage directly undermines the claim that speaking in tongues is required of every believer. Not everyone prophesies. Not everyone heals. Not everyone speaks in tongues. The Spirit gives what the Spirit gives.

I recall a young man, a catechumen at our parish, who came to me after watching a series of videos online about how to pray in tongues. He looked genuinely distressed. "Father," he asked, "am I resisting the Holy Spirit because I can't make the sounds they describe?" I've heard some version of that question more times than I can count.

Here's what I told him. The Holy Spirit isn't manipulated by technique. Not by breathing exercises, not by repeating syllables, not by working yourself into an emotional state. The Church points first to repentance, to Baptism, to Chrismation, to liturgical prayer, and to the Jesus Prayer, while affirming that charisms are given by God as He wills, not as we demand. He left that conversation lighter than he came in. Not with an experience, but with peace. That's usually how it goes.

Metropolitan Kallistos Ware made a similar point in his writing: the Orthodox Church doesn't treat speaking in tongues as a central mark of Christian life, but sees the Holy Spirit primarily in the sacraments, in prayer, and in holiness. I think that's exactly right, and I wish more seekers heard it before they went searching for activation techniques online. For readers wanting a broader biblical discussion of gifts and order, this pastoral resource on foundational biblical principles may also be helpful.

What Are the Rules for Speaking in Tongues, According to St. Paul?

Paul doesn't leave this vague. He gives actual, specific rules, and I think it's telling how rarely competitor articles mention them. Read more: What the Bible Says About Praying in Tongues Revealed.

What Are the Rules for Speaking in Tongues?

"If any speak in a tongue, let there be only two or three, and each in turn, and let someone interpret. But if there is no one to interpret, let each of them keep silent in church" (1 Corinthians 14:27-28). According to Hanks Bible Study's summary of 1 Corinthians 14, Paul regulates public tongues strictly for the sake of order and edification, not to suppress the Spirit but to protect the community from confusion.

• At most two or three speak, never all at once
• Each speaks in turn, one at a time
• There must be interpretation, or the person stays silent
• The purpose is always edification, never spectacle

As St. John Chrysostom teaches in his Homilies on First Corinthians, Homily 29, the gift of tongues was given to profit others, not to glorify those who possessed it. That's the whole orientation Paul is trying to instill. A gift turned inward, toward personal validation, misses the point entirely.

As St. Basil the Great writes in On the Holy Spirit, Chapter 16, the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each for the common good, not for vainglory. So if a practice produces pride, comparison, or spiritual one-upmanship among believers, something has gone wrong somewhere. That's not a small thing to notice.

How Do We Pray in the Holy Spirit, According to Orthodoxy?

So what does the Orthodox Church actually offer someone who longs for deep, Spirit-filled prayer and wonders how to pray in tongues? Not a technique. A whole life.

Why the Jesus Prayer Matters Here

"Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner." I've prayed these words more times than I could ever count, on good days and on days when I barely meant them. And that's exactly the point. The Jesus Prayer doesn't require an emotional peak. It asks for nothing but honesty and repetition, offered humbly, over years.

Romans 8:26-27 tells us that "the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words." Notice what this passage doesn't say. It doesn't describe glossolalia. It describes something broader and, I'd argue, more mysterious: the Spirit praying within us, beyond and beneath our words, even when we have no words left at all. That's Spirit-filled prayer too. Maybe the deepest kind.

Sacramental Life, Psalms, and Liturgical Prayer

In daily Orthodox life, prayer gets learned slowly, through morning and evening prayers, through the Psalms, through the Divine Liturgy, through confession, through receiving the Holy Mysteries. None of that sounds dramatic. I'll admit that. But it's real, and it's tested by two thousand years of saints who lived it. If you'd like a fuller Orthodox introduction to prayer itself, see our guide to Orthodox prayer and our reflection on the Jesus Prayer.

Fr. Alexander Schmemann put it simply: prayer isn't chiefly about chasing experiences but offering one's life to God. I think about that often. The goal was never the sensation. The goal was always communion.

Here's a short video from Orthodox Ethos that goes deeper into how the Fathers read Pentecost and 1 Corinthians against modern charismatic assumptions, if you want to explore further: Orthodoxy and Speaking in Tongues. Some seekers also look for things like praying in tongues audio, praying in tongues verses, or even a how to pray in tongues pdf, but Orthodox guidance remains less about collecting materials and more about learning prayer within the life of the Church.

[YOUTUBE_VIDEO]

How Do I Know If My Experience of Tongues Is Genuine?

This is where I wish I had a simple checklist to hand you. I don't. I'm honestly not sure there's a formula for this, and I'd be suspicious of anyone who claims there is.

Discernment, Humility, and Spiritual Guidance

A parishioner once came back from a charismatic gathering, genuinely moved, but also confused. "How do I know if what I experienced was from God, Father, or just emotion?" she asked me. Fair question. I've asked variations of it myself over the years.

The Orthodox answer is discernment: test the experience by Scripture, by the fruit of the Spirit, by humility, by order, and by conversation with a priest or spiritual father. Galatians 5:22-23 lists that fruit plainly: "love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control." Not intensity. Not goosebumps. Fruit that shows up in ordinary life, over time, in how you treat people.

Fr. Thomas Hopko taught something similar: the gifts of the Spirit exist for building up the Church, and the fruit of the Spirit remains a more reliable sign of God's presence than any single gift. I've found that to be true in decades of pastoral conversations. The person who grows quieter, gentler, more patient with their family, that's the one I trust. Not the one with the most dramatic testimony.

As St. Symeon the New Theologian teaches in the Ethical Discourses, if someone claims to have the Holy Spirit, show me the work: humility, tears, love for enemies. That standard hasn't gone out of date. Discover: What the Bible Says About Prayer and Silence.

I don't fully understand every spiritual experience people bring to me. I want to be honest about that. But I've learned to trust the fruit over the fireworks, every single time.

Orthodox, Catholic, and Protestant Views on Tongues

So how do the major Christian traditions actually differ here? Let me lay it out plainly, because I think clarity helps more than vague comparisons.

How Orthodox, Catholic, and Protestant Traditions Approach Praying in Tongues

[COMPARISON_TABLE]

I knew the Catholic tradition well before my conversion, having been raised in it, and I want to be fair here. Catholic teaching, especially in charismatic contexts, generally allows for tongues as a valid charism, but it doesn't demand it of every believer either. The primacy still belongs to the sacraments. Protestant views, though, vary enormously, from Pentecostal traditions that actively encourage seeking a prayer language to Evangelical communities that regulate or reject the modern practice altogether. So if someone searches for how to pray in tongues Catholic, the answer will still differ from an Orthodox answer in emphasis, even where both traditions reject making tongues mandatory.

Orthodoxy's distinctive contribution, I'd argue, is holding biblical seriousness, patristic memory, sacramental theology, and ascetical discernment together without collapsing into either extreme. We don't deny the Spirit's freedom. But we also refuse to turn an extraordinary gift into a technique or an identity badge.

Father Victor's Perspective: Why So Many People Search for Tongues Today

Let me try to say something here that I don't think most articles on this topic will tell you.

An Orthodox answer to "how to pray in tongues" has to begin by questioning the assumption hidden inside the phrase itself: that prayer is a skill we activate rather than a communion we receive. That's the real fork in the road. In Orthodox theology, the first movement of prayer isn't self-expression. It's surrender. Everything else follows from that, or it doesn't follow at all.

With training in both theology and psychology, I've seen how easily spiritual hunger turns into anxiety once someone's told they must produce a gift rather than receive prayer humbly from God. The modern search for tongues, in my experience, often reveals a crisis of assurance, not a crisis of prayer. People aren't really asking for a charism. They're asking for proof that God is with them. Sound familiar?

Orthodoxy answers that longing differently than a five-step method would. Not through one dramatic sign, but through the steady, embodied life of the Church: confession, where you're heard and forgiven by name; the Eucharist, where you receive Christ Himself; the Psalms, prayed by millions before you; the Liturgy, which has held the same words for centuries. What most online articles about how to pray in tongues miss is that, in actual pastoral life, the deeper issue is rarely technique. It's spiritual insecurity, and it deserves a gentler, more grounded answer than a checklist.

I do not say this to dismiss anyone's longing. I say it because I've watched that longing get answered, not through forced sounds in a quiet room, but through years of quiet, ordinary faithfulness that slowly became something solid.

Practical Orthodox Guidance for Seekers

So what does this actually look like day to day? Something like this, though I'd encourage you to bring it to a spiritual father rather than treat it as a universal formula.

• Begin and end each day with simple morning and evening prayers, even five minutes matters
• Pray the Jesus Prayer quietly through the day, at a red light, washing dishes, walking
• Read a Psalm slowly, out loud if you can, and let the words become yours
• Go to confession regularly, not as an obligation but as honesty before God
• Receive Holy Communion within the life of a parish community

I've gone back and forth on how much detail to give here, because prayer rules genuinely differ between jurisdictions and spiritual fathers. What one priest recommends for a beginner, another might adjust entirely. That's not confusion. That's pastoral care, tailored to a real person rather than a general audience. Speak with a priest near you if you can. Real conversation, not another article, is where this really gets worked out. People may search for praying in tongues examples, speaking in tongues list of words, speaking in tongues list of words pdf, or even how to pray in tongues for long hours, but the Orthodox path begins somewhere more humble and more solid: with repentance, stability, and prayer under guidance.

Common Misconceptions About Praying in Tongues

"Every true Christian should pray in tongues." Orthodoxy teaches that the Holy Spirit is given to all in the life of the Church, but not all receive the same charisms. 1 Corinthians 12:29-30 makes this especially clear. This idea became common in many Pentecostal and charismatic settings where tongues were treated as normal evidence of Spirit baptism. I'd affirm the desire behind it, the longing for the Spirit is good, while gently pointing out that Scripture itself distinguishes between receiving the Spirit and receiving a particular gift. See also: Prayer of the Heart: An Orthodox Christian Guide to....

"If I repeat sounds by faith, I can learn tongues like any other prayer practice." The Orthodox Church doesn't teach techniques to manufacture charisms. Authentic gifts are given by God and tested within the Church. Popular ministries often present activation steps because they fit modern expectations of fast results. Many sincere Christians use this language, and I don't doubt their sincerity, but Orthodoxy stays cautious because prayer can be imitated externally without any inner change at all.

"Tongues are mainly a private heavenly language for personal spiritual power." In Acts, tongues are tied to mission and intelligibility; in 1 Corinthians, they're regulated for the Church's edification. Orthodoxy treats them as a real but specific charism, not a universal private tool. Modern charismatic spirituality often emphasizes personal empowerment more than the historical reading of Acts and Corinth.

"If a spiritual experience feels intense, it must be from God." Orthodoxy insists on discernment. Experiences get tested by humility, peace, obedience, the fruit of the Spirit, and conversation with a priest. Contemporary religious culture often equates strong emotion with authenticity. God can touch people deeply, genuinely, but the Church has always distinguished between grace, emotion, suggestion, and self-deception.

"Orthodox Christians don't believe in the gifts of the Holy Spirit." Orthodoxy deeply believes in the Holy Spirit and His gifts, but receives them with sobriety, ecclesial discernment, and sacramental grounding. Because Orthodox worship is liturgical rather than demonstrative, outsiders sometimes assume it lacks spiritual vitality. It doesn't. It just locates that vitality differently.

"Praying in tongues guarantees healing or breakthrough if done long enough." Orthodoxy rejects formulaic spirituality. Prayer always stands under "Thy will be done," and healing comes as gift, never as something a method can control. Some ministries connect tongues to promised results because testimony-based media rewards dramatic outcomes. I'd never dismiss someone's testimony. But there's a real difference between God's freedom to heal and any human claim to spiritual certainty.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can anybody pray in tongues?

No, not in the sense of it being universally available on demand. Tongues are a specific spiritual gift given by the Holy Spirit to some believers, not to all, according to 1 Corinthians 12:29-30. Every Christian receives the Holy Spirit through Baptism and Chrismation, but not everyone receives this particular charism. What every believer is called to is repentance, love, and prayer in the Spirit, whether or not tongues ever appear.

What are the rules for speaking in tongues?

St. Paul gives clear apostolic rules in 1 Corinthians 14:27-28: at most two or three speakers, each taking a turn, with an interpreter present, or the speaker stays silent in church. According to Hanks Bible Study's summary of 1 Corinthians 14, these rules exist to preserve order and edification, not to limit the Spirit's freedom.

How to activate the power in your tongue?

Orthodoxy doesn't teach techniques to "activate" tongues or manufacture a spiritual experience through effort. Instead, the Church points toward confession of faith, sacramental confession, thanksgiving, and blessing rather than cursing (James 3, Galatians 5:22-23). The real power of the tongue, in Orthodox understanding, gets shaped through the Psalms, the Lord's Prayer, and the Jesus Prayer, trusting the Spirit to work through ordinary faithfulness rather than a forced performance.

How do I know if I'm really praying in tongues?

Orthodox discernment looks at fruit, not sensation: does the experience lead to humility, repentance, and love, or toward pride and comparison? Does it align with Scripture and a spiritual father's counsel? If practiced publicly, does it follow the order Paul lays out in 1 Corinthians 14:27-28? If those fruits are missing, the Church would gently caution that something else may be at work, and would redirect you toward tested, safer forms of prayer.

Does the Orthodox Church reject speaking in tongues?

No, and this misconception comes up often enough that it deserves its own answer. Orthodoxy doesn't reject the charism of tongues described in Scripture. It simply refuses to make it central, mandatory, or something to be engineered through technique. The Church affirms the Spirit's freedom to give whatever gifts He wills, while placing the ordinary Christian's hope in the sacraments, the Liturgy, and a life of repentance rather than in one extraordinary sign.

A brief note on process: AI-assisted editorial tools were used during the research and drafting of this article, with full theological review and final approval by Father Victor Meshko, in line with EU AI Act transparency expectations.

About the Author

Father Victor Meshko is an Orthodox priest of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad, serving since 2013 at the Cathedral of the Holy New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia in Munich, in the Diocese of Berlin and Germany. He holds multiple degrees in philosophy, theology, and psychology, including advanced theological study at LMU Munich's Institute for Orthodox Theology, and he's the published author of a book on Archbishop Filaret of Chernigov. For Find to God, he brings together patristic scholarship, pastoral care, and lived parish experience to guide seekers with both clarity and compassion.

Researched and written by Father Victor Meshko. AI tools were used during the research process.