Spoken Language and Linguistics

Animals communicate with each other in various ways, including sounds, movements, colors, odors, and more. Humans are the only creatures God has created that use spoken language. Many scholars have studied language in the field of linguistics. Noam Chomsky is an American linguist who has been called “the father of modern linguistics.” Chomsky is a controversial figure because of his political and atheistic radicalism, but his credentials in linguistics are widely recognized.

Chomsky insists that the principles of language structure are biologically present in the human brain and are genetically inherited from birth. He believes that knowledge of syntax is at least partially inborn and that children need only learn the specific features of the language they are exposed to in their native culture. Thus, Chomsky maintains that there is an innate linguistic capacity in every human, enabling language-based communication in ways no other creature can.

Some animals, such as parrots, can imitate spoken language, but they are just imitating sounds. They are not capable of understanding syntax or communicating in human language. Dr. Stephen C. Meyer has said, “Every single human language has this complexity and suppleness of expression, all the tenses and the declensions and so forth. This was Chomsky’s mantra: There are technologically primitive cultures, but there are no primitive languages. And how you get from what the primates do to what we do is a complete mystery.”

In Genesis 1:28, we find God telling the first couple to “be fruitful and multiply and fill the Earth.” It seems they failed to do so, since at the time of the flood they were still confined to a limited area of the planet that God covered with water. Then, when Noah’s family emerged from the ark, God repeated his command to “be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth” (Genesis 9:1). Again, they failed to do so because they still lived in a limited area, and, working together, they contrived to build a tower to reach heaven against God’s wishes.

It was then that God gave them different languages: “So the Lord scattered them abroad from there over the face of all the earth” (Genesis 11:8). They still had that sophisticated inborn language ability, but they could no longer understand one another or work together to accomplish the project they were attempting. That action of God finally caused them to spread over the Earth. In the genealogies of Genesis 10:25, we read an interesting note. It says that in the days of Peleg, “the earth was divided.” Could that refer to the time when the land bridge between Asia and North America became covered with water, so the people who had migrated to the Western Hemisphere could no longer travel back to the east? The land bridge was no longer needed.

Today, of course, we are scattered over the Earth, but our ability to communicate with one another through spoken language has increased to the point where we can instantly talk with people around the world. Even in cases where we don’t speak the same language, computers and even handheld devices can translate our words into another language. We have today the ability to use language to accomplish prideful things, similar to the people in Babel attempting to build the tower. Or we can use our ability to communicate with one another to achieve peace and bring the message of salvation through Jesus Christ to people all over the world. I pray that we will make the right choice.

— Roland Earnst © 2026

References: scienceandculture.com and wikipedia.com