On the Use of Language in Individual and Clinical Group Analysis and in Training

Abstract

The nature of the first language is the subject of many myths and beliefs. It is believed that language is a supernatural gift and the grace of one or many gods. According to the Judeo–Christian culture to which I belong, there is no doubt that the first language was Hebrew. The belief that Hebrew was the original language comes from the text in the first book of Moses:

‘The Lord our God formed every beast of the field and every bird in the sky, and brought them to man to see what he would call them . . . Man gave names to all the cattle, and to the birds of the sky, and to every beast in the field. And the whole earth was of one language and one speech’ (Genesis 11.1).

But when the ‘children of men’ started to build the city and the tower of Babel, God punished their vanity, ‘Let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech’. So the Lord scattered them all over the face of the earth, and they abandoned the building of the city (Genesis 11:7, 8).

As we know, communication is the essence of psychotherapy. Linguistic diversity, as the consequence of God’s punishment, could therefore cause much trouble for the therapist and the patient in both individual and group psychotherapy, as they try to communicate and discuss their experience in different languages.