Words are important because language affects the concepts we come to believe. No one knows this better than the authors of classic literature. They are wordsmiths whose skill is in crafting language to promote the ideas that shape our world.
Take Jonathan Swift’s classic Gulliver’s Travels, for example. The book has for ages been read as a children’s story, but it finds itself among the greatest novels ever written in the English language because it strikes at the heart of the human condition, exposing man’s vices and looking for a better way.
In Gulliver’s Travels Swift takes Lemuel Gulliver on a series of voyages to strange lands where the poor sailor encounters unusual races that give him a fresh perspective on his own people back in England. His final journey takes him to the country of the Houyhnhmns, a race of horses endowed with reason. In this place Gulliver discovers that his counterparts are dirty, grotesque versions of himself. They are called Yahoos.
After staying with the Houyhnhmns for some time, Gulliver learns that they are more righteous and dignified than his own race and know nothing of corruption, vice, or lying. They are gentle, loving, and kind to one another.
One of the reasons the Houyhnhmns stayed pure was because they did not have the vocabulary to describe the vices of humankind. For example, the Houyhnhnms had no word for lying, so Gulliver had to explain the corrupt politics of England in a round about way, using the phrase “saying the thing that was not.”
Gulliver’s Travels highlights an important truth: words matter. We cannot take language for granted. Our words shape who we are and what we stand for.
Before the classics ever took up this theme, God promoted it in the Bible. Jesus taught, “I tell you, on the day of judgment people will give account for every careless word they speak, for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned” (Mt. 12:36-37). Paul said, “Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear” (Eph. 4:29). He continued, “Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving” (Eph. 5:4).
Pay attention to what you are saying. What do your words say about your heart? Do they betray a bitter, vulgar soul, or do they reveal love, peace, and faith? Listen to yourself. Words matter.