“Good talking, Dad.”

I waited each Sunday after I’d preached for my daughter, Nicola, then a teenager, to say those words. Sometimes she did, sometimes she didn’t. When she did, I felt heaven’s approval, or at least its nod. When she didn’t, I felt my preaching was slipshod, a mere sputtering and blathering. If my words couldn’t reach and touch my daughter, woe is me.

And who else was I missing?

I loved the little grammatical glitch in Nicola’s phrase, her slightly off-kilter syntax. Not, “Father, you spoke well today.” Not, “Oh, paterfamilias, what a splendid utterance you uttered just now.” No. Just “Good talking, dad.”

I took it to mean that there was both truth in what I said and beauty in how I said it. My words were soul food, and a little bit ear candy.

Another word for this is rhetoric.

What Is Rhetoric?

Rhetoric is the art of persuasion. We tend now to use the word dismissively, disparagingly, or derisively. “That’s just rhetoric” we say, as a critique. Rhetoric is a byword for political doublespeak, corporate sloganizing, and commercial spin. Bluster, bombast, smooth talk. It’s the stuff of demagogues and con artists, those who want us to believe something that isn’t true, buy something we don’t need.

But it wasn’t always so. In its origins, rhetoric was opposed to all forms of spin. When Aristotle, working on older models, developed his theory of rhetoric, he did so over against the manipulative and deceptive speech of the Sophists, expert bamboozlers whose speechcraft was precisely designed to mislead people, for the gain of the speaker and at the expense of the listener. Sophist speech was all verbal slight-of-hand, intended to get money out of the listener’s pocket and put it into the speaker’s.

But rhetoric, Aristotle said, is persuasive precisely because it is true, good, and beautiful. It is aimed at the listener’s highest good. If anyone need suffer for the sake of the message, it is the speaker.

Aristotle said three things always, and equally, characterize someone trained in rhetoric: They speak with reason, they speak with passion, and they speak only about matters they believe in with all their heart. Aristotle’s names for these three things: Logos, Pathos, and Ethos. (There is much more to his theory of rhetoric, but this simplifies it without dumbing it down).

What Is Logos, Pathos, and Ethos?

Logos is Greek for logic. A truly persuasive talk is well-researched and well-argued. It’s free of logical fallacies. It holds up under scrutiny. It’s been fact-checked. It doesn’t use statistics, that most slippery of sources, selectively or tendentiously. Like Apollos, a person with logos can speak in a way that refutes others vigorously (Acts 18:28).

The logos of rhetoric deals with a talk’s accuracy, cogency, and thoroughness. It holds together. We say of a speech rich in logos, “I believe in what they’re saying.”

Pathos is Greek for passion. The speaker cares deeply about what they’re saying. It is fire in their bones. They have personal stakes in it. If what they say turns out to be false, they are more devastated than their listeners. If it proves true, their delight knows no bounds. The speaker is willing to suffer and even die for their message. They never yell, whisper, or weep simply for effect: it comes from within, from genuine conviction. Like Paul, they can say “… when I preach the gospel, I cannot boast, since I am compelled to preach. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel!” (1 Cor. 9:16).

The pathos of rhetoric deals with the speaker’s deeply held personal convictions. They burn. We say of a speaker with pathos, “I believe they believe what they’re saying.”

Ethos is Greek for ethics. The speaker is honest and straight-forward. True to the bone, and would rather die than lie. They never utter anything exaggerated, distorted, or false, not knowingly. If they get it wrong, they publicly apologizes and corrects the error. Like Paul, they can say, “… we have renounced secret and shameful ways; we do not use deception, nor do we distort the word of God. On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly we commend ourselves to everyone’s conscience in the sight of God” (2 Cor. 4:2).

The ethos of rhetoric deals with the speaker’s integrity. They shine. We say of a speaker with ethos, “I believe her.”

When I teach my introductory preaching course, I give my students a basic introduction to rhetoric. Most have negative associations with the word, so it usually takes some, well, persuasion to convince them otherwise.

“Which of the three elements of classic rhetoric,” I ask, “is optional for preaching?” Of course, none: all three are needed, and needed equally. Remove even one, the speech fails. Take out logos, your listeners will eventually find the talk hollow, no matter how passionate and credible you were. Take out pathos, the speech may be inerrant and you oozing sincerity, but the whole thing is uninspiring. Take out ethos, even if all you said was true and delivered with burning conviction, your flaws of character will eventually find you out and taint your message.

The Fourth Element of Rhetoric

The Apostle Paul was likely trained in classic (sometimes called ancient) rhetoric, though this claim is contested. Still, it’s easy to identify all three elements—logos, pathos, ethos—in his speeches and letters.

But a more interesting case, I think, is Apollos. It’s almost certain he had training as a rhetorician—he hails from Alexandria, a hub of classic Greek philosophy and rhetoric, and Luke describes him as a “learned man,” meaning he was taught in the Greek way. Luke also says he spoke “boldly” and “with fervor, and taught about Jesus accurately,” that he “vigorously refuted his Jewish opponents in public debate,” and that he proved “from the Scriptures that Jesus was the Messiah” (see Acts 18: 24-28).

Logos, pathos, ethos—all the elements of classic rhetoric.

Yet something was off. Two lay leaders in the church, Priscilla and Aquilla, felt the need to explain to Apollos, in private, “the way of God more adequately” (Acts 18:26). It’s unclear what was amiss in either the man or his teaching, but the next story (Acts 19:1-7) strongly suggests that Apollos, while powerful in speech and character, had either a poor theology of the Holy Spirit or a lack of anointing by the Spirit. Maybe both.

At any rate, perhaps for Christian speakers, the scriptures adds a distinctly fourth element to classic rhetoric: Be filled and in step with the Holy Spirit, and learn to lead others likewise. But this would take another article to explore.

Some of my students remain wary of rhetoric, and for good reason: good talking does involve some verbal maneuvers. Some speeches move us—literally, get us from one place to another, in our hearts and minds—because, in part, they are beautiful, memorable, funny, poignant, surprising, and easy on the ears. In other words, a speech works, in part, because of its rhetorical devices—its poetry, its humor, its gravitas, its spiciness. Its speechcraft.

Another word for this: tricks of the trade. That’s what makes my students wary. Tricks?

So maybe a better word is artistry. A speech should be artful.

An Artful Sermon

To cultivate the artfulness of a talk is to enhance its persuasiveness. This, of course, has limits: speeches that are too flowery, too dramatic, too overblown tend to create suspicion. But speeches that are too plain, too listless, too flat tend to induce sleep. There is a fine balance.

But there is a balance.

My daughter Nicola’s little grammatical glitch—“Good talking, Dad”—uses a rhetorical device called enallage (pronounced similar to analogy but with a sharp e at the start). Enallage is a breach of a grammatical rule, often deliberate, usually aimed at making a phrase more memorable. We remember, because of an enallage, what boxing manager Joe Jacobs shouted after his boxer Max Schmeling lost on points: “We was robbed!” It sticks because it’s a hair off.

I encourage several things to help my students become better rhetoricians (assuming I’ve persuaded them that this is a worthy goal).

On the logos scale, I encourage careful research and argumentation (I even give a crash course in basic logic). Ask God to make you clear.

On the ethos scale, I encourage a life of integrity, and especially (from that hint in the story of Apollos) a life in step with the Holy Spirit. Ask God to make you pure.

On the pathos scale, I encourage a movement from mere belief to deep conviction—we hold beliefs, but convictions hold us. Ask God to make you burn.

But in and through all this, I show them ways to make it sing. Rehearse what you’re going to say. Keep working a phrase, repeating it out loud, until the music flows. Say blunt things bluntly, soothing things soothingly, joyful things joyously, serious things seriously. Occasionally, ham it up. Get loud (but not too much), get quiet (but not too long). Stand still. Move quick. Slow down for a punchline. Speed up for a crescendo. Soliloquize here and there. Flail like someone running from an evil clown, then stand motionless like someone in awe of a waterfall. Try never to move from mere nervous energy but train yourself to gesture so you’re your body emphasizes what you’re saying and doesn’t distract from it.

Plus read poetry and novels, and watch good movies, and tune your ear to the dialogue, and listen to comedians, and watch their pacing.

In none of it, play the sophist. In all of it, be a rhetorician: logical, ethical, passionate.

Good talking.

Mark Buchanan is an Associate Professor of Pastoral Theology at the Ambrose Seminary in Calgary, Alberta.