Swedenborg the Evangelist?

Here Nathan argues that the sentiment that Swedenborg did not intend to start a church is erroneous. He illustrates this point with many personal accounts from Swedenborg's life. Originally given as a talk for the Carmel New Church Swedenborg Banquet January 2010, we are publishing it now in honor of the 323rd anniversary of Swedenborg's birthday, January 29th, 1688. -Editor

In the New Church we believe that the “Writings” are revelation from the Lord. So why would we care about Swedenborg? It seems like making a big deal over the cover on a book rather than the content.

Would you call Swedenborg an evangelist?

The Gospel writers are often referred to as evangelists. They are called evangelists because they wrote the gospels which told the good news about the Lord Jesus being born and how he was the Christ or Messiah come to save people. They were telling the “good news” which is what the “evangel” literally means.

We also know that the Lord sent his disciples to preach the gospel and teach all nations about his advent. So thinking of the four apostles as evangelists we might think about their preaching and converting as well as their writing.

Today when we think about evangelicals or evangelizing we probably would think about people coming up to you in your home or randomly on the street and trying to convert you by preaching at you. You might also think about a televangelist with a dynamic personality who attracts a large following, not because he may be teaching the good news but because of a charismatic personality or exciting delivery.

So would it be fair to call Swedenborg an Evangelist? Did Swedenborg try to start a church? Well, since you can find out anything on the internet I checked Wikipedia to find out the answer to this question:

“Swedenborg spoke of a "New Church" that would be founded on the theology in his works, but he himself never tried to establish an organization. At the time of his death, few efforts had been made to establish an organized church, but on May 7, 1787, 15 years after Swedenborg's death, the New Church movement was founded in England.” Wikipedia (New Church)

Is it a fair representation of Swedenborg's work to say that he never tried to establish a New Church organization? I also have heard people say that Swedenborg never imagined that a church organization would be formed on the basis of his writings. This is a fair statement if we remember that Swedenborg did not consider himself the author of the Heavenly Doctrines (see True Christian Religion 779, which I will be quoting in full later). He of all people would know that it is the Lord's Doctrine and that it is He alone who establishes the church. But I think it is unfair to say that Swedenborg didn't try to start a New Church organization. Two important points need to be made. Swedenborg did not establish an organization. He did not build a church building or hire a preacher or set down a plan for how a New Church organization would be run. Secondly, and more importantly, he did not preach sermons or gather followers around himself.

But there are many things that show us that Swedenborg put a lot of effort and work and personal sacrifice towards the cause of the establishment of a New Church. He did do work of evangelization in the best sense. He was trying to share the good news of the Lord's second advent.

It is easy to think of Swedenborg sitting at home writing books and sending them off to publishers and that was that, having no further involvement with them. But this is not true. One early effort that Swedenborg had to put forth was to find publisher's willing and able to print his books. In his home country of Sweden it was forbidden to publish books without the approval of the government censors, which meant that all of his works would have needed to be approved by the Swedish clergy and government before they could be published. We know that the Heavenly Doctrines are in complete agreement with the Word but in Swedenborg's own time it was considered heresy that could not be published.

So Swedenborg was forced to travel to England and Holland, places where there was freedom of the press to publish books without worrying about censorship. So just publishing the books was not a simple, straightforward job. And Swedenborg didn't stop with publishing the books. He also took many copies of them and mailed them to different people.

In one of his journals (which has been published under the names Spiritual Experiences and Spiritual Diaries), Swedenborg describes meeting the spirit of an English bishop who wanted to come argue with him to refute all the doctrine that Swedenborg had written. This entry also mentions that Swedenborg had sent copies of several works to the English clergy, and House of Lords and some of the universities, specifically Oxford. This bishop had done his best to discredit the work of Swedenborg in England while he was alive. So we see how Swedenborg was trying to share the doctrine with the people whom he thought would be best able to understand it.

Remember that the Writings were originally written in Latin and so only people with higher education would have been able to read them. And Swedenborg tried to send books to those people.

Swedenborg apparently thought that the educated people in the church would be able to understand and see the value of the doctrines for the New Church. Unfortunately, this was a false hope since even in the relatively free county of England there was still a very strong sense of religious orthodoxy. Basically nobody would listen to the books. How many of the people who received the books actually read them is also hard to know. But what is obvious is that Swedenborg put a lot of work into sending books to the clergy and nobility, but saw little to no response.

From letters and passages in the Doctrines we can see why this effort was not going to produce much result.

"The clergy who have confirmed themselves in their dogmas at the universities will be convinced only with difficulty, for all confirmations in theological matters are as if glued fast in the brain, and are budged only with difficulty" (Letter 5).

In Brief Exposition 81 it is said: "the doctrine of justification by faith alone prevails at this day over every other doctrine throughout the whole Reformed Christian world, and is esteemed in the sacred order almost as the only important point of theology."

There is already a barrier for people steeped in the idea of faith alone to accept the genuine doctrine of truth but it was made harder by active efforts of people like the English bishop, mentioned above, who went out of his way to sabotage the possibility that anyone would read or find value in the Writings.

Another effort Swedenborg made was to send books to libraries and universities hoping perhaps that students studying religion would be able to understand the new doctrines before they were confirmed in the false doctrines of the Church:

"How soon a New Church is to be expected? Answer: The Lord is now establishing a new heaven from those who believe in Him and acknowledge Him to be the true God of heaven and earth, and who also look to Him in their lives, which means the shunning of evil and the doing of good; for it is from this heaven that the New Jerusalem is to descend (see Revelation xxi 2). Daily I see spirits and angels descending and ascending in numbers from 10 to 20,000 and being arranged in order. In so far as this heaven is formed the New Church will commence and grow. The universities of Christianity are now receiving instruction, and from them new priests will come; for the new heaven holds no sway with the old priests who regard themselves as learned in the justification by faith alone" (Letter 7.2).

When Swedenborg wrote that the universities of Christianity were receiving instruction presumably he was referring to the fact that he had sent books of the Heavenly Doctrines to universities in Germany, France, and England.

But did Swedenborg find this effort successful?

Unfortunately not, as he wrote in a letter. He wrote that “[faith alone] is what all young students among the clergy greedily learn and imbibe at the universities, and what they afterwards teach in temples, and publish in books, as if they were inspired with heavenly wisdom, and whereby they endeavor to acquire to themselves a name, and the reputation of superior learning, as well as diplomas, licenses, and other honorary rewards" (Letter 7).

Besides sending books to people, Swedenborg also had them translated into other languages. A man named John Marchant was hired to translate part of Arcana Coelestia and also the work Brief Exposition of the Doctrines of the New Church. Swedenborg personally paid for this to be translated into English. Others translated the books into different languages. Oetinger translated some of Arcana Coelestia into German and was persecuted for it. Swedenborg wrote to him encouraging him, saying:

"I am very sorry that you should have to suffer for the translation...but what suffers more at this day than the truth itself?...Do not allow yourself to be discouraged thereby, but be a defender of the truth" (Documents 2, p. 257).

Swedenborg saw the importance of translation to the spread of the Heavenly Doctrines. He also possibly anticipated that English would be one of the most important languages to the spread of the church.

In True Christian Religion we read:

"As to the English nation, the better ones among them are at the center of all Christians, because they have an interior intellectual light; a light that is not manifest to anyone in the natural world, but it is clearly manifest in the spiritual world. This light they acquire from their freedom of speech and of the press, and consequent freedom of thought" (807).

When we consider how much Swedenborg did to spread the Word, we can wonder if he was instructed by the Lord to follow the course he took or if it was based on his own trial and error. Even though he published in other countries and other languages, he did not give up on his home country. He personally brought copies of Conjugial Love to Sweden and gave them to the King and Queen of Sweden and various nobles and clergymen. He also shipped a much larger quantity home but that ran into trouble.

Those copies of Conjugial Love were seized and held, apparently without authority, by a bishop named Filenius (Sigstedt pp. 393-94). Swedenborg at first asked Filenius for help not realizing it was all his fault. Filenius actually promised help then proceeded to urge the government to ban the books. Even after it was determined that there were no grounds for censoring or quarantining the books, Filenius still wouldn’t give them back. It seems like Swedenborg never managed to get those books into Sweden but may have recovered them to distribute in other countries.

Swedenborg was also willing to put himself at risk. Two of the readers of his works came under fire. Doctors Beyer and Rosen were teachers at Gothenburg and were put on trial as heretics for teaching the Doctrines of the New Church. This was a rather underhanded method since Swedenborg's books had never actually been determined to be heresy. Beyer and Rosen were not harmed but they were removed from their posts at the university. Swedenborg tried to intercede for them and even wrote to the King demanding that he, Swedenborg, be included and put on trial since it was his work. This put the whole trial on hold while the legitimacy of Swedenborg's books were examined by the Swedish clergy. This stalled things but still the two teachers did not get to have their jobs back during the investigation. Swedenborg was a minor noble but fairly influential and popular even if nobody really cared about his theological writings. This helped the case significantly, but still, even though they were suspended from teaching in 1770, things were not resolved to allow the Doctors to begin teaching again until 1779. And it was not because there ever was a ruling on the validity or heresy of Swedenborg's works. The trial or investigation was allowed to disappear, whether intentionally or by neglect or other cause we don't know.

Even though Swedenborg's efforts seemed to have been frustrated at many turns there were still people, even during in his lifetime, who recognized the work as the Lord's Heavenly Doctrine.

Thomas Hartley in England and Beyer and Rosen in Sweden received books from and had contact with Swedenborg. Hartley became acquainted with the Writings through William Cookworthy who was introduced to them by Stephen Penny (one of the first people besides Swedenborg who we know about becoming part of the New Church) in the early 1760’s. Cookworthy, on first reading a book by Swedenborg, threw it away in disgust but later became so struck by what he read there that he acquainted Hartley with the works. They became engaged in sharing them with others (Sigstedt p. 378). The amazing account of Swedenborg and the 1759 Stockholm fire was what introduced Rosen to the man but he did not apparently become a reader of Swedenborg’s theological works until later (Sigstedt p. 270). In 1765, Beyer met Swedenborg at a party at the house of Rosen. Beyer was familiar with the rumors about Swedenborg and had even tried to read some of his theology but at first was not impressed (Sigstedt p. 322).

It is interesting to note that most if not all opposition to Swedenborg and his works was in the form of deceit and slander rather than reasoned objections to the doctrine. In general it seems that in England assaults fell more on the person of Swedenborg and in Sweden the doctrine was attacked more in its receivers, as Swedenborg was personally protected from attack since he was something of a hero to Sweden for his early scientific studies.

True Christian Religion 779: "VIII. THIS SECOND COMING OF THE LORD IS EFFECTED BY MEANS OF A MAN TO WHOM THE LORD HAS MANIFESTED HIMSELF IN PERSON, AND WHOM HE HAS FILLED WITH HIS SPIRIT, THAT HE MAY TEACH THE DOCTRINES OF THE NEW CHURCH FROM THE LORD BY MEANS OF THE WORD.

Since the Lord cannot manifest Himself in Person, as shown just above, and nevertheless has foretold that He was to come and establish a new church, which is the New Jerusalem, it follows that He will do this by means of a man, who is able not only to receive these doctrines in his understanding but also to publish them by the press. That the Lord manifested Himself before me, His servant, and sent me to this office, that He afterward opened the eyes of my spirit and thus introduced me into the spiritual world and granted me to see the heavens and the hells, and to talk with angels and spirits, and this now continuously for several years, I affirm in truth; as also that from the first day of that call I have not received anything whatever pertaining to the doctrines of that church from any angel, but from the Lord alone while I have read the Word."

Letter 17: "I rejoice in the friendship to which you testify in your letter; for both of them, for your letter, but especially for your friendship, I offer you my sincere thanks. The praises which you heap up upon me I accept only as arising from your love of the truths to be found in my writings; and as that is their origin I redirect them to the Lord our Savior from Whom all truth comes since He is the Truth itself, John 14.6."

So why do we care about Swedenborg? We do care most about the work he did but he also led an unusual life. He got to personally experience the afterlife and scribe books for the Lord. This means we can look at his life as an example of an individual acting freely but serving the Lord with his whole heart.

Nathan Cole

Nathan is married to Vera King Cole. They have three children (so far): Otto, Eleora, and Jasher. They are having a blast living in Ontario, Canada and discovering how to be good people and good parents. Nathan is an assistant pastor at the Carmel New Church in Kitchener. He loves thinking about heaven and working towards heaven on earth. Nathan's favorite topics are Conjugial Love, family, and children.

Comments

[Chelsea]

Thanks for your article, Nathan!

You make the point that "the Writings were originally written in Latin and so only people with higher education would have been able to read them. And Swedenborg tried to send books to those people."

I have read how Swedenborg personally sent books to various universities, clergy-members, royalty, etc. But I think saying that since the books were written in Latin, only those with higher education were able to read them is a bit misleading on two counts.

First, my limited understanding of that time period is that anyone with any academic education learned Latin. I remember being surprised when I read in Sigstedt's The Swedenborg Epic that the educational system of that age was incredibly different than what we have today. I remember something along the lines that what during Swedenborg's time was called "college" was essentially our high-school, in terms of age. And Latin was the language of academics at that time, so my guess also is that people learned Latin somewhat as a prerequisite to any other subject, and so it could be surmised that people learned it early on in their education.

And secondly, Swedenborg purposefully wrote his theological works in the simplest, plainest Latin of his day so that the material would be as easily accessible and understandable as possible.

I think these two points go along with the overall thrust of your argument, as you also point out that Swedenborg oversaw the translation of his works into other languages, at least English. So obviously he was not trying to isolate his works to the upper classes--he wanted them to have as widespread of readership as he could manage! I'm just adding that this effort of his is also inherent in the very Latin that he originally wrote them in, as far as I know.

[Nathan Cole]

Thanks Chelsea,
I really appreciate your points and I agree. Latin was the language that was the most universally read in the world and so publishing in Latin was not an elitist or exclusiveist choice. Publishing in English would be an equivalent strategy today.

My point was not that Swedenborg restricted his distribution but that he sent books wherever there were people who could read them.

Nathan