Emanuel Swedenborg: Talking with angels



(Emanuel Swedenborg)

Many on earth have preached about the virtues of heaven, but few have claimed firsthand knowledge.  Emanuel Swedenborg was one of those few.

Swedenborg didn’t begin life with such claims.  His father, Jesper Swedborg, was the family theologian – impressing the King of Sweden with his sermons, and later becoming the Bishop of Skara.  Jesper’s theology, which was filled with talk of angels and spirits in everyday life (and diverged sharply from the mainstream Lutheran beliefs), must have made a deep impression upon the young Swedenborg.  It took half a century, however, for this impression to fully germinate.

Swedenborg therefore primarily spent his first 55 years as a scientist and inventor.  He was heralded for his insights into the smelting of copper and iron, for his nebular hypothesis (which explained the formation of solar systems), and for his

studies of anatomy and physiology.  Within these latter studies, Swedenborg focused upon the central nervous system.  Wikpedia reports that he had “prescient ideas about the cerebral cortex, the hierarchical organization of the nervous system, the localization of the cerebrospinal fluid and the functions of the pituitary gland.”  Sweden’s royalty was so impressed with the Swedborg family contributions that Queen Ulrika Eleonora ennobled Jesper’s children and changed their surname to “Swedenborg.”

Although Swedenborg’s life was certainly full in the worldly sense, he had also always had a penchant for philosophy.  Even before his intense spiritual awakening, he had begun a series of investigations into the nature of the soul.  This he combined with his scientific bent, the result of which were mergers of disciplines

such as geometry and cosmology.

These investigations became firsthand experiences when, at age 56, Swendenborg’s spiritual dreams and visions began occurring.  He began prodigiously writing about these experiences (some say because he was a stutterer, and was therefore too inhibited to preach aloud).  One of his most famous works, Heaven and Hell, reads like a travelogue of his personal visits to both.  While in heaven (or heavens, according to Swedenborg), he talked with angels.  He writes:  Whenever I have talked with angels face to face, I have been with them in their houses.  And how do angels talk?  Pretty much like humans, only “more intelligently than we do because they talk from a deeper level of thought.”

Resources

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emanuel_Swedenborg

http://www.newcenturyedition.org/HH_Translation.pdf

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heaven_and_Hell_(Swedenborg)

http://www.newchurch.org/beliefs/index.html

Copyright June 20, 2011 by Linda Van Slyke   All Rights Reserved