-St . *** MICROFILMED 1991 COLUMBIA LWIVERSITY LIBRARIES/NEW YORK as part of the 'Toundations of Western Civilization Preservation Project" Funded by the NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR THE HUMANITIES Reproductions may not be made without permission from Columbia University Library COPYRIGHT STATEMENT The copyright law of the United States ~ Title 17, United States Code - concerns the making of photocopies or other reproductions of copyrighted material... Columbia University Library reserves the right to refuse to accept a copy order if, in its judgement, fulfillment of the order would involve violation of the copyright law. AUTHOR: AGER, JOHN CURTIS TITLE: WHAT IS SWEDENBOR ANISM? PLA CE : PHILADELPH DA TE : COLUMl^lA UNIVHKSITY LIBRARIES PRESERVATION DEPARTMENT BIBLIOGRAPHIC MICROFORM TAUC: ET Master Negative # Original Material as Filmed ^ Existing Bibliographic Record 93a, 94 z o <*.. I Vilr-t 10 nwedonbor^ianisui? Pllil TV-; date 3 ^-T p (Airiericari new church and r--\) licati r^n :--^ciety [Tract3 ^ ) ?lc 4 f ^i vol of pamphlets Frn>v Frmk Lenl1-*c funday magazine W i ',*. W U Restrictions on Use; Ti.CilNICAL MICROFORM DATA RFDUCTION RATIO: FILM SIZH:^ ^d5 ni 'H IMAGE PLACEMENT: JaTIlA IB II » DATE FILMED: ^l^:./^^ LN ITi A I S (^ CZ. FILMED BY: RESEARaiJZUBIJ.CATl_ONS^^^^^ VV( )( M3iiR!lX ;ii '( ; ! /C^ r^^^-TT'WSi^^ '^-^^W^^^^^^^^'^^^^r^^f^^^^^ IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) 1.0 I.I .25 1^ 2.8 2.5 U£ 15.6 3.2 2.2 I4£ 3.6 Ik U£ 1 4.0 2.0 U£ 1 t^ »i ^ tiil^tl. 1.8 1.4 ^^ 1.6 150mm .// ^>*i M PHOTOGRAPHIC SCIENCES CORPORATION 770 BASKET ROAD P.O. BOX 338 WEBSTER, NEW YORK 14580 (716) 265-1600 ^^^ • -^ -'^^^^^mm > > J 9 iTo ■i [BlgbtU SeHes. What IS S' ffEDENI lORGIANK ■v i > ( ?■ ,1 • BY THE ^ REV. JOHN C. AGER. vv REPRINTED FROM FRANK LESLIE'S SUNDAY MAOAZINE- c PHILADELPHIA: AMERICAN NEW CHURCH TRACT AND PUBLICATION SOCIETt, Twenty-Second and Chkotnut Strkets. HIW CHURCH BOARD OP PDBLICiTION, Ko. 20 COOPER DNIOH, SBV TOffl^ BOSTOH: MiSSiCHDSBTTS NEW CHURCH UNIOH, 169 TRSMOHT 8TRKT. Priuted bj J. B. Lippincoti Compamt, Philadelphia. I PUBLISHED BY The American New ClinrcnracUiKl PDWication Society. DOCTRINES OP THE NEW CHVRCH< NO. I. 2. 3- 5- 6. I: 9- NO. I. a. 3- 4. 5. 6. I: WHAT THEY THACH, AND WHAT THEY DO NOT TBACH By Rev. Chauncey Giles. T^f ^^ ^ ^pint: What he is, and what he is not. 1 he Divinity of the Sacred Scriptures: What it is what it is not The Death of the Material Body Essential to HumarHappfness Spiritual Death: Its Nature. Origin, Delights, and Tomiems 1 he Resurrection of the Soul from Spiritual Death ^°""^""- 1 he Resurrection of Man from the Material Body Heavenly Happiness: Its Principles and Means oY Attainment Heaven a Society of Regenerated Men and Women By Rev. Chauncey Giles. The Origin and Nature of Truth. The Origin and Nature of Love Truth the Light of Heaven. The Nature and Office of the Holy Spirit. 1 he Divine Humanity of Jehovah the Central Truth of Christianitv tIusUu th?L"rr' '^' ^°'^ ^'^ ^^°""^"^ ^°^^ °f RcdempS'^* The Oil of Joy. B 9. Stumbling Blocks. ^^ »iisce:i,i,abjbous discourshs. 1. Salvation Possible to all Men, by Rev. A. F. Frost. " "^ Chfur/^GUes"' ^""^'°"^ °' Ecclesiastical Government, by Rev ^* S/Hf"^-"i" ^^'^^'' Probation and Judgment, by Rev Oliver Dver 4. WhatisSwedenborgianism? by Rev. J (> ^'^^^ ^^^^ ^^^ver Dyer. 5. Manna, by Rev. Abiel Silver ' ^ ' ;;ge^rd^R:^^ "• ' Ch/u;^c';r(SL^' ^'^ "^''^ ^^ ''' ^°^^'^ ProviJenr^a?^;% Rev The Book of Li/e, by Rev. Chauncey Giles. Rev.' L R MerLr. ^^^"^"^^"^^ Explained and its Dangers Shown, by Man's Ability the Measure of his Obligation, by Rev. Chauncey Giles. ga]^trthe1,'um>>^l"S'^' '^^ ^"^^ °^- '^^^"^ '^^^^ '^ *^° ""^ ^^^h, without re- R man add ro ceL/S''^'' ' ^^ ^''P'^?' ^5 «nts ; 100 copies, $1.25. If ordered Rn^m •' . cents for every 50 copies. For sale at the " New Church Book- NerChurcrBoarH'nf'?"Sf'"^ Twenty^ccond Streets, Philadelphia; oSy settTNerChurch TJnLr iL'T°"' ^° ?°°P^r Union. New York; Massachu^ wifhtonbL?n'''''""V*l"'^'^^ '° Societies. Associations, and individuals who xo II 12 13 i ^ ^ > V 4 ^ WHAT IS SWEDENBORGIANISM?* " Swedenborgianism" is the popular name for that system of religious doctrine and philosophy which is set forth in the theological writings of Emanuel Swedenborg. The designation, however, has always been disowned by those who accept that form of faith, for this reason, among others, that they are unwilling to tolerate even a possible implication that the faith they hold is the product of any human mind. Swedenborg insists, in the strongest terms, that no credit is due to him for the truth which his writ- ings contain ; that his mission was simply to write out and publish, through the press, what was given him by the Lord; and those who adopt his teachings feel bound to accept this claim with the rest, and to give as little prom- inence as possible to the man Swedenborg. They contend that the system of faith they accept is no " ism," no man*8 version of Christianity, but the true Christian doctrine, the actual contents of Holy Scripture. And this conviction rests on no human or traditional authority, but upon the simple fact that they see for themselves in the Scriptures the things which they believe. Swedenborg's theological writings are less voluminous than is generally supposed. The English translation of ♦ Reprinted from Frank Leslie** Sunday Magazine, by permission of Mrs. Frank Leslie. In this reprint a few of the paragraphs have been somewhat extended. I A -iift'i 4 WHAT IS SWEDENBORGIANISMi those published by himself is contained in nineteen ordi- nary octavo volumes, to which may be added a posthumous work on the Apocalypse, in six volumes, and a few brief treatises, which, combined, would make no more than a small volume. These are all which Swedenborg wrote for publication. Their contents may be classified under four heads : (1) The exposition of the interior meaning of the Scriptures ; (2) The analysis and discussion of doctrine ; (3) The discussion of the philosophical principles on which the system rests ; and (4) A record of the things seen and heard by him in the spiritual world. And it is well to note, so contrary is it to general opinion, that the third and fourth subjects occupy only a small portion of the whole. Of the twenty-six volumes above mentioned, eighteen are expository, explaining, consecutively, Genesis, Exodus, and the Book of Revelation, and incidentally the greater portion of the rest of Scripture. Of the remain- ing eight volumes, one is a treatise on the nature of the spiritual world and its relation to the physical world ; an- other is a philosophical treatise, while the other six are mainly of a doctrinal character. From which it appears that Swedenborg is to be regarded first, and chiefly, as an expounder of Scripture, and, secondly, as an expounder of Christian doctrine ; while his experiences in the spiritual world were employed in his writings simply to illustrate and exemplify the spiritual principles and laws which he set forth. Current opinion about Swedenborg is equally at fault in one other respect. TJie present tendency of religious specu- lation is essentially anti-dogmatic, calling in question the old interpretations of doctrine and Scripture without sup- plying anything definite in their place. Swedenborg is 4 T > t ^ WHAT IS SWEDENB0RQIANISM1 6 commonly classed among these negative reformers. But no Christian writer has covered the whole ground of the- ology and ethics so completely as Swedenborg. He neither sets aside nor weakens the force of any Christian doctrine. His writings simply furnish a new and more spiritual ex- position of the Scriptures and of Christian doctrine ; a sys- tem which is definite and positive in all its minutest details, with the closest logical connection and completeness. Only a bare outline of the system can be given, of course, in a brief article like this. If I were writing for theolo- gians, I should say that the system is much more nearly allied to the earliest Christian theology, which grew up in the Greek schools, than to the later and more mechanical interpretations of doctrine which characterized Western theology and gave tone to all the leading Reformation sys- tems. Modern writers are beginning to see that Christi- anity bore earlier and perhaps better fruits than the pre- dominantly legal and mechanical forms of doctrine which the genius of Augustine made dominant in the Western Church, and the genius of Calvin perpetuated in the Re- formed Churches. The distinguishing and formative idea of this earlier theology was the immanence of God and the reality and dominance of the supernatural or spiritual. It was superseded by the grosser conceptions of the Western theology for the same reason that the simpler forms of the apostolic churches were superseded by rituals which ap- pealed to the senses, and by autocratic forms of government adapted to ignorant peoples. The more spiritual concep- tions and aspirations continued to make themselves felt, but mainly in movements which were pronounced heretical, till at last, in the fulness of time, the Lord raised up a man, who, under Divine guidance, restored the true spiritual in- sir -' ■'!?*='•'? ^S^^^*^^^^?*^^.^ "Jj».^ 6 WHAT IS SWEDENBOROIANISMf V terpretation of Christianity, for which this long succession of protestanta in the Church had been blindly, and for the most part vainly, seeking. In this more spiritual scheme of doctrine expounded by Swedenborg, there is little which will commend itself to those who find all Christian truth summed up in the exist- ing orthodox creeds. But there are many sincere Chris- tians in all sects who are no longer content with these old doctrinal statements. And these conscientious seekers after truth, cherishing the hope of John Robinson of Leyden, that " new and brighter light is yet destined to break forth from the Word of God," will not be deterred, by sneers about " novelties of doctrine,*' from looking for the fulfil- ment of the prophecy, " Behold, I make all things new.'* But these doctrines are new only in the sense that lost truth is called new when it is recovered. Being simply truth drawn from the Word of God, it is as old as the Word of God. Each man reads the Scriptures in the light of whatever doctrine he accepts. Hence the innumerable meanings imposed upon the Scriptures, and the weakness of this appeal to Scripture for the support of any doctrine. No writer on theology ever drew his doctrine more directly and plainly from Scripture than Swedenborg does. In his doctrinal treatises he quotes Scripture by the page. But while Swedenborg teaches very clearly the neces- sity for definite forms of belief, he never assumes that the whole contents of Scripture can be summed up in dog- matic statements, or that infinite truth can be compassed by finite intelligence. No writer recognizes more clearly the principle so admirably stated by Frederick Robertson. *^ that spiritual truth is discerned by the spirit, instead of intellectually, in propositions ; and, therefore, that truth > f > WHAT IS SWEDENB0RQIANISM7 7 must be taught suggestively, not dogmatically." Mere logical processes of reasoning are seldom found in Sweden- borg s writings. He shuns all disputation. He expressly condemns persuasion as an infringement on intellectual freedom. He teaches that truth is to the mind what light is to the eye, and where there is spiritual vision spiritual truth will be spontaneously and joyfully accepted; in other words, that spiritual things can never otherwise be discerned than in a spiritual way. He appeals, therefore, directly to the religious instincts and conscience, and the truth he offers, if seen, comes not as an irritant to the reason, but as a refreshment to the soul. If there is any satisfaction to be gained from Swedenborg, it is a satis- faction of legitimate spiritual appetites or needs, a satis- faction which allays the spirit of controversy and dis- courages argumentation. Hence it has been well said of him that " he gives the intellect a repose which it has lacked throughout history, — a repose as natural, and there- fore as sane and sweet, as the sleep of infancy." This is the repose, not of intellectual torpor, but of calm content. And this dominant characteristic of his writings should be kept in mind by all who attempt to study them. Perhaps the clearest idea of this new system of faith may be conveyed, in a brief space, by presenting some of the salient points in which it differs from the old theology which was universally prevalent in Swedenborg s day, but which is now held in greatly modified forms. In the first place, Swedenborg protests strongly against the old conceptions of the Trinity as tending to destroy that clear apprehension of the divine unity which is es- sential to an intelligent love and worship of the one God. All scholars admit that the word petsona, when first ap- ■,X?tt?^i' ^■^■•■^t" *" fK'T^ 8 WHAT IS SWEDENBOROIANISMf plied to the Trinity, did not have its modern meaning. It was probably used to designate a real distinction in the Godhead, but a distinction which could not be defined in exact terms. But now that modern skepticism has created a wide-spread doubt of the personality of God, the theo- logians have come to realize the difficulty of defining and enforcing, at the same time, the one personality and the threefold personality. See Professor Fisher's first chapter in his new book, " The Grounds of Theistic and Christian Beliefs,'' where he begins with the definition, " The essen- tial characteristics of personality are self-consciousness and self-determination ; that is to say, these are the elements common to all spiritual beings;" making ^er^o/i and heiug essentially identical terms, as they always have been in the popular mind. Does not this justify Swedcnborg's contention that, in the popular belief of Christians, the three persons are three beings, which is tritheism ? And tritheism is not a harmless error. It is radical and far- reaching, corrupting all doctrine and dissipating all true love and worship. Swedenborg, however, insists upon a real Trinity in the Godhead, a trinal distinction in the very essentials of the Divine nature. These he defines ontologically as Love, Wisdom, and their combined activity and procedure. A type of this Trinity he finds in all created things, in their substance, form, and use; and in man in his emo- tional nature or will, his intellectual nature or under- standing, and the combined outcome of these in influence and conduct. The Trinity of Scripture is the same thing revealed, or brought down, to the common apprehension of men. The Father is the essential Divine nature or Love ; the essence and substance, and therefore the source v> "•V,' ft .-■V ^h WHAT IS SWEDENBORQIANlSMt 9 and parent of all things ; the unrevealable Divinity, which man hath never seen or conceived of, and which hath only been declared, or can only be apprehended, in and through the Son (John i. 18). The Son is the Wisdom or Word made flesh, brought down, through an assumed human nature, to human apprehension, and made eflfective for instruction, for judgment, for redemption, and for s^va- tion in the plane of corrupted humanity. The Holy Spirit, aa revealed through the Incarnation, is the redeem- inc- and uplifting power of Father and Son, of the Divine Lwe, and the Divine Wisdom, tabernacled in humanity to energize and renew it. This Trinity, it will be seen, is not Sabellian,— that is, not merely phenomenal and transient. It is as real a Trinity as can be conceived of, with the avoidance of tritheism. It includes in one Personal Being all of God that has been or can be revealed to men. It shows that the Jehovah of the Old Testament and the Jesus Christ of the New are the same God, at first but partially revealed, then brought down into immediate contact with fallen humanity, and henceforth permanently tabernacled in human conscious- ness as the God-Man. It thus sets before us a God who is infinite, but still near ; who is perfect, but still a par- laker in our human experiences; who is immutable and immovable, but still inconceivably sensitive to all our needs and longings; a God whom we can love and serve and worship with all our heart and soul and mind and strength. ., , , • ^i Again, Swedenborg differs from the old theology in the prominence he gives to the spiritual nature of man and to the spiritual realm of being, as contrasted with the physical part of man and its realm of being. The old < - 10 WHAT IS SWEDENBOROIANISMf WHAT IS SWEDENB0RGIANISM7 11 theology is pre-eminently materialistic in its conceptions of man and his destiny. Man was created to live eternally on this earth. His temporary separation from the body by death is a disorder consequent upon the Fall. This disorder is to be rectified by the restoration of all men to their physical bodies and to this physical realm of being. This materialistic conception pervades the whole scheme of doctrine, especially the eschatological doctrines. Swedenborg, on the other hand, conceives of man as a spiritual being, created for an endless life in a purely spir- itual realm of being, his life in this world being simply the incipient and preparatory stage of his existence. He is here for a brief period at the longest ; and then, by dropping his physical body, he passes over into the spirit- ual plane of life, where, as a spiritual being, he lives for ever. The spiritual world contains, therefore, all who have ever lived on this or any other earth. It is the abode of all who have been created from the beginning, except the few who are yet passing through this preparatory stage of life. And even these ought not to be excepted, for the essential part of man is his spiritual nature, and this, even from its beginning, belongs to the spiritual world, and lives in it, though unconsciously. The soul of man could no more live apart from the spiritual world than the body could live apart from the physical world. Our spiritual nature, therefore, is an inhabitant of the spiritual world from the beginning of its life. We are unconscious of this fact during our life in the body, because our consciousness, 80 long as we are in the body, is limited mainly to the sensual or physical part of our nature. But that portion of our life of which we are conscious is by no means the whole of it. Back of this, or beneath this, are unflithomed f^ ^tk i \ ^ depths of being ; and in those depths there are forces and influences working, there are tides of influx and efflux surging and sinking, which are manifest to our conscious- ness, if at all, only through dim, indefinable sensations or unaccountable changes of thought and feeling. All this is explained by the fact that we have other companionships than those of this world, that we are actually living another life than that which pertains to this world, — a life of which we are only partially conscious, the issues of which we but feebly apprehend. And this other plane of being, in which we begin to live consciously when the body is laid aside, What is it ? Where is it ? It is a fundamental principle of Swedenborg's philosophy that all reality lies in the spiritual, that the physical is purely phenomenal. He also contends that space and time are purely physical conditions. The soul of man is none the less the real man because it is destitute of physical qualities. So the spiritual plane of being is none the less real because physical conditions and attributes cannot be ascribed to it. Again, the soul can no more be located in some portion of the body than its quality can be expressed in chemical formulas. So the spiritual world can no more be located in some corner of the physical universe, or its relation to this earth expressed in terms of space, than its constitution can be defined in terms of chemistry or physics. In our attempts to define spiritual things physical terms, from the lack of anything better, must be employed, but we choose those which have acquired most fully a spiritual meanmg. The best we can do, therefore, in defining the spiritual world, is to say that it is a realm of being purely spiritual, '*ii T--- ir,« ,- • 5 12 WHAT IS SWEDENBORQIANISMJ WHAT IS SWEDENBORGIANISMf 13 subject only to spiritual laws. And as the accepted theory of light necessitates the assumption of an interstellar ether, so does this conception of the spiritual world necessitate the assumption of a spiritual substance ; for reality involves substance. And in defining the relation of the spiritual world to the physical, we can only say that the one is above or within the other, — not in the sense of contiguity of space, but as the soul is within the body, or as all causes are within and above effects. Consequently, we pass at death from the natural world to the spiritual, not by any passage through space or change of location, but simply by being relieved of the physical body, and by the consequent change of consciousness. Death is sim'^Iy the withdrawal of the real person from his physical environ- ments and conditions, followed by^ the awakening of his spiritual faculties to a clear apprehension of his spiritual environment and the laws and conditions of the spiritual life. It will be seen at once that this conception essentially changes, almost reverses, the point of view from which all doctrine is regarded. If man is essentially a spiritual being, and only incidentally and temporarily endowed with a physical nature ; if, even while encased in flesh, he is really an inhabitant of the spiritual world ; if the influ- ences by which he is moulded flow mainly from the spirit- ual surroundings of which he is not yet conscious, then the fall of man must have wrought essential changes in the spiritual world ; the work of redemption must have had relation primarily to that world ; the influences to which man is subject from that world must constitute a most important feature of his regeneration ; that world must 'be the theatre of all general judgments ; death and i\ ff f resurrection would be simply man's losing his conscious connection with this physical realm of being and awaken- ing to a consciousness of his spiritual surroundings, just as we awake from sleep to a consciousness of our physical surroundings ; and the future life would be simply a con- tinuation of the spiritual life we have been living here under somewhat different laws and conditions. Let us see a little more fully what form these doctrines take under this conception of human life. Man was created, we are taught, in the image and like- ness of God. This refers primarily, of course, to his spiritual nature. He was created to be a finite recipient of the Divine Life, that is, of the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom. His recipiency of the Divine Love forms his emotional nature, and his recipiency of the Divine Wisdom forms his intellectual nature. In the beginning, man was capable of receiving and reflecting the Divine Love and Wisdom without perversion or distortion. But he was not an impassive mirror. That he might be a being capable of reciprocating the Love which created him and filled him with joy and light, he was endowed with the power and responsibility of determining his affections and thoughts, and, consequently, his life; that is, he was endowed with freedom and rationality. This freedom rested on a sense of independence of God, on the feeling that one's life is his own. This feeling of self-dependence and self-ownership was the tree of knowing good and evil. In the light of Divine truth it was seen to be an appear- ance, a reverse reflection of the real truth. But to the lower or sense nature, it seemed a reality. Eating of the tree of knowing good and evil at the solicitation of the serpent was a yielding to the sense-nature and accepting the 'ii <",-i ■% .^" u WHAT IS SWEDENB0ROIANISM7 WHAT IS SWEDENBORQIANISMf 15 illusion as true in place of the real truth. By so doing man's sense of dependence upon God became dimmed and his spiritual intelligence obscured, and little by little love to God and to the neighbor lost its supremacy, and self-love took its place. It is not necessary to believe that all this occurred in a single lifetime. Man did not drop at once from the highest innocence and wisdom to the depths of folly and wickedness. Adam, like the other names in the early chapters of Genesis, is a generic, not an individual, appellation ; and the spiritual history symbolized by Adam' and the transactions in Eden may have covered many generations. But the fall, though gradual, was none the less real. The accumulating evil propensities, transmitted from parent to child, gradually undermined the spiritual life and obscured all spiritual truth. Consequently, when we reach the earliest historic period, we find almost no knowledge of God or of true spiritual life. The world is covered by an almost universal idolatry or heathenism. Such loyalty to God, such capacity to recognize Divine truth, such disposition to yield to Divine commands as still remained among men, was gathered up and made to serve as a basis for Divine revelation, and for the hope and expectation of a coming Redeemer. Bat during all these centuries, societies of evil and idolatrous spirits\ad been forming in the spiritual world, from the millions pouring into that world from this, increasing the evil in- fluences to which men were subject and correspondingly weakening the good influences. These infernal hosts^o increased in number and power as to cut off from men all influx from heaven. They overshadowed the race like a dense cloud. The most direful disorders prevailed alike in the spiritual and in the natural worlds. That balance ; 4 ' r < \ \ y r . y between heavenly and infernal influences, which is a neces- sary condition of human freedom, was destroyed ; the devils began to take possession of the bodies as well as of the souls of men, and the frequent cases of individual obsession foreshadowed what the destiny of the whole human race must be, unless this tide of evil could be rolled back and the infernal hosts reduced to subjection. This indicates, in a general way, what it was that man needed to be saved from. It was not the anger of God ; it was not an accumulated mass of penalty, which must be satisfied by an equivalent suffering; it was a "lost con- dition.*' The race was submerged in spiritual disorder and darkness. The light and warmth of the Divine Sun, and the uplifting influences of heaven, could no longer reach man on the earth. He had lost the ability to be saved, not alone because of what he was in himself, but also because of the spiritual conditions in which he was placed. Hell was triumphant. Satan had encircled the human race with his hosts, closing up all sources of relief, and a complete victory for the powers of evil seemed near at hand. Nothing short of Divine aid could save mankind from this impending danger. But this danger had been foreseen from the moment man chose self-intelligence and self-love for his guides. It was promised that the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent's head. This prophecy is repeated throughout the Old Testament in a variety of forms. Take, for in- stance, one of the earliest of the Messianic prophecies, — '' A star goeth forth out of Jacob, and a sceptre riseth out of Israel, and smiteth the borders of Moab, and destroyeth all the sons of tumult." Take another example from one of the later prophets, — '^ Behold, theday of the Lordcometh. f^=r':r7T-- WHAT IS SWEDENBOROIANISMt 17 1 r < r X y cies the central truth of their faith. Their doctrine of the atonement was that Christ came to overthrow the devil, to wrest man from his grasp, to deliver him from spiritual captivity, and restore to him freedom and the power of salvation. With this doctrine of the atonement, which inspired and sustained the faith of the early Christians, ' supporting them in all their struggles and sufferings, and satisfying the Christian Church for the first thousand years, the doctrine of Swedenborg is in substantial agree- ment. A few words are necessary in respect to the Incarnation and what was accomplished by it. Our space will permit only a few general statements, which I hope will not prove misleading. It must be remembered that we arc here dealing with the mysteries of the Divine nature, of which man can know but little. But some general truths are necessary to any right conception of God and of what He has done for us. In the first place, the Scriptures make it very clear that it was the one God, the Jehovah of the Old Testament, who assumed the human nature and was thereby revealed to man as Jesus Christ. And the object of this was to restore to man the conditions of salvation, by overthrow- ing the powers of evil and bringing man back into right relations to God and heaven. This God chose to do in strict accordance with spiritual law. The Divine came down to meet evil, where alone it can be met without miracle, on the plane of humanity. God took upon Him- self a nature wherein goodness and truth could come in contact with, and through experiences strictly human could combat and overcome evil and falsity. How this yiras done the Gospels tell us in the simplest language. < 18 WHAT JS SWEDENBORQIANISMf The only thing miraculous about this birth was that there was no human father. All else seems to have been in strict accordance with spiritual and physical law. The child was born as other children were born, and the life which followed was certainly on the one side an essentially human life. But the Gospels make it plainly evident that within and above this human side of the life, there was such an immediate presence and activity of the Divine as would be involved in the fact that in Christ the Divine and the human had met. The interior workings of this twofold life of the God-Man it is not for the hum^n mind to fathom. Of this, however, we are assured, both that His experiences were truly human experiences, and that they included in their scope all possible human ex- periences. There is no infernal influence to which man can ever be subject, no form of delusion by which he can be seduced, which our Lord did not meet and completely overcome. The powers of evil were completely subju- gated, order was re-established in the spiritual world, the balance of heavenly and infernal influence, which insures human freedom, was restored, and the hells could hence- forth have no influence over man beyond what the man himself freely admitted. At the same time, this perfect obedience to all the laws of human life, this complete realization of the life of heaven on the earth, stood henceforth as an inspiring ex- ample to the world. There could be no more intelligible and impressive revelation of what a true human life is than that which we have in the life and teachings of our Lord Jesus Christ. But this truth is robbed of all force and reality unless it is seen and acknowledged that the human nature which our Lord assumed was an infirm nature like l> < J i < i <. < > % WHAT IS SWEDENBORQIANISMf 19 ours, and consequently that His experiences as a man were truly human experiences. This alone gives us the assur- ance that the Divine life has been brought down into actual contact with the currents of our daily life, and will, at any moment that we open the way for it, flow in to reinforce and sustain whatever is true and good in us, and to rebuke and resist whatever is evil and false. The old theology fails to recognize another feature of our Lord's work in the flesh to which Swedenborg gives special emphasis. In Christ's human life and experiences, the old theology seems to see little of any practical signifi- cance, except the sufi'erings by which He satisfied the accumulated penalties of human transgression. But that life brings clearly before us certain very significant facts. It was certainly, on the one side, an actual human life, a life " tempted in every way like as we are, apart from sin." Every possible phase of infernal solicitation was brought to bear upon that nature ; and every such solicitation was met by the most complete repulse. In that nature, there- fore, was summed up every spiritual experience possible to man except such as comes from yielding to temptation. What must have been the efi*ect of that experience on the assumed nature ? Then we have the suggestive utterances Bf the Lord Himself, such as this: " I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how am I straitened" (distrcvssed, perplexed, afflicted) " till it be accomplished." This bap- tism must have been the spiritual purification or sancti- fication which was going on in His human nature. And this. He teaches us, was needful to human salvation. " For their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also might be sanc- tified through the truth." So the apostle tells us that He " W^ made perfect through suffering ^ And that it waa 20 WHAT IS SWEDENB0RGIANISM1 " by what He Himself had suffered in being tempted, that He is able to succor them that are tempted." Add to this the fact that only of His human, not of His Divine, nature could He have said, — '' All power is given unto Me in heaven and on earth ;" and, '' as the Father hath life in Himself, so hath He given to the Son to have life in Himself;'* and that it was through that nature, glorified, made Divine, and thus made one with the Divine, that He afterward revealed Himself to man as the " First and the Last, the Beginning and the End, the Almighty," — and have we not abundant ground for Swedeuborg's doctrine of the Divine Humanity, which is, that the assumed nature was transformed, by the experiences to which it wa^ sub- ject, into a Divine Human, which henceforth became the permanent instrument of Divine operation, and the chan- nel of that governing and energizing influence whereby the infernal powers are confined within their legitimate limits, and humanity is slowly being uplifted and regenerated. This is our rainbow witness that the flood of evil shall never again overflow the world. This also is implied in the teaching that the Holy Spirit could not be given until Jesus was glorified, that He must go away that the Com- forter might come. Finally this doctrine brings before us the personality of the Lord Jesus Christ as the only personality under which the Infinite Jehovah can be clearly revealed and made present to us. " In Him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily"; hence all the fulness of the Trinity. The Father, ^' which dwelleth within Him," is the Essen- tial Divinity which no man can know except as it is re- vealed through the Son. The Son is the Divine Human through which the Divine is revealed, and through which V f> 1 J i \ -€ |> ^ it J 1 '^ i 1 y WBAT tS SWEDENBOROIANISMi 21 < 1 I < K God comes down into spiritual contact with man to " save him from his sins." And the Holy Spirit is the energizing and saving influence which proceeds from the Father through the Sou to regenerate and save mankind. This is a Trinity which leaves the unity of God intact, and points us to the Lord Jesus Christ as God revealed or ** declared," whom we are to love, and worship, and serve. It naturally follows, from the doctrine stated above, at the true human life is the Christ-life, and that the regen- erate life is simply living the life which He gives, living from Him, not from our selfhood. But as it is our manhood which makes us truly His children, He must needs, in the fullest degree, respect our manhood in everything He does for us ; and in giving us His life, He must win from us our fullest consent. It must be a consent which includes an active response from our whole spiritual nature. It cannot be a consent of the lips alone, nor the consent of a feeble desire to be saved, nor of a feeble faith in the means of salvation. It must be a consent which includes desire, determination, faith, and conduct. In other words, while it is true that man does not save himself, while it is true that he has no knowledge of salvation, no desire to be saved, no power to resist evil or do good, except what he receives as a direct gift from the Lord, it is also true that the Lord requires from man a desire to be saved and a faith in Him which shall find expression in nothing short of a faithful and continued resistance to whatever he finds in himself which is contrary to the Divine will. Regeneration, therefore, has its human and its Divine side. On its human side, it calls forth all the powers and faculties of our moral nature. It is not a product of faith alone, or of a sense of dependence upon God. That is the -^yi. Jl-. i] 22 WHAT IS SWEDENBORQIANlSMf higher or interior side of it. The other side is a persist- ent, self-compelled obedience to the Divine precepts, the laws of right living, and its progress is determined bj the amount of self-compelled obedience the Lord can induce us to exercise. It is, therefore, not an instantaneous, but a gradual process or experience. The new life begins in a new birth ; but man is no more born a full-grown man spiritually than physically. The new life begins in spirit- ual feebleness and ignorance ; it goes on by gradual stages ; it has its days and its nights, its summers and its winters ; but it cannot fail, except from man's rejection of the Divine-Human life, in which it has its root. ^ Religion, then, is a new life in the soul. And this new life is, of course, the heavenly life, which has, as its gen- eral and dominant motive, love to the Lord and to the neighbor. It is a life, therefore, which manifests itself in an unselfish and loving spirit, in honesty and strict integ- rity in all the affairs of life, and in loving service to our fellow-men. And where these are lacking, the religious life must be very feeble, if it exists at all. But it is a law of the spiritual as well as of the physical realm that growth involves permanence, and that the more there is involved in maturity the greater the permanence. And we have abundant proof from experience that either good or bad character, in the degree that it is persisted in, tends to become fixed and permanent. Every one believes that the peace and blessedness of heaven spring from an established goodness of life, from which evil is effectually banished. But can goodness of character attain to such complete dominance and permanence, and not badness of character? If not, then has not man unlimited freedom only to be good, with a partial and limited freedom toward 1 < \ > > f % WHAT IS SWEDENBORQIANISMf 23 evil ? Swedentorg contends that man is so far free that he may give to evil, by continued choice and confirmation, an entire and permanent supremacy in his life. And this he does in the face of the utmost influence wliich the Lord can exert upon him without violating his freedom and destroying his manhood. Consequently, man alone is re- sponsible for this permanence of evil in the character. Heaven and hell are simply the result of man's choice of character. If a man seeks and learns to love purity, uprightness, heavenly-mindedness, he reaps the fruits of that love, and even during his life in the world is associated with those in the spiritual world of like character. His passing into the other world does not change his internal and essential, but only his external and accidental, associa- tions. He is relieved of the trials and annoyances which grow out of these worldly associations and responsibilities, he comes into conscious association with those between whom and himself there can be only the fullest reciproca- tion of thought and feeling, and his surroundings reflect the beauty and joyousness of his inner life. This is heaven. Those, on the other hand, who seek, in this life, and learn to love, what is unheavenly, and confirm and harden themselves in that love, thereby bring about themselves, even while they are here, infernal associations and influ- ences. But in this world they are also associated, by many external ties, with those who are better than themselves, whereby they are restrained from a free expression of their desires and preferences. When they pass into the other world, they both find relief from those external ties and restraints and also enter into conscious and unrestrained issociation with those like themselves ; and their surround- l^maai^ 24 WHAT IS SWEDENBORQIANISMf WHAT IS SWEDENBORGIANISMf 25 ings reflect the deformity and hideousness of their inner life. And this is hell. But there are few who are so wholly good or so wholly bad as to be ready to enter at once into these heavenly or infernal associations. No man's character is fully deter- mined until he has been brought into the clear light of truth, and in that light has made his determining choice. And such final judgment, that is, such final determinations of character, are scarcely possible in this world, where the good and the evil are inextricably mingled, and where, from that and other causes, few, even of the well-disposed, can be brought to a full apprehension and realization of the truth. " After death cometh the judgment." And the judgment consists simply in man's being brought, little by little, into the light of truth, and in his accept- ance or rejection of the truth, as his dominant internal loves or character may determine. And as everything pertaining to human character is susceptible only of gradual change, this work of judgment must be a gradual, and sometimes a long-continued, process. And this jud^*- ment period or state must evidently be a state essentially distinct both from the heavenly and the infernal state. Swedenborg calls this the World of Spirits. It is by no means identical with the Romish doctrine of purgatory ; but it furnishes the truth of which that doctrine was the perversion, and which Protestantism unfortunately failed to recognize. The point in Swedenborg's teachings which it is most difficult to state in a brief form is his doctrine of the Sacred Scriptures. Like the Jews and the early Chris- tians, he recognizes two grades or kinds of inspiration by which the books constituting our present canon are dis- 4 > ^ tinguished. In the first class, he places all the books, except Ruth, which precede the Chronicles; also the Psalms, the Prophets, the Gospels and the book of Revela- tion. To the remaining books he ascribes an inspiration very similar to that which is ascribed to them by recent evangelical writers. But he elevates the first class so far above the second, and says so little about the character of the second class, as to lead undiscriminating readers to assume that he ascribes no Divine guidance at all to the writers of the second class. His frequent quotations from these writers in support of the doctrine he is expounding is a sufficient answer to this charge. The books of the first class constitute the veritable Word of God. They are the Divine Truth itself, brought down and accommodated to human apprehension. In this body of history, and law, and prophecy, the Lord is actually present with man. Here also Swedenborg revives a doc- trine of the early Christian Church,— the immanence of God in Holy Scripture, which is made evident by an apprehension of its higher meanings. Down to the time of the Reformation, though the extravagances which grew out of an abuse of the doctrine were often rebuked, this doctrine of higher meanings in Scripture than that of the letter was almost universally accepted. The early Church held that the sense of the letter is to Scripture what the body is to man, simply the clothing and medium through which the soul reveals itself. They found this doctrine clearly taught in both the Old and the New Testaments. They found in the Psalms, for instance, a spiritual signifi- cance ascribed to the leading points of Jewish history. (See, as an example, Ps. Ixxviii.) They found the Old Testa- ment prophecies declared fulfilled in the New Testament ■"-■•'.- r^" 26 WBAT IS SWEDENBORQIANISMf WBaT is SWEDENBOROlANlSMf 27 in such a way as made it necessary to ascribe to them a spiritual meaning. They found the Lord Himself giving a spiritual significance to the commandments and to the Jewish ceremonies. They found the Apostolic writers doing the same. Why then should they not ascribe to the Gospel histories also, and to the Apocalyptic prophe- cies, a higher meaning than that of the letter? But one naturally asks, If there are such higher mean- ings in the Word of God, why were they not more fully disclosed to the early Christians ? This question applies to all revelation of spiritual truth ; and the only answer is that truth is given to men as fast as they are prepared to accept it and profit by it. The early Christians were able to grasp the essential facts of Christianity. The way they comprehended those facts we cannot be very certain about ; but we know that the Church very speedily drifted into false doctrines and erroneous practices, which shows how little prepared the human mind then was for interior spirit- ual truth. Furthermore, the relation between the letter and the spirit in Scripture is the same as the relation be- tween body and soul, between the physical and the spiritual throughout nature. This principle could find entrance into the thought of man only when more accurate conceptions, both of the spiritual and of the physical, had been reached. And we all know what progress the world has made, both in natural and in spiritual intelligence, in eighteen hundred years. We believe that when the time had come for making known to the Christian world the law which lays open the higher meanings in the Divine Word, a man was provi- dentially called and trained to do this work. What this law is and how it is applied to the interpretation of Scrip- < ^ t e ^ > < ► A, t^ < ^ \ ► i j^ i i i ^ w ture can only be suggested here. Its fundamental idea is this : that as the body not only clothes but also reveals the soul, so, universally, does the physical or natural both clothe and reveal the spiritual. And the body reveals the soul, because it, in every way, corresponds to it— is the type of it. So everywhere, throughout creation, in all history, in all language, this law prevails. The physical or natural or phenomenal is the outcome of the spiritual, corresponds to the spiritual, and therefore, when under- stood, reveals it. In a profounder sense than the meta- physicians have ever dreamed is it true that the mind deals only with symbols, and its chief function is to interpret the symbols. But this applies, in a special sense, to the revelation of Divine Truth to men. Such revelation must be adapted to all grades of intelligence, so that the simple may appre- hend it in simplicity, and the wise in the measure of their wisdom. And this can only be adequately done through what we may be permitted to call a Divine-Human lan- guage, a language in which the correspondential relation between the spiritual or real, and the physical or phenome- nal is fully exemplified. This is the language in which Divine Truth is conveyed to men in the Divine Word. And when this law of correspondence is applied to the Divine Word, it opens everywhere, within the letter, higher meanings, which themselves demonstrate the law ; as the application of the law by which the hieroglyphics are read is a demonstration of that law. It shows that every natural picture set before the mind in the letter, whether it be drawn from something which actually oc- curred or not, is a perfect reflection of some spiritual ex- perience or state. '•4 J .•^SS 28 Wn:AT IS SWEDENBORGIANISMf WHAT IS SWEDENBORGIANISMf 29 Take, for instance, the first chapter of Genesis, which the theologians have tried in vain to reconcile with the conclusions of modern science, and which we are now assured is simply an ancient Babylonian tradition. It matters little with whom these conceptions of creation originated, when we see that they have been divinely em* ployed to reflect the processes of man's spiritual creation, — the way man was brought and is brought from the chaos of nature into the spiritual image and likeness of God. It matters little whence came the picture of Eden, when it is seen to depict the paradise or heavenly state of mind, which is set before us as the ideal we are to strive for. So the question whether the story of the Fall is only a para- ble, or is an account of something which actually occurred, becomes of little consequence when it is seen to depict, in the clearest and fullest manner, what comes to every man who rejects Divine guidance and yields to the delusions which are urged upon him by his sensuous nature. This serpent spirit was never more active or alluring than to- day, and the lessons of this third chapter of Genesis never more needed. So, again, are confirmed practices of the Jews, such as the bloody sacrifices, the customs springing from revenge and retaliation, which are common to all semi-civilized peoples, even that of the extermination of enemies, were made use of to symbolize the Christian law of sacrifice or self-consecration, and that relentless hostility to spiritual enemies, — that is, evils in the character, — which alone will secure their extermination. Enough has already been said to indicate the general character of Swedenborg's eschatology. Death is simply a laying aside of the physical body ; resurrection is awaken- ing to consciousness in the spiritual world. And as < A. ^ i those to whom this change has come are never again to resume their physical bodies, the spiritual world must be the theatre of all general judgments. Such judgments have come at the close of every dispensation. The close of the first dispensation and the judgment accompanying it are typically described in the story of the flood. Another general judgment occurred, as the Gospels plainly indicate, when the Lord revealed Himself in the flesh. The first age of the Christian dispensation r<3ached its consummation in the middle of the last century. All Christian writers are agreed that Christianity about that time was at its lowest ebb. We all know what the world's progress, ma- terial and spiritual, has been since that time. No words can depict, no mere worldly philosophy can account for, the wonders of the New Age on which the world then entered. Swedenborg finds a spiritual cause for it in the fact that a general judgment was then accomplished in the spiritual world, similar to that which accompanied the close of the Jewish dispensation, whereby the world was brought under new spiritual conditions and influences. The clouds which had long obscured the Sun of Righteous- ness were dispersed, and the human mind, quickened and stirred by the new light and warmth, everywhere gave ^ evidence that the winter was past and a new spring had dawned. Between all this intellectual and spiritual quick- ening and the opening of the higher senses of the Divine Word, by the disclosure of the law of correspondence, there would seem to be little or no connection. But if it should come to be seen, by-and-by, that the new currents of thought which are sweeping away the old errors have their orrgin in that fountain, Swedenborg's claim will seem \ess preposterous. vrvw* 30 WHAT IS SWEDENBORQIANISMf WHAT IS SWEDENBORQIANISMf 31 Swedenborg claims simply to have been called by the Lord to report to the world what then occurred. He was permitted to witness and describe the judgment which was accomplished in the spiritual world. It was given him to perceive and understand how the spiritual realm of being is related to the physical, and from this to under- stand the law of correspondence, which is the key to the higher meanings of the Divine Word. This enabled him to open to the world the inner contents of the Word, and to unfold the true nature of God and man, and their mutual relations, which had been so entirely misapprehended. It is plain that if there was such a work as this to be done, it must have been done in essentially the way in which Swedenborg claims that it was done. He claims that he was providentially endowed and equipped for this work, and the history of his life confirms this claim. Until he was fifty-six years of age he was an ardent student of natural science, a writer of wide repute, the first au- thority in Sweden, if not in Europe, in mining affairs, and a statesman held in high esteem for his ability, prudence, and integrity. He was a man not only of exceptional learning, but also of deep philosophical insight. He was, therefore, in every way most eminently fitted for just such a work as, by his claim, he was called to do. He was admitted, by the opening of his spiritual senses, to the spiritual world, and for twenty-seven years he was engaged in learning and expounding the secrets of human life and destiny. Swedenborg^s claim to this open vision of the spiritual world is the only valid ground for the belief that he was insane. If no such vision was providentially granted him, he was, of course, the victim of a monstrous delusion. How 4 ^ t is this question to be settled ? Evidently by the general credibility of his teachings and the agreement of the nature and contents of his visions with what is credible in his exposi- tions of doctrine and Scripture. It is plainly unfair to in- sist that he was insane until it is proved that he was not, shifling the burden of proof from accuser to defendant ; but this is far less culpable than the uniform refusal of his opponents to examine the only legitimate evidence on which the question can be fairly decided. It is assumed by many that these visions of Sweden- borg were of the same character as the visions of modern spiritual mediums, having possibly a basis of truth, but entirely untrustworthy. Swedenborg recognized the pos- sibility of such unsanctioned intercourse with ignorant or evil spirits, and predicted the destruction of Christian belief and moral restraint which almost universally results therefrom. Moreover, what he discloses respecting the phe- nomena of the spiritual world will show to every one who examines the matter candidly that the results of such intercourse can have no value even as reports of fact. One needs to be providentially prepared and guided to understand phenomena so diff"erent from anything in this world. Con- sequently, even if we admit that these modern visions are all that they claim to be, they are no more to be ranked with Swedenborg's, than a school-boy's glimpse of a solar eclipse through a smoked glass is to be ranked with the observations of it by a trained astronomer with his elaborate preparation and complicated instruments. Finally let it not be forgotten that this feature of Swedenborg's work was merely incidental. He uses the facts he thus obtains simply to illustrate the spiritual principles which he is expounding. The most plausible and serious objections which have ^ k,i' hVi^ 32 WHAT IS SWEDENBORGIANISMf been urged against Swedenborg's teachings can be clearly Been to be misrepresentations when the matter is carefully examined. They are based on a few statements in a small treatise of a hundred pages entitled " Adulterous Love and its Insane Pleasures" (appended to his work on "Conjugial Love"), wherein Swedenborg aims to show that some phases of sexual evil are less destructive of conjugial love or of spiritual life in the soul than others, and are conse- quently, in that sense, to be preferred to others. The cur- rent misrepresentations are made possible and plausible by ignoring two facts, — first, that Swedenborg is discussing a state of society totally different from that in which we are living, one in which the social and legal obstacles to mar- riage made a legalized concubinage a seeming necessity, and in which all the elements of the problem (except the abstract principle of right and wrong) were so remote from our present experience as to be almost unintelligible to us ; and, secondly, that Swedenborg, writing in the most licen- tious country of Europe at its most corrupt period, taught the purest and most exalted doctrine of marriage the world has ever known, and that it is only common fairness to claim that these few seemingly objectionable statements should be interpreted in the light of what he uniformly teaches elsewhere. When the intricate nature of this question is seen all fair-minded persons will hold it in abeyance until they have had opportunity for a full and impartial examination of it. In closing, allow me to say that these brief statements furnish only an imperfect outline of Swedenborg's system. But I trust that they will awaken a sufficient interest, or, at least, curiosity, to induce some of my readers to inquire further. < 1 0- i ^ >t This book is due two weeks from the last date stamped below, and if not returned at or before that time a fine of five cents a day will be incurred. = -^ HmL jef qss.^-^ 53S -^4 V.I COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY LIBRARI ES 0652671 I FEB 4 1937 cm:,,.-:. Jdi