Emanuel Swedenborg

Memorial plaque at the former location of Swedenborg's house at Hornsgatan on Södermalm, Stockholm.

Swedenborg's father, Jesper Swedberg (1653–1735), descended from a wealthy mining family, the first known paternal ancestor being Otte Persson from Sundborn parish, mentioned 1571.[16] He travelled abroad and studied theology, and on returning home, he was eloquent enough to impress the Swedish king, Charles XI, with his sermons in Stockholm. Through the king's influence, he would later become professor of theology at Uppsala University and Bishop of Skara.[17][2]

Jesper took an interest in the beliefs of the dissenting Lutheran Pietist movement, which emphasised the virtues of communion with God rather than relying on sheer faith (sola fide).[18] Sola fide is a tenet of the Lutheran Church, and Jesper was charged with being a pietist heretic. While controversial, the beliefs were to have a major impact on his son Emanuel's spirituality. Jesper furthermore held the unconventional belief that angels and spirits were present in everyday life. This also came to have a strong impact on Emanuel.[17][2][19]

In 1703–1709, Swedenborg lived in Erik Benzelius the Younger's house. Swedenborg completed his university course at Uppsala in 1709, and in 1710, he made his grand tour through the Netherlands, France and Germany before reaching London, where he would spend the next four years. It was also a flourishing centre of scientific ideas and discoveries. Swedenborg studied physics, mechanics and philosophy and read and wrote poetry. According to the preface of a book by the Swedish critic Olof Lagercrantz, Swedenborg wrote to his benefactor and brother-in-law Benzelius that he believed he might be destined to be a great scientist.[20][21]

The Flying Machine, sketched in his notebook from 1714. The operator would sit in the middle and paddle himself through the air.[22] p. 32, or on the video clip at 5:48 on its timeline.[23]

In 1715 Swedenborg returned to Sweden, where he devoted himself to natural science and engineering projects for the next two decades. A first step was his meeting with King Charles XII of Sweden in the city of Lund, in 1716. The Swedish inventor Christopher Polhem, who became a close friend of Swedenborg, was also present. Swedenborg's purpose was to persuade the king to fund an observatory in northern Sweden. However, the warlike king did not consider this project important enough, but did appoint Swedenborg to be assessor-extraordinary on the Swedish Board of Mines (Bergskollegium) in Stockholm.[24]

From 1716 to 1718, Swedenborg published a scientific periodical entitled Daedalus Hyperboreus ("The Northern Daedalus"), a record of mechanical and mathematical inventions and discoveries. One notable description was that of a flying machine, the same he had been sketching a few years earlier.[21]

In 1718, Swedenborg published an article that attempted to explain spiritual and mental events in terms of minute vibrations, or "tremulations".

Upon the death of Charles XII, Queen Ulrika Eleonora ennobled Swedenborg and his siblings. It was common in Sweden during the 17th and 18th centuries for the children of bishops to receive that honor, as a recognition of the services of their father. The family name was changed from Swedberg to Swedenborg.[25]

In 1724, he was offered the chair of mathematics at Uppsala University, but he declined and said that he had dealt mainly with geometry, chemistry and metallurgy during his career. He also said that he did not have the gift of eloquent speech because of a stutter, as recognized by many of his acquaintances; it forced him to speak slowly and carefully, and there are no known occurrences of his speaking in public.[26] The Swedish critic Olof Lagerkrantz proposed that Swedenborg compensated for his impediment by extensive argumentation in writing.[27]

During the 1730s, Swedenborg undertook many studies of anatomy and physiology. He had the first known anticipation of the neuron concept.[28] It was not until a century later that science recognized the full significance of the nerve cell. He also had prescient ideas about the cerebral cortex, the hierarchical organization of the nervous system, the localization of the cerebrospinal fluid, the functions of the pituitary gland, the perivascular spaces, the foramen of Magendie, the idea of somatotopic organization, and the association of frontal brain regions with the intellect. In some cases, his conclusions have been experimentally verified in modern times.[29][30][31][32][33]

In the 1730s, Swedenborg became increasingly interested in spiritual matters and was determined to find a theory to explain how matter relates to spirit. Swedenborg's desire to understand the order and the purpose of creation first led him to investigate the structure of matter and the process of creation itself. In the Principia, he outlined his philosophical method, which incorporated experience, geometry (the means by which the inner order of the world can be known) and the power of reason. He also outlined his cosmology, which included the first presentation of his nebular hypothesis. (There is evidence that Swedenborg may have preceded Kant by as much as 20 years in the development of that hypothesis.[34])

In 1735, in Leipzig, he published a three-volume work, Opera philosophica et mineralis ("Philosophical and mineralogical works") in which he tried to conjoin philosophy and metallurgy. The work was mainly appreciated for its chapters on the analysis of the smelting of iron and copper, and it was the work that gave Swedenborg his international reputation.[35] The same year, he also published the small manuscript de Infinito ("On the Infinite") in which he attempted to explain how the finite is related to the infinite and how the soul is connected to the body. It was the first manuscript in which he touched upon such matters. He knew that it might clash with established theologies since he presented the view that the soul is based on material substances.[36][37] He also conducted dedicated studies of the fashionable philosophers of the time such as John Locke, Christian von Wolff, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, and Descartes and earlier thinkers such as Plato, Aristotle, Plotinus and Augustine of Hippo.[38]

In 1743, at the age of 55, Swedenborg requested a leave of absence to go abroad. His purpose was to gather source material for Regnum animale (The Animal Kingdom, or Kingdom of Life), a subject on which books were not readily available in Sweden. The aim of the book was to explain the soul from an anatomical point of view. He had planned to produce a total of 17 volumes.[39]

By 1744, Swedenborg had traveled to the Netherlands. Around the time, he began having strange dreams. Swedenborg carried a travel journal with him on most of his travels and did so on this journey. The whereabouts of the diary were long unknown, but it was discovered in the Royal Library in the 1850s and was published in 1859 as Drömboken, or Journal of Dreams.

Swedenborg experienced many different dreams and visions, some greatly pleasurable, others highly disturbing.[40] The experiences continued as he traveled to London to progress the publication of Regnum animale. This process, which one biographer has proposed as cathartic and comparable to the Catholic concept of Purgatory,[41] continued for six months. He also proposed that what Swedenborg was recording in his Journal of Dreams was a battle between the love of himself and the love of God.[42]

Arcana Cœlestia, first edition (1749), title page

In June 1747, Swedenborg resigned his post as assessor of the board of mines. He explained that he was obliged to complete a work that he had begun and requested to receive half his salary as a pension.[46] He took up afresh his study of Hebrew and began to work on the spiritual interpretation of the Bible with the goal of interpreting the spiritual meaning of every verse. From sometime between 1746 and 1747 and for ten years henceforth, he devoted his energy to the task. Usually abbreviated as Arcana Cœlestia or under the Latin variant Arcana Caelestia[47] (translated as Heavenly Arcana, Heavenly Mysteries, or Secrets of Heaven depending on modern English-language editions), the book became his magnum opus and the basis of his further theological works.[48]

The work was anonymous, and Swedenborg was not identified as the author until the late 1750s. It had eight volumes, published between 1749 and 1756. It attracted little attention, as few people could penetrate its meaning.[49][50]

His life from 1747 to his death was spent in Stockholm, the Netherlands and London. During the 25 years, he wrote another 14 works of a spiritual nature; most were published during his lifetime.

One of Swedenborg's lesser-known works presents a startling claim: that the Last Judgment had begun in the previous year (1757) and was completed by the end of that year[51] and that he had witnessed it.[52] According to The Heavenly Doctrine, the Last Judgment took place not in the physical world but in the World of Spirits, halfway between heaven and hell, through which all pass on their way to heaven or hell.[53] The Judgment took place because the Christian church had lost its charity and faith, resulting in a loss of spiritual free will that threatened the equilibrium between heaven and hell in everyone's life.[54][lower-alpha 1]

The Heavenly Doctrine also teaches that the Last Judgement was followed by the Second Coming of Jesus Christ, which occurred not by Christ in person but by a revelation from him through the inner, spiritual sense of the Word[55] through Swedenborg.[56]

In another of his theological works, Swedenborg wrote that eating meat, regarded in itself, "is something profane" and was not practiced in the early days of the human race. However, he said, it now is a matter of conscience, and no one is condemned for doing it.[57] Nonetheless, the early-days ideal appears to have given rise to the idea that Swedenborg was a vegetarian. That conclusion may have been reinforced by the fact that a number of Swedenborg's early followers were part of the vegetarian movement that arose in Britain in the 19th century.[58] However, the only reports on Swedenborg himself are contradictory. His landlord in London, Shearsmith, said he ate no meat, but his maid, who served Swedenborg, said that he ate eels and pigeon pie.[59]

In Earths in the Universe, it is stated that he conversed with spirits from Jupiter, Mars, Mercury, Saturn, Venus and the Moon as well as spirits from planets beyond the solar system.[60] From the "encounters", he concluded that the planets of our solar system are inhabited and that such an enormous undertaking as the universe could not have been created for just one race on a planet or one "Heaven" derived from its properties per planet. Many Heavenly societies were also needed to increase the perfection of the angelic Heavens and Heaven to fill in deficiencies and gaps in other societies. He argued: "What would this be to God, Who is infinite, and to whom a thousand or tens of thousands of planets, and all of them full of inhabitants, would be scarcely anything!"[61] Swedenborg and the question of life on other planets has been extensively reviewed elsewhere.[62]

Swedenborg published his work in London or the Netherlands because of their freedom of the press.[63][64]

Swedenborg's crypt in Uppsala Cathedral

In July 1770, at the age of 82, he traveled to Amsterdam to complete the publication of his last work. The book, Vera Christiana Religio (The True Christian Religion), was published there in 1771 and was one of the most appreciated of his works. Designed to explain his teachings to Lutherans, it is the most concrete of his works.[65]

In the summer of 1771, he traveled to London. Shortly before Christmas, he suffered a stroke and was partially paralyzed and confined to bed. His health improved somewhat, but he died in 1772. There are several accounts of his last months, made by those with whom he stayed and by Arvid Ferelius, a pastor of the Swedish Church in London, who visited him several times.[66]

There is evidence that Swedenborg wrote a letter to John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, in February. Swedenborg said that he had been told in the world of spirits that Wesley wanted to speak with him.[67] Wesley, startled since he had not told anyone of his interest in Swedenborg, replied that he was going on a journey for six months and would contact Swedenborg on his return. Swedenborg replied that that would be too late since Swedenborg would be going to the spiritual world for the last time on March 29.[68] (Wesley later read and commented extensively on Swedenborg's work.)[69] Swedenborg's landlord's servant girl, Elizabeth Reynolds, also said that Swedenborg had predicted the date and that he was as happy about it as if he was "going on holiday or to some merrymaking":[70]

In Swedenborg's final hours, his friend, Pastor Ferelius, told him some people thought he had written his theology just to make a name for himself and asked Swedenborg if he would like to recant. Raising himself up on his bed, his hand on his heart, Swedenborg earnestly replied,

"As truly as you see me before your eyes, so true is everything that I have written; and I could have said more had it been permitted. When you enter eternity you will see everything, and then you and I shall have much to talk about".[71]

He then died, in the afternoon, on the date he had predicted, March 29.[71]

Swedenborg House in London

He was buried in the Swedish Church in Princes Square in Shadwell, London. On the 140th anniversary of his death, in 1912/1913, his remains were transferred to Uppsala Cathedral in Sweden, where they now rest close to the grave of the botanist Carl Linnaeus. In 1917, the Swedish Church in Shadwell was demolished, and the Swedish community that had grown around the parish moved to Marylebone. In 1938, Princes Square was redeveloped, and in his honor the local road was renamed Swedenborg Gardens. In 1997, a garden, play area and memorial, near the road, were created in his memory.[72][73][74]

Swedenborg's transition from scientist to revelator or mystic has fascinated many people. He has had a variety of both supporting and critical biographers.[75] Some propose that he did not have a revelation at all but developed his theological ideas from sources which ranged from his father to earlier figures in the history of thought, notably Plotinus. That position was first taken by Swedish writer Martin Lamm who wrote a biography of Swedenborg in 1915.[76][lower-alpha 2] Swedish critic and publicist Olof Lagercrantz had a similar point of view, calling Swedenborg's theological writing "a poem about a foreign country with peculiar laws and customs".[77]

Swedenborg's approach to proving the veracity of his theological teachings was to use voluminous quotations from the Old Testament and the New Testament to demonstrate agreement with the Bible, and this is found throughout his theological writings, since he rejected blind faith and declared true faith to be an internal acknowledgement of the truth. The vast use of these Biblical confirmations led a Swedish Royal Council in 1771 to examine the heresy charges of 1770 against two Swedish supporters of his theological writings: "there is much that is true and useful in Swedenborg's writings".[78] Victor Hugo felt that Swedenborg had "lapsed into madness" in Chapter 14 of Les Misérables.

Swedenborg proposed many scientific ideas during his lifetime. In his youth, he wanted to present a new idea every day, as he wrote to his brother-in-law Erik Benzelius in 1718. Around 1730, he had changed his mind, and instead believed that higher knowledge is not something that can be acquired, but that it is based on intuition. After 1745, he instead considered himself receiving scientific knowledge in a spontaneous manner from angels.[79]

From 1745, when he considered himself to have entered a spiritual state, he tended to phrase his "experiences" in empirical terms, to report accurately things he had experienced on his spiritual journeys.

One of his ideas that is considered most crucial for the understanding of his theology is his notion of correspondences. But, in fact, he first presented the theory of correspondences only in 1744, in the first volume of Regnum Animale dealing with the human soul.[21]

The basis of the correspondence theory is that there is a relationship among the natural ("physical"), the spiritual, and the divine worlds. The foundations of this theory can be traced to Neoplatonism and the philosopher Plotinus in particular. With the aid of this scenario, Swedenborg now interpreted the Bible in a different light, claiming that even the most apparently trivial sentences could hold a profound spiritual meaning.[80] Swedenborg argued that it is the presence of that spiritual sense which makes the Word divine.[81]

Four incidents of purported psychic ability of Swedenborg exist in the literature.[82] There are several versions of each story.

Immanuel Kant (pictured) wrote Dreams of a Spirit-Seer, a methodical investigation of Swedenborg's claims.

In 1763, Immanuel Kant, then at the beginning of his career, was impressed by accounts of Swedenborg's psychic abilities and made inquiries to find out if they were true. He also ordered all eight volumes of the expensive Arcana Cœlestia (Heavenly Arcana or Heavenly Mysteries). One Charlotte von Knobloch wrote to Kant asking his opinion of Swedenborg's psychic experiences.[97][lower-alpha 6] Kant wrote a very affirmative reply, referring to Swedenborg's "miraculous" gift, and characterizing him as "reasonable, agreeable, remarkable and sincere" and "a scholar", in one of his letters to Mendelssohn,[98] and expressing regret that he (Kant) had never met Swedenborg.[99][100] Joseph Green, his English friend, who investigated the matter for Kant, including by visiting Swedenborg's home, found Swedenborg to be a "sensible, pleasant and openhearted" man and here again, a scholar.[101]

However, three years later, in 1766, Kant wrote and published anonymously a small book entitled Träume eines Geistersehers (Dreams of a Spirit-Seer)[102] that was a scathing critique of Swedenborg and his writings. He termed Swedenborg a "spook hunter"[103] "without official office or occupation".[104] As rationale for his critique, Kant said he wanted to stop "ceaseless questioning"[105] and inquiries about Dreams from "inquisitive" persons, both known and unknown.[106] Kant's friend Moses Mendelssohn thought there was a "joking pensiveness" in Dreams that sometimes left the reader in doubt as to whether Dreams was meant to make "metaphysics laughable or spirit-seeking credible".[107] In one of his letters to Mendelssohn, Kant refers to Dreams less-than-enthusiastically as a "desultory little essay".[108]

Kant never closed off the possibility of mysticism or spirits in Dreams of a Spirit-Seer, and the exact relationship of his thought to Swedenborg's remains unclear, according to contemporary scholars.[109]

Swedenborg at the age of 75, holding the soon to be published manuscript of Apocalypse Revealed (1766)

Swedenborg claimed in The Heavenly Doctrine that the teachings of the Second Coming of Jesus Christ were revealed to him.[110]

Swedenborg considered his theology a revelation of the true Christian religion that had become obfuscated through centuries of theology. However, he did not refer to his writings as theology since he considered it based on actual experiences, unlike theology,[21] except in the title of his last work. Neither did he wish to compare it to philosophy, a discipline he discarded in 1748 because, he claimed, it "darkens the mind, blinds us, and wholly rejects the faith".[111]

The foundation of Swedenborg's theology was laid down in Arcana Cœlestia (Heavenly Mysteries), published in eight Latin volumes from 1749 to 1756. In a significant portion of that work, he interprets the Biblical passages of Genesis and Exodus. He reviews what he says is the inner spiritual sense of these two works of the Word of God. (He later made a similar review of the inner sense of the book of Revelation in Apocalypse Revealed.[112]) Most of all, he was convinced that the Bible describes a human's transformation from a materialistic to a spiritual being, which he calls rebirth or regeneration. He begins this work by outlining how the creation myth was not an account of the creation of Earth, but an account of man's rebirth or regeneration in six steps represented by the six days of creation. Everything related to mankind in the Bible could also be related to Jesus Christ, and how Christ freed himself from materialistic boundaries through the glorification of his human presence by making it Divine. Swedenborg examines this idea in his exposition of Genesis and Exodus.[113]

Swedenborg made no attempt to found a church.[129][130] A few years after his death – 15 by one estimate[131] – for the most part in England, small reading groups formed to study his teachings.[132] As one scholar states, The Heavenly Doctrine particularly appealed to the various dissenting groups that sprang up in the first half of the 18th century who were "surfeited with revivalism and narrow-mindedness" and found his optimism and comprehensive explanations appealing.[133]

A variety of important cultural figures, both writers and artists, were influenced by Swedenborg's writings, including Robert Frost,[134] Johnny Appleseed, William Blake, Jorge Luis Borges, Daniel Burnham, Arthur Conan Doyle,[135] Ralph Waldo Emerson,[136] John Flaxman, George Inness, Henry James Sr., Carl Jung,[137] Immanuel Kant, Honoré de Balzac, Helen Keller, Czesław Miłosz, August Strindberg, D. T. Suzuki, and W. B. Yeats. His philosophy had a great impact on the Duke of Södermanland, later King Carl XIII, who as the Grand Master of Swedish Freemasonry (Svenska Frimurare Orden) built its unique system of degrees and wrote its rituals. In contrast, one of the most prominent Swedish authors of Swedenborg's day, Johan Henric Kellgren, called Swedenborg "nothing but a fool".[lower-alpha 8] A heresy trial was initiated in Sweden in 1768 against Swedenborg writings and two men who promoted them.[lower-alpha 9]

In the two and a half centuries since Swedenborg's death, various interpretations of his theology have been made, and he has also been scrutinized in biographies and psychological studies.[139][lower-alpha 10] Swedenborg, with his claimed new dispensation, has been considered by some to suffer from mental illness.[lower-alpha 11][140][lower-alpha 12] While the insanity explanation was not uncommon during Swedenborg's own time, it is mitigated by his activity in the Swedish Riddarhuset (the House of the Nobility), the Riksdag (the Swedish parliament), and the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. Additionally, the system of thought in his theological writings is considered by some to be remarkably coherent.[141] Furthermore, he was characterized by his contemporaries as a "kind and warm-hearted man", "amiable in his meeting with the public", speaking "easily and naturally of his spiritual experiences",[142][143][144] with pleasant and interesting conversation. An English friend of Kant's who visited Swedenborg at Kant's behest described Swedenborg as a "reasonable, pleasant and candid man and scholar".[145] Of note here is Swedenborg's statement that he was commanded by the Lord to publish his writings and "Do not believe that without this express command I would have thought of publishing things which I knew in advance would make me look ridiculous and many people would think lies".[146]

Copies of the original Latin version in which Swedenborg wrote his revelation are available from the following sources.[147][148]

List of referenced works by Swedenborg and the year they were first published.[149][150]

Within parenthesis is the common name used in a New Church listing[151] Then follows the title in its original publication. All the titles listed were published by Swedenborg, except one, The Spiritual Diary, which was not.[152] Various minor reports and tracts have been omitted from the list.

• 1716–1718, (Daedalus Hyperboreus) Swedish: Daedalus Hyperboreus, eller några nya mathematiska och physicaliska försök. (English: The Northern inventor, or some new experiments in mathematics and physics)
• 1721, (Principles of Chemistry) Latin: Prodromus principiorum rerum naturalium: sive novorum tentaminum chymiam et physicam experimenta geometrice explicandi
• 1722, (Miscellaneous Observations) Latin: Miscellanea de Rebus Naturalibus
• 1734, (Principia) Latin: Opera Philosophica et Mineralia (English: Philosophical and Mineralogical Works), three volumes
  • (Principia, Volume I) Latin: Tomus I. Principia rerum naturlium sive novorum tentaminum phaenomena mundi elementaris philosophice explicandi
  • (Principia, Volume II) Latin: Tomus II. Regnum subterraneum sive minerale de ferro
  • (Principia, Volume III) Latin: Tomus III. Regnum subterraneum sive minerale de cupro et orichalco
• 1734, (The Infinite and Final Cause of Creation) Latin: Prodromus Philosophiz Ratiocinantis de Infinito, et Causa Finali Creationis; deque Mechanismo Operationis Animae et Corporis.
• 1744–1745, (The Animal Kingdom) Latin: Regnum animale, 3 volumes
• 1745, (The Worship and Love of God) Latin: De Cultu et Amore Dei, 2 volumes
• 1749–1756, (Arcana Cœlestia (or Caelestia) (Heavenly Mysteries) Latin: Arcana Cœlestia, quae in Scriptura Sacra seu Verbo Domini sunt, detecta, 8 volumes
• 1758, (Heaven and Hell) Latin: De Caelo et Ejus Mirabilibus et de inferno. Ex Auditis et Visis.
• 1758, (The Last Judgment) Latin: De Ultimo Judicio
• 1758, (The White Horse) Latin: De Equo Albo de quo in Apocalypsi Cap. XIX.
• 1758, (Earths in the Universe) Latin: De Telluribus in Mundo Nostro Solari, quæ vocantur planetæ: et de telluribus in coelo astrifero: deque illarum incolis; tum de spiritibus & angelis ibi; ex auditis & visis.
• 1758, (The New Jerusalem and Its Heavenly Doctrine) Latin: De Nova Hierosolyma et Ejus Doctrina Coelesti
• 1763, (Doctrine of the Lord) Latin:Doctrina Novæ Hierosolymæ de Domino.
• 1763, (Doctrine of the Sacred Scripture) Latin: Doctrina Novæ Hierosolymæ de Scriptura Sacra.
• 1763, (Doctrine of Life) Latin: Doctrina Vitæ pro Nova Hierosolyma ex præceptis Decalogi.
• 1763, (Doctrine of Faith) Latin: Doctrina Novæ Hierosolymæ de Fide.
• 1763, (Continuation of The Last Judgement) Latin: Continuatio De Ultimo Judicio: et de mundo spirituali.
• 1763, (Divine Love and Wisdom) Latin: Sapientia Angelica de Divino Amore et de Divina Sapientia. Sapientia Angelica de Divina Providentia.
• 1764, (Divine Providence) Latin: Sapientia Angelica de Divina Providentia.
• 1766, (Apocalypse Revealed) Latin: Apocalypsis Revelata, in quae detegunter Arcana quae ibi preedicta sunt.
• 1768, (Conjugial Love, or Marriage Love) Latin: Deliciae Sapientiae de Amore Conjugiali; post quas sequumtur voluptates insaniae de amore scortatorio.
• 1769, (Brief Exposition) Latin: Summaria Expositio Doctrinæ Novæ Ecclesiæ, quæ per Novam Hierosolymam in Apocalypsi intelligitur.
• 1769, (Interaction of the Soul and the Body) Latin: De Commercio Animæ & Corporis.
• 1771, (True Christian Religion) Latin: Vera Christiana Religio, continens Universam Theologiam Novae Ecclesiae
• 1859, Drömboken, Journalanteckningar(Journal of Dreams), 1743–1744
• 1983–1997, (Spiritual Diary) Latin: Diarum, Ubi Memorantur Experientiae Spirituales.

• Swedenborg Society

• List of Christian thinkers in science
• Lord's New Church Which Is Nova Hierosolyma
• The New Church (Swedenborgian)
• General Church of the New Jerusalem
• Swedenborgian Church of North America
• Swedenborg Rite

• Ahlstrom, S.E. A Religious History of the American People (Yale 1972) Includes section on Swedenborg by this scholar.
• Benz, Ernst, Emanuel Swedenborg: Visionary Savant in the Age of Reason (Swedenborg Foundation, 2002) ISBN 0-87785-195-6, a translation of the thorough German language study on life and work of Swedenborg, Emanuel Swedenborg: Naturforscher und Seher by the noted religious scholar Ernst Benz, published in Munich in 1948.
• Bergquist, Lars, Swedenborg's Secret, (London, The Swedenborg Society, 2005) ISBN 0-85448-143-5, a translation of the Swedish language biography of Swedenborg, Swedenborgs Hemlighet, published in Stockholm in 1999. ISBN 91-27-06981-8
• Block, M. B. The New Church in the New World. A study of Swedenborgianism in America (Holt 1932; Octagon reprint 1968) A detailed history of the ideational and social development of the organized churches based on Swedenborg's works.
• Crompton, S. Emanuel Swedenborg (Chelsea House, 2005) Recent biography of Swedenborg.
• Johnson, G., ed. Kant on Swedenborg. Dreams of a Spirit-Seer and Other Writings. Translation by Johnson, G., Magee, G.E. (Swedenborg Foundation 2002) New translation and extensive set of supplementary texts.
• Lamm, Martin, Swedenborg: En studie (1987; first ed. 1915). A popular biography that is still read and quoted. It is also available in English: Emanuel Swedenborg: The Development of His Thought, Martin Lamm (Swedenborg Studies, No. 9, 2001), ISBN 0-87785-194-8
• Lagercrantz, Olof, Dikten om livet på den andra sidan (Wahlström & Widstrand 1996), ISBN 91-46-16932-6. In Swedish.
• Leon, James, Overcoming Objections to Swedenborg's Writings Through the Development of Scientific Dualism An examination of Swedenborg's discoveries. The author is a professor of psychology (1998; published in New Philosophy, 2001)
• Moody, R. A. Life after Life (Bantam 1975) Reports correlation of near-death experience with Swedenborg's reports of life after death.
• Price, R. Johnny Appleseed. Man and Myth (Indiana 1954) Definitive study of this legendary man. Includes details of his interest in Swedenborg and the organizational New Church
• Robsahm, Carl, Hallengren, Anders (translation and comments), Anteckningar om Swedenborg (Föreningen Swedenborgs Minne: Stockholm 1989), ISBN 91-87856-00-X. Hallengren writes that the first complete publication of the Robsam manuscript was in R. L. Tafel's Documents, Vol. I, 1875 (see section "Further reading")
• Schuchard, Marsha Keith. 2011. Emanuel Swedenborg, Secret Agent on Earth and in Heaven: Jacobites, Jews and Freemasons in Early Modern Sweden. Brill.
• Sigstedt, C.,The Swedenborg Epic. The Life and Works of Emanuel Swedenborg (New York: Bookman Associates, 1952). The whole book is available online at Swedenborg Digital Library.
• Toksvig, Signe (1948). Emanuel Swedenborg, Scientist and Mystic . New Haven: Yale University Press. ISBN 0-87785-171-9 – via Wikisource.

Newer material

• The Arms of Morpheus—Essays on Swedenborg and Mysticism, ed. Stephen McNeilly (London: Swedenborg Society, 2007), ISBN 978-0-85448-150-7.
• Between Method and Madness—Essays on Swedenborg and Literature, ed. Stephen McNeilly (London: Swedenborg Society, 2005), ISBN 978-0-85448-145-3.
• In Search of the Absolute—Essays on Swedenborg and Literature, ed. Stephen McNeilly (London: Swedenborg Society, 2005), ISBN 978-0-85448-141-5.
• On the True Philosopher and the True Philosophy—Essays on Swedenborg, ed. Stephen McNeilly (London: Swedenborg Society, 2005), ISBN 978-0-85448-134-7.
• Swedenborg and His Influence, ed. Erland J. Brock, (Bryn Athyn, Pennsylvania: The Academy of the New Church, 1988), ISBN 0-910557-23-3.
• Jonathan S. Rose, ed. Emanuel Swedenborg: Essays for the New Century Edition on His Life, Work, and Impact (West Chester, Pennsylvania: Swedenborg Foundation, 2002), ISBN 0-87785-473-4. 580 pages. Multiple scholars contributed to this collection of information on Swedenborg, his manuscripts, and his cultural influence. Republished in 2004 under new title, Scribe of Heaven: Swedenborg's Life, Work, and Impact ISBN 0-87785-474-2.
• Wilson van Dusen, The Presence of Other Worlds, Swedenborg Foundation, Inc., New York, Harper & Row, 1974. ISBN 0-87785-166-2
• "The Madness Hypothesis," a special issue of The New Philosophy (1998;101: whole number), a journal produced by the Swedenborg Scientific Association, reviews the question of Swedenborg's sanity in scholarly detail, making the case that he was in fact quite sane.
• Donald L. Rose, ed., Afterlife: A Guided Tour of Heaven and Its Wonders. Swedenborg Foundation, 2006. (abridged version of Heaven and Hell)
• D. T. Suzuki, translated by Andrew Bernstein, Afterword by David Loy, Swedenborg: Buddha of the North. Swedenborg Foundation, 1996. (Brilliantly shows relevance of Swedenborg's ideas to Buddhist thought.)
• Nemitz, K., "The Man and His Work".
• Larsen, T, Larsen, Lawrence, JF, Woofenden WR. Emanuel Swedenborg. A Continuing Vision. Swedenborg Foundation, 1988
• Sig Synnestvedt, ed., The Essential Swedenborg: Basic Religious Teachings of Emanuel Swedenborg. Swedenborg Foundation, 1970.

Older material of importance (some of it not in print)

• James John Garth Wilkinson (1849), Emanuel Swedenborg: A Biography, London: William Newbery, retrieved December 2, 2014
• The most extensive work is: RL Tafel, Documents concerning the Life and Character of Swedenborg, collected, translated and annotated (3 vols., Swedenborg Society, 1875—1877);
• J. Hyde, A Bibliography of the Works of Emanuel Swedenborg (Swedenborg Society).
• Kant's Träume eines Geistersehers (1766; the most recent edition in English is from 1975, ISBN 3-7873-0311-1 );
• J. G. Herder's "Emanuel Swedenborg," in his Adrastea (Werke zur Phil. und Gesch., xii. 110–125).
• Transactions of the International Swedenborg Congress (London, 1910), summarized in The New Church Magazine (August 1910).
• Swedenborg and Esoteric Islam (Swedenborg Studies, No 4) by Henry Corbin, Leonard Fox
• Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Swedenborg; or, the Mystic", in Emerson: Essays and Lectures (New York, New York: The Library of America, 1983), ISBN 978-0-940450-15-8.
• William White, Emmanuel Swedenborg, His Life and Writings, 2nd Ed., Rev. (xx, 767 p.; London, Simpkin, Marshall, and Co., 1868) – This is the second of White's two biographies of Swedenborg, the first one published in 1856 (White, W. Swedenborg: his life and writings Bath : I. Pitman, Phonetic Institution, 1856) and this second one in 1867. White worked for the Swedenborg Society in London and wrote an affirmative biography of Swedenborg. However, he was fired for publishing spiritist books and selling them at the Society's store, as well as otherwise interfering with the Society's function. White's response was the 1867 biography, in which he, in Tafel's words, "turn[ed] a complete somersault in his convictions," and wrote a highly derogatory biography of Swedenborg and his teachings. (The Swedenborg Epic footnote # 769) (R. Tafel, Documents Concerning the Life and Character of Emanuel Swedenborg, Vol. 3, p. 1284. London. Swedenborg Society 1890)

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• Works by Emanuel Swedenborg at Project Gutenberg
• Works by or about Emanuel Swedenborg at Internet Archive
• Works by Emanuel Swedenborg at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)