Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772)

(1688-1772) Philosopher, theologian and scientist

Born Emanuel Swedberg (the family name was changed to Swedenborg in 1719) in Stockholm, the son of a leading clergyman who later became Bishop of Skara, he was educated at the University of Uppsala, graduating in 1709, having developed a fascination for the natural sciences and mathematics. He continued his studies in England, the Netherlands, France and Germany before returning to Sweden in 1715 to edit the country's first scientific journal "Daedalus Hyperboreus". His early years were spent in researching and recording Sweden's current scientific scene, but the second half of his life was devoted to theology and a synthesis of science and Christian doctrine, and it is for his theological writings that he is remembered. He rejected the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, and saw the Bible as the immediate direct word of God.

Swedenborg died in London in 1772 and was buried in the Swedish Church there, but was reburied in Uppsala Cathedral in 1908. The New, or Swedenborgian, Church was founded in 1788 in his name and memory in Eastcheap, London and continues to this day. He had no hand in its foundation other than to suggest that a new church had been foretold in the book of Daniel.

In the year before he died Swedenborg presented to the University Library a set of his work "Vera Christiana religio continens universam theologiam novae ecclesiae a Domino apud Danielem ..." (2 volumes, Amsterdam: 1771), a collation of his theological writing and thinking.