On the True Philosopher and the True Philosophy: Essays on Swedenborg

On the True Philosopher and the True Philosophy: Essays on Swedenborg addresses how few attempts have been made to integrate the work of eighteenth-century Swedish philosopher and mystic Emanuel Swedenborg into the history of ideas. Monographs have been written, but little has been done to introduce his thought directly into philosophical debate. Today, when one encounters the name of Swedenborg, one does so all too often as a footnote to specialist studies of the eighteenth century. Even here, however, he is misquoted, misjudged or simply misunderstood.
 
This volume of essays, beginning with a look at Immanuel Kant's reading of Swedenborg, aims to shed new light on common misconceptions. Drawing on comparisons with Arthur Schopenhauer, Christian Wolff, Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz, and others, the essays show Swedenborg to be a much greater influence than previously acknowledged and a key component of subsequent nineteenth- and twentieth-century thought. This volume, the second of the Journal of the Swedenborg Society series, contains the following seven essays:
 
• Michelle Grier, “Swedenborg and Kant on Spiritual Intuition”
• Gregory R. Johnson, “Swedenborg’s Positive Influence on Kant’s Moral Philosophy”
• Francesca Maria Crasta, “Metaphysics and Biology: Thoughts on the Interaction of the Soul and Body in Emanuel Swedenborg”
• Michael Costello, “Swedenborg and the Comparative Philosophy of the Soul”
• Gregory R. Johnson, “Swedenborg and Schopenhauer”
• Lars Bergquist, “Swedenborg and Heavenly Hermeneutics”
• José Antonio Antón-Pacheco, “Representation and Concept in Swedenborg”
 
Also included are an introduction by Stephen McNeilly, a chronology of Swedenborg, and an index.