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ABSTRACT
This article provides the first extensive study of Emanuel Swedenborg’s (1688–1772) views on Africans and slavery. Although significant scholarship has been devoted to Swedenborg’s influence on the British abolitionist movement in the 1780s-1790s, comparably little has been written on the ideas and context which inspired this influence in the first place. This article explores Swedenborg’s ties to networks and debates about African evangelization, colonization, and slavery during the neglected period of the Swedish Age of Liberty (1719–1772). It shows that Swedenborg was the first Swede to condemn slavery, as early as 1741, explains why he regarded slavery as a divine punishment in the afterlife for European missionaries, and why he presented sub-Saharan Africans as superior, in contrast to the dominant dismissive views of Linnaeus, Bäck, Kant, or Buffon. Like most Lutherans of his time, Swedenborg did not advocate the abolition of slavery, yet within a generation his provocative views about African superiority and spiritual emancipation were used by his followers to articulate their abolitionist agenda. Swedenborg’s millenarian doctrines more broadly re-harnessed biblical traditions about Africa and tropes about the bon sauvage, in a counter-example to narratives about the trope’s decline in the second half of the eighteenth century.
Acknowledgements
My gratitude to the peer reviewers and the editor, along with the scholars who provided me with insights, encouragements, support, and source materials for this research, especially Rob Iliffe, John Lidwell-Durnin, Brian Young, Catherine Jackson, Fredrik Thomasson, Hanna Hodacs, Petter Hellström, Matthew Daniel Eddy, Göran Rydén, Linda Andersson Burnett, Jacob Orrje, Maria Asp, Karl Grandin, James Wilson, Alex Murray, Stephen McNeilly, Noel Malcolm, Maxine Berg, Carl Wennerlind, and Craig Koslofsky. An early version of this paper received funding from the Senior Kirkaldy Prize 2021 for best essay in the history of science, awarded by the Oxford Centre for the History of Science, Medicine and Technology, University of Oxford.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 Swedenborg, Sapientia Angelica De Divina Providentia, §148:1, §149:4.
2 Rönnbäck, “Enlightenment, Scientific Exploration and Abolitionism”, 63–5, 81.
3 For studies of Swedenborg’s posterity in spiritualist, Mesmerist, and Romantic milieus, see Haller, Swedenborg, Mesmer; Wilkinson, Swedenborg and French Literary Culture.
4 See Rob Sunderlin’s Swedenborgianismens historia from 1886.
5 See Sundelin, Swedenborgianismens Historia; Dahlgren, Carl Bernhard Wadström; Sprinchorn, “Sjuttonhundratalets planer”; Bodman, “August Nordenskiöld”; Kup, “Adam Afzelius”; Kup, “John Clarkson”; Ambjörnsson, “La République de Dieu”; Braidwood, Black Poor; Nelson, “Carl Bernhard Wadström”; Schama, Rough Crossings; Coleman, Romantic Colonization; Clifford, From Slavery to Freetown; Walvin, The Slave Trade, Quakers; Rönnbäck, “Enlightenment, Scientific Exploration and Abolitionism”; Forshagge, “Varför var de gamla”; Hallengren, The Moment is Now; Persson, “Southern Darkness”.
6 See, for instance, Ambjörnsson, “La République de Dieu”, 254–73; Coleman, Romantic Colonization, 43–4; Hallengren, The Moment is Now; Dibb, A Love Affaire with Africa.
7 Dunér, The Natural Philosophy, 12.
8 Swedenborg has frequently been presented as a “passive prophet” by confessional believers, see e.g. Robsahm, Memoirs, 5; Duckworth, A Branching Tree; Lawrence; “A World Apart”.
9 The foundational studies of Michael Roberts, The Age of Liberty, and Charlotta Wolff’s Noble Conceptions of Politics during the period make almost no mention of these issues.
10 Linnaeus was related to Swedenborg and the Swedberg family by dint of Linnaeus’s marriage to Swedenborg’s little cousin Sara Elisabeth Moraea (1716–1806) in 1739. Acton, Letters and Memorials, I, 487–8.
11 Hudson, “From Nation to Race”, 247–8.
12 On the Swedish public being opposed to slavery, see Thomasson, “Knowledge, Silence and Denial”, 42.
13 Walvin, The Slave Trade, Quakers, 165.
14 On the trope’s decline during the eighteenth century until its mythical historiographical reinvention in the 1850s, see Ellingson, Myth of the Noble Savage, 45, 99. On increasingly negative depictions towards the end of the eighteenth century, see Ibid., 126.
15 Stange, “Lutheran Church and Negro Slavery”, 280. On Swedenborg’s lack of direct exhortation to end slavery, see Lawrence, “A World Apart”, 176.
16 For a pioneering assessment of this relationship, see Coleman, Romantic Colonization, 66.
17 Lawrence, “A World Apart”, 176–7.
18 Ibid.
19 For scholars suggesting the higher end of such estimates, see Lawrence, “A World Apart”, 176–7.
20 Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia (London, 1748–1756), Swedenborg, De Coelo (London, 1758), Swedenborg, De Nova Hierosolyma (London, 1758), Swedenborg, Doctrina Novae Hierosolymae de Scriptura Sacra (Amsterdam, 1763), Swedenborg, Continuatio de Ultimo Judicio (Amsterdam, 1763), Swedenborg, Sapientia Angelica De Divino Amore et de Divina Sapientia (Amsterdam, 1763), Swedenborg, Sapientia Angelica De Divina Providentia (Amsterdam, 1764), Swedenborg, Apocalypsis Revelata (Amsterdam, 1766), Swedenborg, De Amore Conjugiali (Amsterdam, 1768), and Swedenborg, Vera Christiana Religio (Amsterdam, 1771). Minor mentions of slavery also occur in Swedenborg, Oeconomia Regni Animalis II (London and Amsterdam, 1741) and Swedenborg, De Cultu et Amore Dei (London, 1745).
21 Unpublished works discussing Africans include Swedenborg, Spiritual Diary (1747–1765), Swedenborg, Index to Arcana Coelestia (1749), Swedenborg, Apocalypsis Explicata (1759), Swedenborg, De Athanasii Simbolo (1759), Swedenborg, De Ultimo Judicio (Posthumous) (1759), Swedenborg, De Verbo (1762), and Swedenborg, Index Operis De Amore Conjugiali (1767).
22 Mentions of slavery in unpublished manuscripts include Swedenborg, Explicatio in Verbum Historicorum Veteris Testamenti (1745–1747) Swedenborg, Spiritual Diary, Index to Arcana Coelestia, Apocalypsis Explicata, and Swedenborg, Coronis (1772).
23 Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia §2604; Swedenborg, De Coelo §326:1. On the natural rationality of Africans, see also Swedenborg, Vera Christiana Religio, §838:2. Swedenborg also presented Africans as more disposed to embrace the teachings of his millenarian New Jerusalem: see Swedenborg, Continuatio de Ultimo Judicio, §73, §75.
24 Acton, Letters and Memorials, I, 503.
25 Swedenborg, Spiritual Diary, §392.
26 Swedenborg, Spiritual Diary, §454: “et quod interiora desiderent, nam verba ponderant; dicunt, quod dum male tractantur tunc nigri sint et postmodum exuant nigredinem, ac induant candorem animae, et sic intrant in coelum”.
27 Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia §2603; Westphal, “The Click Languages”, 375–90.
28 Swedenborg, Spiritual Diary, §7392, §454, §460.
29 Swedenborg, Spiritual Experiences §432; Swedenborg, Continuatio de Ultimo Judicio §77.
30 Fromont, “Common Threads”, 847–50.
31 Danielsson, “Gustav Badin”, 46–56.
32 For reference to Swedenborg’s privileged relationship to the queen, see Roy-Di Piazza, “Ghosts from other planets”, 21.
33 Danielsson, “Gustav Badin”, 48. See also Östlund, “Playing the White Knight”.
34 For reference to Swedenborg’s multiple diners in the presence of the “whole royal family” thus likely involving Badin, see Sigstedt, The Swedenborg Epic, 406.
35 Basir, Badin’s Diary, i, 73, 42.
36 On the common features of Swedenborg’s memorabilia with dialogues of the dead, see Roy-Di Piazza, “Ghosts from other planets”, 19–21, 25.
37 Swedenborg, Spiritual Diary, §5811:2.
38 Swedenborg, Sapientia Angelica de Divino Amore et de Divina Sapientia, §11.
39 Swedenborg, Vera Christiana Religio §840.
40 Swedenborg, Continuatio de Ultimo Judicio §73 ; Swedenborg, Vera Christiana Religio, §837–9.
41 Swedenborg, De Coelo, §326.
42 Swedenborg, Continuatio de Ultimo Judicio, §72.
43 On the blurring of the two, see Thomasson, “Knowledge, Silence and Denial”, 40, 44. Swedenborg sometimes used “Moors” and “Ethiopians” as rare synonyms for Africans; the latter mostly in biblical contexts.
44 Swedenborg, Continuatio de Ultimo Judicio, §77. On Africans and conjugal love, see Swedenborg, De Amore Conjugiali, §113.
45 Swedenborg, De Amore Conjugiali §79, §291.
46 Roy-Di Piazza, Homo Maximus, 251–2; Swedenborg, Concerning the Messiah about to Come, iii–v, 1, 13, 98–9.
47 Armbjörnson, “La République de Dieu”, 253; Coleman, Romantic Colonization, 73–5.
48 Swedenborg, Continuatio de Ultimo Judicio, §120–1.
49 Parfitt, Black Jews in Africa, 3–23; Kidd, The Forging of Races.
50 Coleman, Romantic Colonization, 19.
51 Rix, “The Little Black Boy”, 135.
52 Swedenborg, De Athanasii Simbolo, §154.
53 Swedenborg, De Telluribus. On the links between travel literature, this work and the plurality of worlds debate, see Roy-Di Piazza, “Ghosts from other planets”, 13.
54 Compare e.g. Swedenborg, Continuatio de Ultimo Judicio, §76, with Swedenborg, De Amore Conjugiali, §113, and Swedenborg, De Telluribus, §158, §162.
55 Fullagar, The Savage Visit, 127.
56 Helander, Emanuel Swedenborg Ludus Heliconius, 204.
57 For an extensive study of the trope, including discussions about the extent of its historical validity, see Elligson, The Myth of the Noble Savage.
58 Bergquist, Swedenborg’s Secret, 469–82.
59 Thomasson, “Knowledge, Silence and Denial”, 38.
60 Thomasson, “Knowledge, Silence and Denial”, 38, 40.
61 On the Swedish public being opposed to slavery, see Thomasson, “Silence, Knowledge and Denial”, 42. On Swedenborg’s memorabilia addressing contemporary debates, see Roy-Di Piazza, “Ghosts from other planets”, 22–5.
62 On associations between African savagery and barbarism etc., see Fullagar, “Reynolds’ New Masterpiece”, 197–8. On African Arcadia, see Persson, “Southern Darkness”, 5.
63 Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia, §2567:7.
64 On ear-piercing, see Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia, §3869:11; on trials, §1846:2.
65 Whitford, The Curse of Ham.
66 Bäck, “Om Negrernas Svarta Hud”, 9–15. On the evolution of studies of black skin towards scientific racism around 1750, see Koslofsky, “Knowing Skin”, 795; Hudson, “From Nation to Race”, 247–8, 253–4.
67 Bäck, “Om Negrernas Svarta Hud”, 13–15.
68 On the curse, see Goldenberg, The Curse of Ham; Whitford, The Curse of Ham in the Early Modern Era.
69 On Linnaeus’s statements about Africans, see Charmantier, Linnaeus and Race.
70 Tawil, The Making of Racial Sentiment, 43. See also Müller-Wille, “Linnaeus and the Four Corners”, 192.
71 On Swedenborg’s wider influence on Linnean naturalists, see Forshage, “Varför var de gamla”, 109–30.
72 Rönnbäck, “Enlightenment, Scientific Exploration and Abolitionism”, 80–1. On the views of Linnaeus’s apostles about natives, see also Rausing, “Underwriting the Economy”, 193.
73 Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia, §1062–3, see the New Century Edition for Hebrew commentary. For Swedenborg’s other commentaries on the curse of Ham, see Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia, §975, §1077, §1083, §1093.
74 On Bäck’s views about the curse of Ham, see Bäck, “Om Negrernas Svarta Hud”.
75 Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia, §891.
76 Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia, §1703, §6895:2, §7093:2, §10409. On spiritual captivity, see Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia, §8049, §8866.
77 Bergquist, Swedenborg’s Secret, 329–30. For Swedenborg’s earliest statements about Africans in the spiritual world, see Swedenborg, Spiritual Diary, §4740, §4777, §5517, §5518, §5519.
78 Swedenborg, De Ultimo Judicio, §74.
79 Koch, “Slavery, Mission and the Perils of Providence”, 375, 393.
80 Thornton, “African Dimensions”, 1106; Vartija, “Revisiting Enlightenment”, 608; Swedenborg, Oeconomia Regni Animalis, II, §323.
81 For a list of the work’s reviewers, see Ryder, A Descriptive Bibliography, I, 430.
82 Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia, §5647.
83 On Moravians, spiritual emancipation, and enslaved Africans, see Raphael-Hernandez, “The Right to Freedom”, 468–9.
84 Swedenborg, Continuatio de Ultimo Judicio, §78.
85 Voltemat, Gienwäg til de förnämsta europäiska, I, 103–8.
86 Enslaved by hell: Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia, §6281. On infernal freedom, see Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia, §9590; Swedenborg, De Coelo, §603:4, Swedenborg, De Divina Providentia, §149; Swedenborg, Vera Christiana Religio, §495:3. On infernal freedom being slavery, see Swedenborg, De Divina Providentia §97:8, §145:4; Swedenborg, Apocalypsis Explicata, §1155:4; Swedenborg, Vera Christiana Religio, §495:3.
87 On slavery in hell, see Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia, §8293; Swedenborg, De Coelo, §574:2; Swedenborg, De Nova Hierosolyma, §73, §142.
88 Swedenborg, Sapientia Angelica De Divina Providentia, §148:1, §149:4.
89 “Slave to the Lord”, Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia, §5763. “Slave under sin”, Swedenborg, Apocalypsis Revelata, §578.
90 Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia, §905.
91 Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia, §2890, §9586. Heavenly freedom is emancipation from self-love: Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia, §2884–5; on the role of diabolical spirits in spiritual slavery, see Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia, §892, §2890.
92 Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia, §456 ; Swedenborg, De Coelo, §404.
93 Armbjörnson, “La République de Dieu”, 263, 273.
94 Swedenborg, Vera Christiana Religio, §400:9.
95 Petry, Carl Von Linné Nemesis Divina, 95, 206. The precise date of Linnaeus’s statements on slavery remains unknown, as he wrote Nemesis Divina over thirty years (1740s–1770s).
96 Thomasson, “Knowledge, Silence and Denial”, 33.
97 Ibid.
98 Keith Tribe, Baltic Cameralism, 39–41. See also Rausing, “Underwriting the Economy”, 177.
99 Acton, Letters and Memorials, I, 299–30, 318. For Swedenborg’s four economic memorials to the Riksdag, see Ryder, A Descriptive Bibliography, I, 313, 315, 317, 320.
100 Acton, Letters and Memorials, I, 318; Gill, “The Affair of Porto Novo”, 47–8; Sakano and Tamaki, “Swedish trade”, 43.
101 Evans and Rydén, “Voyage Iron”, 11–12, 14. The profits of Swedish iron merchants funded the construction of the London Swedish Church; on this, see Roy-Di Piazza, Homo Maximus, 28.
102 On musket barrels built in West Africa with Swedish iron, see Evans and Rydén, “Voyage Iron”, 22.
103 Svenskt Biografiskt Lexikon (SBL), “Claes Grill”.
104 Ibid..
105 For discussion of mercantilism versus capitalism during the period, see Hughes, Circulating Ceramics, 5, 74.
106 Thornton, “African Dimensions”, 1106.
107 Rausing, “Underwriting the Economy”, 185; Wennerlind, “Theatrum Oeconomicum”, 111–14. On the “Oeconomia Animalis” as a Dutch cartesian genre, see Booth, A Subtle and mysterious machine, 82–7.
108 Hodacs et al, Linnaeus, natural history, and the circulation of knowledge.
109 Burnett, “Collecting Humanity”, 2–5.
110 Voltemat, Gienwäg til de förnämsta europäiska, I, 103–8.
111 Fur, “Different ways”, 47.
112 Swedenborg, De Fibra, §537.
113 Wennerlind, “Atlantis Restored”, 1690.
114 The links between those issues outside of Sweden have been extensively studied in Frykenberg, Christians and Missionaries in India.
115 SBL, “Jesper Swedberg”.
116 Hoffecker et al., New Sweden in America, 324–5. See also SBL, “Jesper Swedberg”.
117 Stange, “Lutheran Church and Negro Slavery”, 273, 280. For reference to the enslavement of both Africans and indigenous native Americans in New England, see Newell, Brethren by Nature, 5.
118 On Jesper Swedberg and the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, see SBL, “Jesper Swedberg”. On Swedenborg giving all proceedings to the Society, see Ryder, Descriptive Bibliography, II, 186.
119 Fullagar, Savage Visits, 42–3, 46. Coincidentally, Swedenborg titled his last publication The True Christian Religion (Swedenborg, Vera Christiana Religio, Amsterdam, 1771).
120 Acton, Letters and Memorials, I, 34. On anti-slavery debates, see Carey, From Peace to Freedom, 106. For Hesselius’s accounts of his travels to America, see Hesselius, Kort berettelse.
121 On these early discourses, see also Carey, From Peace to Freedom, 143–8.
122 Carey, From Peace to Freedom, 147.
123 On Quakers in the spiritual world, see Swedenborg, Continuatio de Ultimo Judicio, §83–5.
124 Swedenborg, De Telluribus, §61; Roy-Di Piazza, “Ghosts from other planets”, 484.
125 On Swedenborg and the Zinzendorf Moravians, see Bergquist, Diary, 31–4. On Moravian evangelizing in the Americas, see Stange, “Lutheran Church and Negro Slavery”, 279. For evidence of the group’s early action on the Danish Gold Coast, see Van Gent, “Rethinking Savagery”, 30; Raphael-Hernandez, “The Right to Freedom”, 460.
126 Hessayon, “Jacob Boehme, Emanuel Swedenborg”, 337–84.
127 Tafel, Documents, II, 603.
128 Chaplin, “The Problem of Genius”, 12.
129 On Kant’s views on race and Africans, see Kant, “On the Distinctiveness of Races in general”, 16–24. See also Chukwudi, Race and the Enlightenment, 39–48; Lauer and Rupke, Johann Friedrich Blumenbach.
130 For an overview of Swedenborg’s fame as a theologian, see Roy-Di Piazza, “Ghosts from other planets”, 21–6.
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Vincent Roy-Di Piazza
Vincent Roy-Di Piazza is an early modern historian of science, religion and the Northern World. He recently completed his D.Phil. at the University of Oxford (2022) in history of science, medicine, economic, and social history. His other peer-reviewed publications include research articles in Annals of Science (2020) and Etudes Germaniques (2021).