• NEW! LOWEST RATES EVER -- SUPPORT THE SHOW AND ENJOY THE VERY BEST PREMIUM PARACAST EXPERIENCE! Welcome to The Paracast+, eight years young! For a low subscription fee, you can download the ad-free version of The Paracast and the exclusive, member-only, After The Paracast bonus podcast, featuring color commentary, exclusive interviews, the continuation of interviews that began on the main episode of The Paracast. We also offer lifetime memberships! Flash! Take advantage of our lowest rates ever! Act now! It's easier than ever to susbcribe! You can sign up right here!

    Subscribe to The Paracast Newsletter!

Swedenborg?


U

unhandyandy

Guest
I've never heard any reference to Swedenborg on the show. I have a fat volume of his visions of Heaven and Hell which I have, uh, paged through. He seems to report the kind of things you'd expect from an enlightenment intellectual - not particularly impressive. But his story is remarkable. He was a mining engineer in 18th century Sweden who began having visions in middle age. His clairvoyance was looked into by Kant of all people, who thought it genuine. He influenced William Blake, and Helen Keller later was a member of the Swedenborgian church.
 
Thanks for posting andy and welcome to the forums,

Never heard of this guy and I thought it best to put a wiki link up for everyone,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emanuel_Swedenborg

Sounds like an interesting chap, his ideas on the relationship between matter and spirit sound so very modern, having said that I guess Man has always been modern and his Nebular hypothesis, seems to have stood the test of time. Also his thoughts on the Christian belief in the holy trinity are interesting to me.

That's one of the aspects of that paticular religion that has always interested me as that attitude does in some way to me at least, seem to incorporate some concept of unknowable otherness, perhaps paranormal would be a better word. What I am getting at is personally I dont believe we are simply dualistic creatures though we do tend to act that way most of the time. It is that third hidden for the most part facet to our nature that I think brings us all here for instance.

I know what I've just said might sound a little hazy and confused but I've just got up and the coffee hasn't kicked in yet. :)

Mark
 
A close friend of mine grew up in a household of Swedenborg followers, I've been trying to coordinate with him to get him on the show. It'll happen soon.

dB
 
Cool, I look forward to hearing from your friend David. I'm always keen to hear about other peoples beliefs and the Swedenborgian church is something I had never heard of.
I looked them up through wikipedia last night for anyone interested,
http://www.swedenborg.org/

Mark
 
Back
Top