Emanuel Swedenborg, Secret Agent on Earth and in Heaven: Jacobites, Jews and Freemasons in Early Modern Sweden (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9789004183124)

Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772) won fame and infamy as a natural scientist and visionary theosopher, but he was also a master intelligencer, who served as a secret agent for the French king, Louis XV, and the pro-French, pro-Jacobite party of "Hats" in Sweden. This study draws upon unpublished diplomatic and Masonic archives to place his financial and political actitivities within their national and international contexts. It also reveals the clandestine military and Masonic links between the Swedish Hats and Charles Edward Stuart ("Bonnie Prince Charlie"), providing new evidence for the prince's role as hidden Grand Master of the Order of the Temple. Swedenborg's usage of Kabbalistic meditative and interpretative techniques and his association with Hermetic and Rosicrucian adepts reveal the extensive esoteric networks that underlay the exoteric politics of the supposedly "enlightened" eighteenth century, especially in the troubled "Northern World" of Sweden and Scotland.

Author: Marsha Keith Schuchard
ISBN-10: 9004183124
ISBN-13: 9789004183124
Publisher: Brill
Language: English
Published: 10/28/2011
Pages: 804
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 3.20lbs
Size: 9.70h x 6.70w x 2.00d

Review Citation(s):
Choice 06/01/2012