Life of Emanuel Swedenborg: Together with a brief synopsis of his writings, both philosophical and theologicalWhite, William
Religion
Life of Emanuel Swedenborg: Together with a brief synopsis of his writings, both philosophical and theological
White, William
Mystics -- Sweden -- Biography; Swedenborg, Emanuel, 1688-1772
“The Brief Exposition of the Doctrines of the New Church” is an
exposition effected by means of comparisons between the doctrines of the
New Church and those of Catholics and Protestants. The work is avowedly
only a sketch, and the precursor of a larger book—“The True Christian
Religion”—a work of some years, which will shortly demand our attention.
The Catholic doctrinals are taken from the records of the Council of
Trent; and the Protestant from the Formula Concordiæ, composed by persons
attached to the Augsburg Confession. The disagreements between the tenets
of the Old and New Churches are considered under twenty-five Articles,
the heads of which we will condense and present to the reader.
The Churches which, by the Reformation, separated themselves from
the Roman Catholic Church, differ in various points of doctrine; but
they all agree in the Articles concerning a Trinity of Persons in the
Godhead, original sin from Adam, imputation of the merit of Christ,
and justification by faith alone. The Roman Catholics, before the
Reformation, held and taught exactly the same things as the Reformed did
after it, in respect to these points; only with this difference, that
they conjoined faith with charity or good works.
The leading Reformers, Luther, Melancthon, and Calvin, retained all the
tenets concerning a Trinity of Persons in the Godhead, original sin,
imputation of the merits of Christ, and justification by faith, just as
they were, and had been, among the Roman Catholics; but they separated
charity or good works from that faith, and declared at the same time that
they were not of a saving efficacy, with a view to be totally severed
from the Roman Catholics as to the very essentials of the Church, which
are faith and charity. Nevertheless the leading Reformers adjoined good
works, and even conjoined them to their faith, but in man as a passive
subject; whereas the Roman Catholics conjoin them in man as an active
subject; and notwithstanding this, there is actually a conformity between
the one and the other as to faith, works, and merit.
The whole system of theology in the Christian World, at this day, is
founded on an idea of three Gods, arising from the doctrine of a Trinity
of Persons, and when this doctrine is rejected, then all the tenets of
the aforesaid theology fall to pieces. The truth of this must be apparent
to every one. The Doctrine of a Trinity of Persons in the Divine Being,
is the key-stone of Roman Catholic and Protestant theology. If this
Doctrine be false, the whole structure totters to its fall.
When the faith in three Gods is rejected, then it is possible to receive
the true and saving faith, which is a faith in One God, united with good
works.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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