Swedenborg – Was he sexist?

Spiritual writer Emanuel Swedenborg is often seen as sexist. He wrote that a woman’s heart can remain elevated in higher heat longer than a man’s heart. According to this view, women, more than men, are capable of a deeper and more sustained sense of care and affection.

In contrast, Swedenborg wrote that a man’s mind can remain elevated to a higher light longer than a woman’s. In other words, a man finds it easier to think rationally and longer. He worries that the sensitive thoughts in his head drive his actions, or if they don’t, he wants them to appear so.

“The feminine nature is to feel and desire to reign, instead of understanding to reign and it is said that it is vice versa in the masculine “(Arcana Coelestia 568)

“It is masculine to perceive from understanding, and feminine to perceive from love” (Marital Love 168)

Gender roles according to Swedenborg

As a consequence of her view on the essence of being a woman or a man, she says that men cannot do what women can do because they do not have distinctive feminine feelings of affection.

Consequently, he writes that a male tends to know things in childhood, understand them in adolescence, and act wisely on them in adulthood. So he saw men engaged in jobs in which the thinking side predominates.

“To take care of the feeding of babes and the rearing of children of either sex, and to teach girls up to the age when they are given in marriage and transferred to the company of husbands, is the proper duty of the wife. But to see to the education of boys between infancy and adolescence, and beyond this until they become independent, is the proper duty of the husband.” (CL 176)

Swedenborg seems sexist

Today it seems that by discriminating between men and women, Swedenborg was being sexist. He wrote his books in Europe three hundred years ago. Since then there has been a sea change in the way the Western world views men and women. People these days now see men and women much more alike mentally and emotionally than previous generations did.

Women have entered the professions and achieved prominence in the public domain and are of equal value to men.

Individuals display to some extent a combination of gender-related behaviors and traits. For example, not all men are more aggressive than all women and not all women are nicer than all men, and this applies to a variety of characteristics. In common parlance we speak of a man struggling to get in touch with his ‘feminine side of him’.

There is now such a considerable overlap between what men and women do that many think that what they see as Swedenborg’s polarized view of gender difference is outdated and sexist.

According to this contemporary way of thinking, we need to liberate our understanding of what women and men can be. Some even say that there is no fundamental difference between the sexes other than bodily ones. Heterosexual attraction from this point of view is purely based on bodily differences.

I’m not so sure Swedenborg was sexist.

I am suggesting that Swedenborg was not sexist as he highly valued women as much as men. It is true that he often wrote in absolutist terms in a dogmatic style. However, I would say that in doing so he is providing general concepts. He then moves on to the details that show some degree of variation.

Swedenborg qualified what he had said about men and women. He suggested that both sexes understand what is true and have an affection for what is good. But in different proportions.

“… because the man is born to be the understanding of the truth, consequently, that predominates in him, and the woman is born to be the affection of the good, consequently, that predominates in her”. (Revelation 121 explained)

I would suggest that the differences between the sexes are biased: the female tends toward a subjective mental set and the male toward an objective mental set. This does not mean that she cannot be objective or subjective, but rather that she is often oriented towards the personal angle rather than the impersonal. Her inclination is to be concerned with the practical application and implications of ideas. Rather, he is more interested in the facts, logic, and principles behind the ideas themselves. She is inclined to express her heart and he her head.

personal growth

According to Swedenborg’s view of gender, it could be said that for a man to grow spiritually, he needs to learn from women: he needs to be influenced when women express feelings of care and sensitivity towards personal matters, so that he gains wisdom. moral. At the same time, a woman needs to learn from men. She benefits when men think objectively and rationally.

Is it really sexist to value each sex in this way, albeit in different ways?

There is an idea that the ‘physical chemistry’ between men and women reflects their opposite inner nature. According to this view, we are attracted to complementary elements in the other sex. These are unconscious in oneself.