INTRODUCTION

Swedenborg (1688-1772) worked for decades as a scientist (especially metallurgy and mining), but his reputation today is primarily as a mystic. He kept a dream journal during the period of his great change from engineer to visionary, early 1743 to late '44; one of the world's oldest surviving dream-journals. It was never meant for publication--scrawled, with scratch-outs, abbreviations and highly personal references--difficult even before translation. However, Swedenborg's scientific habits serve him well--dates are clear, dreams are in sequence, and he regularly attempts interpretation; he's practical, reasonable, and sometimes records multiple possibilities.

Yet he was devout; he seems determined to emulate Christ, purging all selfish and worldly urges to become, essentially, a saint. Curious ambition for a scientist! Odder still, he achieved it--at least his practical demonstrations of miraculous knowledge (see Swedenborg's Visions) were the best-documented of his century; he influenced Blake and Emerson, and troubled Kant. If he'd been Catholic he'd likely be a saint--if a controversial one like Francis of Assisi. As it is, he's a strange, powerful figure making both scientists and conventional Christians uncomfortable. Good for him!

HEADSMAN

Hideous dreams: how the executioner roasted the head he had struck off; and laid one roast head after the other in an empty oven that never got full. It was said that it was his meat. He was a great big woman; smiled; had a little girl with him.

Afterwards the Wicked One carried me into sundry deeps and bound me. I do not remember it all. Was cast, bound all over, into hell.

Editor's Note

Wilson van Dusen's introduction to Swedenborg's journal insists his dreams, like all dreams, want him to develop into a well-balanced personality, in his case by taming his over-intellectualism. I often find van Dusen too-narrowly Jungian; but here he makes sense. Compare with Jenny Badger Sultan's dream My Ritual Beheading, Carla Young's A Work of Art, or my own The Head Factory.

Source: Swedenborg's Journal of Dreams 1743-1744, 1989 ed. with intro by Wilson van Dusen. Paragraphs 136-137. Descriptive titles are mine; untitled in journal. Interpretations are Swedenborg's, though run together with dream text; I offset interpretations for clarity.

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