Barrett, Benejamin Fisk

BARRETT, BENJAMIN FISK: Swedenborgian; b. at Dresden, Me., June 24, 1808; d. at Germantown, Penn., Aug. 6, 1892. He was graduated at Bowdoin, 1832, and at the Harvard Divinity School, 1838; became a Swedenborgian, 1839; was pastor of the New Church Society, New York, 1840-48; in Cincinnati 1848-50; after a temporary retirement because of ill health became pastor in Philadelphia; president and corresponding secretary of the Swedenborg Publishing Association, Philadelphia, 1871. He was editor of The Swedenborgian, 1858-60, and of The New Church Monthly, 1867-70 (when it was merged in The New Church Independent). He compiled and edited The Swedenborg Library, giving the substance of Swedenborg’s theological teachings (12 vols., Philadelphia, 1876-81). His books include a Life of Emanuel Swedenborg (New York, 1841); Lectures on the Doctrines of the New Church (1842; title afterward changed to Lectures on the New Dispensation); Beauty for Ashes, or the old and new doctrine concerning the state of infants after death contrasted (1855); The Golden Reed, or the true measure of a true church (1855); The Question concerning the Visible Church (1856; new ed., with title The Apocalyptic New Jerusalem, Philadelphia, 1883); Catholicity of the New Church (1863); The New View of Hell (1870); The Golden City (1874); The New Church, its nature and whereabouts (1877); Swedenborg and Channing (1879); The Question [what are the doctrines of the New Church?] Answered (1883); Heaven Revealed (1885).

Bibliography: J. R. Irelan, From Different Points of View: B. F. Barrett, Preacher. Writer, Theologian, and Philosopher, Germantown, 1896.