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Rosicrucianism in the Early Modern Period in Sweden

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Rosicrucianism in the Early Modern Period in Sweden Early Modern Rosicrucianism in Sweden 439 Chapter 54 Early Modern Rosicrucianism in Sweden Rosicrucianism in the Early Modern Period in Sweden Susanna Åkerman Johannes Bureus: the First Swedish Rosicrucian The Rosicrucian message reached Sweden shortly after the anonymous publi- cation of the original Rosicrucian Manifestos in Germany. When the Royal archivist Johannes Bureus (1568–1652) had read the first Rosicrucian tract Fama Fraternitatis RC (Kassel, 1614), which presents a secret society guarding hidden knowledge soon to be revealed, he published his own answer to the Rosicrucian call in his short tract FRC Fama e Scanzia redux (1616), which in seven sections presents biblical verses pointing to the dawning of the new age. It was in particular the prophetic aspects of the Rosicrucian movement that seem to have attracted Bureus, and in his tract he draws special attention to Balaam’s passage on the coming of ‘a star out of Jacob and [that] a sceptre shall rise out of Israel’ (Numbers 24:17), an allusion to the hidden significance of the new star of 1602 in the Swan, also called the Northern Cross, and the second one in Serpentarius (the “Serpent-Bearer”, now more commonly referred to as Ophiuchus) in 1604, both mentioned in the Rosicrucian Fama. To explain his vision, Bureus uses prophecies ‘from the jawbone of the Ass’ – Balaam’s Ass – who before anyone else saw the Angel of the Lord (Numbers 22:23). Signed “BisvATI Ierubbabel”, a signature that conceals an inverted acro- nym of Bureus’ full, Latinised name Johannes Thomae Agrivilensis Bureus, or ITAB, his pamphlet was called Buccina Jubilei Ultimi – The Trumpet of the Ultimate Jubilee with the subtitle Hyperboreic Prediction of Eos, Smiting With Resplendent Noise the Summits of the Mountains of Europe, Sounding Amidst the Hills and Valleys of Arabia. The pamphlet specifically announces recent discov- eries of “northern antiquities” that would be instrumental for the new reform of science, arts, and society. Essential to Bureus’ work was the idea of a prisca theologia – ancient theol- ogy – the Renaissance concept denoting a supposedly pristine form of thought created at the very beginning of time, yet still valid. Key to this idea of the ancient theology was the belief that the Christian doctrine of salvation had already been formulated during an early Golden Age, albeit in pagan terms. © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2016 | doi 10.1163/9789004325968_056 440 Åkerman The wisdom of the ancients was generally attributed to figures such as Hermes and Zoroaster. Bureus’ ideas on the northern antiquities constitute a similar theory about a form of proto-Christian knowledge, but in his case ancient wis- dom is seen as part of the spiritual heritage of the northern, Hyperborean peoples. Toward the end of his life, Bureus dedicated a manuscript to the com- ing Queen Christina with speculations on the mystical origin of the Runes, entitled Adulruna rediviva (1643), as well as a copy of his apocalyptic work, Nord landalejonsens rytande (The Roar of the Northern Lion, 1644). Bureus begins the latter with a passage directed to Queen Christina on the succession of three ages, the third and final of which would soon commence. Perhaps he also showed her his answer to the Rosicrucian Fama. Bureus’ presence at the court may have influenced Christina’s interest in Christian esoteric mysticism and at the same time have given her hope for a new and highly effective spa- gyric and alchemical medicine. Bureus’ writings had a small but interested readership, and he sent his Fama e Scanzia redux to the Boehme scholar Abraham von Franckenberg, who in turn in 1646 sent it on to the famous Jesuit and Hermeticist Athanasius Kircher in Rome. Franckenberg discussed Bureus with Kircher in a series of letters up until 1652 (see Kircher’s correspondence, deposited at Archivio Pontificale Universitario Gregoriana, Rome). Gustaf Bonde The most important person connected to the Golden Rosy Cross in eighteenth- century Sweden was the parliamentarian and count Gustaf Bonde till Björnö (1682–1764), one of Emanuel Swedenborg’s colleagues at the Board of Mines and an avid collector of Rosicrucian pamphlets. The Order of the Golden and Rosy Cross, which influenced Bonde, was secretly founded in Naples 1678, but was made known to the world in 1710 by Sincerus Renatus (Samuel Richter) under the formal name Orden des Gülden- und Rosen Creutzes. Their aim was to perfect the soul of initiated individuals through alchemy. Gustaf Bonde developed his own form of excremental alchemy, based on swallowing the same golden nugget each morning, thus using the body as an athanor. In his anonymous mythopoetic and alchemical study, Clavicula her­ metica scientiae ab quaedam hyperboreo (The Small Key to the Hermetic Sciences, 1751), Bonde places John Dee’s famous Monas symbol among the numbers that form a Pythagorean tetractus (a pyramid of dots in the series 1, 2, .
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