How I Would Help the World

by HELEN KELLER, Ray Silverman (Introduction)

Overview

Swedenborg’s books are an inexhaustible well-spring of satisfaction to those who live the life of the mind. I plunge my hands into my large Braille volumes containing his teachings, and withdraw them full of the secrets of the spiritual world.

— Helen Keller, How I Would Help the World

This essay by Helen Keller expresses her deep gratitude to Emanuel Swedenborg, the Swedish seer, who had a profound influence on her spiritual life. In it she talks about the importance of love and truth in a world filled with materialism and selfishness, and the joy that comes from true understanding.

Her great advice on how she would help the world is to have people read Swedenborg’s writings and thereby overcome the many problems of the human condition. She states, “It would be such a joy to me if I might be the instrument of bringing Swedenborg to a world that is spiritually deaf and blind.” She further states that reading Swedenborg and understanding his words “has been my strongest incitement to overcome limitations.”

Her words are interwoven with photographs of her life and quotes from Swedenborg on spiritual topics. This book will be a treasure for readers who already know and respect Helen Keller and an inspiration for those who do not.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780877856146
Publisher:	Swedenborg Foundation Publishers
Publication date:	04/01/2011
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	112
File size:	5 MB

About the Author

Helen Keller (1880–1968) was stricken with a disease that left her blind and deaf at only nineteen months of age, and the story of how her teacher, Anne Sullivan, was able to break through and help her learn to communicate became the inspiration for millions. Keller quickly learned to read and write, and later became the first blind and deaf person to earn a college degree when she graduated from Radcliffe College. She spent her life traveling and writing in support of a wide variety of social issues, and was the author of several books, including The Story of My Life; Teacher, Anne Sullivan Macy; and My Religion, which was more recently released as Light in My Darkness. She has been the subject of many other books and films and has received numerous honors for her work.

Read an Excerpt

There is among us a distressing indifference to all things of faith, and impatience at any effort to explain the laws of life in spiritual terms. The only really blind are those who will not see the truth—those who shut their eyes to the spiritual vision. For them alone, darkness is irrevocable. Those who explore the dark with love as a torch and trust as a guide find it good. Blind people who have eyes know that they live in a spiritual world inconceivably more wonderful than the material world that is veiled from them. The landscapes they behold never fade. The flowers they look upon are the immortal flowers which grow in God’s garden. Swedenborg’s message is like the rock smitten by Moses, yielding sweet streams of healing water, even an abundance of truths for those who hunger and thirst in their pilgrimage through an age of materialism and selfishness.

Table of Contents

Contents List of Illustrations Part One - Helen Keller: Seer of a New Civilization Part Two - How I Would Help the World Chapter One - A Great River of Light Chapter Two - A Noble Conception of God Chapter Three - A Love that Embraces All Appendix: The Three Essentials Further Reading Acknowledgments

Editorial Reviews

The life and writings of blind and deaf activist and humanitarian Keller (The Story of My Life) are well known. Less known are the role of Swedenborgian Christianity in her life and her important essay on the subject. This book includes that out-of-print piece as well as a substantial essay by Ray Silverman, editor of the 1994 edition of Keller's Light in My Darkness, which made clear for the first time Keller's faith in Swedenborg's beliefs. Keller's writing is always a marvel of lucidity, and Silverman adds to the store of our understanding of her and her faith. VERDICT Keller's example continues to inspire many, and this brief treatise and its apparatus help to explain her inner strength and continuing appeal; excellent for school groups, church groups, and all interested readers.

Library Journal