Most Christian churches today, encompassing the vast majority of Christians, teach that God consists of a Trinity of three Persons called the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. This doctrine emerged with the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD, and was stated more explicitly in the Athanasian Creed a century or two later. From there it became dominant in Christianity as a whole.

Emanuel Swedenborg (1688–1772) rejected the doctrine of a Trinity of Persons in God, saying instead that there is a Trinity of essential components in a single Person of God.

Followers of Swedenborg’s theology have historically been in a lonely position among Christians due to their rejection of the traditional Christian doctrine of the Trinity. However, in the early 1900s another movement, called Oneness Pentecostalism, arose that also rejected that doctrine.

The question naturally arises, then, whether Oneness Pentecostals agree with Swedenborg’s theology about the nature of God and the Trinity.

Here is the short answer, stated from the perspective of Swedenborg’s theology:

Swedenborg does agree with modalists, including Oneness Pentecostals, in affirming the full divinity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, while denying that they are three persons.

This has led to the common error of labeling Swedenborg and Swedenborgians “modalist.”

However, Swedenborg rejects the essential, defining modalist doctrine: that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are three different modes or manifestations of God to human beings.

Swedenborg, and Swedenborgians, are therefore not modalist in their doctrines and beliefs.

Now for a fuller answer.

First, we need to define God from the modalist, Oneness Pentecostal, and Swedenborgian perspectives.

For more on Swedenborg vs. the Oneness Pentecostal view of God, please click here to read on.