BOSTRÖM, CHRISTOPHER JACOB. – Swedish philosopher, born in Pitea in 1797, died in Upsala, where he was a professor, in 1866. Although following Bibert and Grubbe, he developed his own system, which exerted a great influence on the thought of Sweden and is expressed in a form of national idealism.
The universe is conceived as a hierarchy of conscious and personal beings, at whose summit is absolute perfection. God, from whom every idea of space and time is excluded, and whose eternal forms or ideas constitute the foundation of finite natures or persons. One therefore remains within pantheism, and creation is denied.
The works of B. (among the principal ones: De pantheismi relate ad religionem habitu dis; De nexu rerum cum Deo) are published in Samla de Shrifter, edited by G. J. Keijser and H. Edfeldt (parts 1 and 2, Upsala 1883; part 3, Stockholm 1901).