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- SPINOZA IN DEBATE
- BIBLIOGRAPHY
KNOWLEDGEKnowledge has three main grades, in order of its adequacy: (1) knowledge by hearsay and vague experience; (2) knowledge by general reasoning; (3) intuitive rational insight. The first type of knowledge yields emotion and activity of an essentially confined sort; human liberation consists in movement through the second to the third type of knowledge. Only at that level do we cease to be victims of emotions which we do not properly understand and cannot control. The third type of knowledge ultimately yields the 'intellectual love of God', Spinoza's version of salvation. More informally put, Spinoza regards us in bondage so far as we are under the control of external things and as free to the extent that we meet life with creative understanding of what will best serve the purposes that adequate ideas will determine in us. One may still wonder how far Spinoza is really committed to what one might call a religious view of the world. He was certainly against all forms of religion which he regarded as life-denying and which view the present life as a mere preparation for a life to come. Rather, Spinoza argues, our primary aim should be joyous living in the here and now. This should ideally culminate in that “quasi-mystical grasp of our eternal place in the scheme of things, and oneness with God, or nature, which he calls the intellectual love of God.” Love of God, in this sense, should be the focal aim of the wise one's life. As for religion he clearly thought that a good deal of it was mere superstition, creating intolerance and in many ways being unhelpful as a basis for a genuinely good life. But he also thought that for “the mass of people, who are incapable of the philosopher's intellectual love of God, a good popular religion could act as a morally worthy substitute, providing a less complete form of salvation available to all who live morally and love God, as they conceive him, appropriately, provided only that their love of God is of a type which promotes obedience to the basic commands of morality.” To make his case that God does not willfully direct the course of nature, he first explains why people think that God acts with a purpose. First, he notes that individual humans do not act freely, but are under the illusion that they do. We are ignorant of the true causes of things, but only aware of our own desire to pursue what is useful. Thus, we think we are free. Given this tendency to see human behavior as willful and purposeful, we continue by imposing willful purposes on events outside of us. We conclude that God willfully guides external events for our benefit. Religious superstitions arose as humans found their own ways of worshipping God. Problems of consistency also arose as people insisted that everything in nature is done by God for a purpose. Since natural disasters conflict with the view that God acts with a purpose, we then say that God's judgment transcends human understanding. For Spinoza, mathematics offers a standard of truth which refutes the view that God acts with a purpose. God does not act from a purpose, argues Spinoza. First, the concept of a perfect final goal is flawed. For Spinoza, the most perfect of God's acts are those closest to him. Succeeding events further down the chain are more imperfect. Thus if a given chain of events culminated in sunny weather, for example, that would be less perfect than the initial events in the chain. Belief in final causes compromises God's perfection since it implies that he desires something which he lacks. For Spinoza, the theologian's contention that God willfully directs all natural events amounts to a reduction to ignorance. That is, all natural events trace back to God's will, and we are all ignorant of God's will. Theologians insist on this path of ignorance since it preserves their authority. Finally, Spinoza maintains that belief in God's willful guidance of nature gives rise to an erroneous notion of value judgments, such as goodness, order, and beauty. These values are presumed to be objective abstract notions imposed on nature by God for our benefit. However, Spinoza contends that all of these value judgments in fact arise out of our own human construction and human preferences. For example, things are well-ordered when they require little imagination and are easily remembered. He sees that this is also the case with beauty, fragrance, and harmony. The variety of controversies we have on these topics arise from our differing human constructions. SPINOZA IN DEBATESpinoza could be used in debate to challenge the religious undertones of values. He could also be used to advocate for freedom of thought in all cases. If an opponent presents a value that could lead to censorship, restricting rights, or any other infringement on freedom, Spinoza could be used as evidence that such action would be harmful. However, Spinoza could also be used to support the idea that the "masses" cannot make decisions for themselves. This could support policies or advocacies that want government control in order to protect the larger citizenry from their inability to comprehend complicated arguments and philosophy. BIBLIOGRAPHYBidney, David, THE PSYCHOLOGY AND ETHICS OF SPINOZA; A STUDY IN THE HISTORY AND LOGIC OF IDEAS. New York: Russell & Russell, 1962. Browne, Lewis. BLESSED SPINOZA; A BIOGRAPHY OF THE PHILOSOPHER. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1932. Damasio, Antonio, LOOKING FOR SPINOZA: JOY, SORROW AND THE FEELING BRAIN. Orlando, Fla.: Harcourt, 2003. de Deugd, C. THE SIGNIFICANCE OF SPINOZA'S FIRST KIND OF KNOWLEDGE. Assen, Van Gorcum, 1966 Della Rocca, Michael. REPRESENTATION AND THE MIND-BODY PROBLEM IN SPINOZA. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996. Deleuze, Gilles. SPINOZA: PRACTICAL PHILOSOPHY. San Francisco: City Lights Books, 1988 Donagan, Alan. SPINOZA. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1989. Freeman, Eugene and Maurice Mandelbaum. SPINOZA: ESSAYS IN INTERPRETATION. La Salle, Ill., Open Court, 1975 Garrett, Don. THE CAMBRIDGE COMPANION TO SPINOZA. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996. Hampshire, Stuart. SPINOZA. New York: Penguin Books, 1987. Harris, Errol E. SALVATION FROM DESPAIR; A REAPPRAISAL OF SPINOZA'S PHILOSOPHY. The Hague, Martinus Nijhoff, 1973. Hart, Alan. SPINOZA'S ETHICS, PART I AND II: A PLATONIC COMMENTARY. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1983. Kashap, S. Paul. SPINOZA AND MORAL FREEDOM. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1987. Kennington, Richard, THE PHILOSOPHY OF BARUCH SPINOZA. Washington: Catholic University of America Press, 1980. Koistinen, Olli and John Biro. SPINOZA: METAPHYSICAL THEMES. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. Lloyd, Genevieve. ROUTLEDGE PHILOSOPHY GUIDEBOOK TO SPINOZA AND THE ETHICS. New York: Routledge, 1996. McKeon, Richard. THE PHILOSOPHY OF SPINOZA; THE UNITY OF HIS THOUGHT. New York: Longmans, Green and Co., 1928. McShea, Robert J. THE POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY OF SPINOZA. New York, Columbia University Press, 1968. Nadler, Steven., SPINOZA: A LIFE. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999. ---, SPINOZA'S HERESY: IMMORTALITY AND THE JEWISH MIND. New York: Oxford University Press, 2001. Preus, J. Samuel. SPINOZA ANDF THE IRRELEVENCE OF BIBLICAL AUTHORITY. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001. Scruton, Roger. SPINOZA. New York: Oxford University Press, 1986. Smith, Steven B. SPINOZA, LIBERALISM, AND THE QUESTION OF JEWISH IDENTITY. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1997. Spinoza, Benedict. SHORT TREATISE ON GOD, MAN, AND HUMAN WELFARE. Chicago: The Open Court Pub. Co., 1909. ---, THE POLITICAL WORKS, THE TRACTATUS THEOLOGICO-POLITICUS IN PART, AND THE TRACATUS POLTICS IN FULL. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1965 ---, THE ETHICS. Malibu: J. Simon Publisher, 1981. Wetlesen, Jon. THE SAGE AND THE WAY: SPINOZA'S ETHICS OF FREEDOM. Assen: Van Gorcum, 1979. Wolfson, Abraham. SPINOZA, A LIFE OF REASON. New York: Modern Classics, 1932. Wolfson, Harry. THE PHILSOPHY OF SPINOZA, UNFOLDING THE LATENT PROCCESSES OF REASONING. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1948. Yovel, Yirmiyahu. SPINOZA AND OTHER HERETICS. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1989. 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