On the last day of his life, before his death at the age of 44 32 Consequently, because God is that one infinite substance, and because that makes modes necessarily finite, it follows that there are limits to their existences, and thus, one may claim that that also makes them determinate. When you see the shadow, it defines the light. Heres some Feeling grateful? As men's habits of mind differ, so that some more readily embrace one form of faith, some another, for what moves one to pray may move another to scoff, I conclude that everyone should be free to choose for himself the foundations of his creed, and that faith should be judged only by its fruits; each would then obey God freely with his whole heart, while nothing would be publicly honored save justice and charity. That is, Spinoza believes that through the application of reason, people can gain knowledge, and by doing so, inadequate ideas cease to influence them, and thus, emotions such as sadness can no longer affect them. Remarkable Last Words (or Near-Last Words). And Im so focused. Do not get caught in the drama of white hats or black hats, or good guys or bad guys. Lastly, by maintaining that God is perfect and that the existence of sadness derives from ignorance, and not him/her, this essay hoped to argue effectively that Gods perfection is still justifiable, despite the realities of sadness. God is the Immanent Cause of all things, never truly transcendent from them. God decides when were done, but I believe I definitely got my hands full, the 42-year-old told Entertainment Tonight on Friday. Im locked in. It is also of great importance to address Spinozas views on the types of ideas that the mind can have, which are inadequate, adequate, or true ideas. In other words, modes cannot come to be by themselves, and thus, their natures derive from a series of causes that ultimately leads back to the attribute of God from which they arose. From this, it follows that there can only be one substance in nature, God since the incompatibleness of two or more substances would not only stop them from interacting, but also bar them from causing one another to come to be. Philosophers that are significant to him and his studies are Parmenides, Plato, Plotinus, Descartes, Spinoza, Kant, and Hegel. Jaspers, Karl. His view of God was not the conventional, personal Judeo That is, the mind is a thinking expression of God, as an immaterial substance, and since it does so in a determinate or limited way, it follows that it cannot have attributes since attributes are infinite and eternal. I want you to enjoy, sing, have fun and enjoy everything Ive made for you. He who loves God cannot endeavor that God should love him in return. 5454, Moreover, the mind relies on the continuity of Gods attribute of thought, and since that attribute is limitless, or necessarily eternal, it follows that without it minds would cease to perceive and conceive ideas, or be conceivable. 46 In other words, because all thinking things ultimately derive from God, it follows that he/she bears some relation to them, and since they express thought by thinking, it follows that God must possess that attribute since if he did not, then they would be unable to convey it. If you cant read me in a sunrise, in a landscape, in the look of your friends, in your sons eyes you will find me in no book! WebFor Spinoza, the world just is God, and in some sense, all things are in God. In the attenuated and metaphorical sense that God can be said to love, God loves every single creation equally, i.e. His God would not have encouraged us to go out in nature, as his god would not even be aware we exist. That eternal and infinite being we call God, or Nature [Deus sive Natura], acts from the same necessity from which he exists. If I made you I filled you with passions, limitations, pleasures, feelings, needs, inconsistencies free will. 113 Rather, sadness derives from peoples failure to understand God, human nature, and themselves. I want you to believe in you. WebNo he warned against people (esp. And why were less interested now in Spinozas logic than in his peace of mind. Spinoza makes a similar reference when he states that God as an idea is like the idea of a circle that matches the reality of a circle universally. To him, God would have said: Stop praying and God is the indwelling and not the transient cause of all things. Creation, preservation, transformation = love building, love preserving, love dissolving = inbreath, pause, outbreath = rajas, sattwa, thamas (gunas) = Akar, Ukar, Makar (Aum) = Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva (Trimurthy). 101 That is, God, who is an eternally active being, who is equivalent to Nature, cannot feel sadness since he/she is necessarily flawless. 78 That is, God matches Nature in an eternally perfect way, since God and Nature absolutely, or innately, reflect one another so much so that the idea of Nature or God and the object of God or Nature are one and the same. 104 In other words, sadness exists in God, but cannot act upon him/her, because for that to occur that affect would have to exist outside of him/her, but since nothing can exist in that way, it follows that God is immune to sadness. In other words, because only substances are causes of themselves, it follows that only they are unique, and thus, by not being of the same ontological type they are unable to interact. 22 Spinoza believes that this cannot be so since the continuity of existence can only rely on a being who is eternally active, and thus, all that was, is and will be, cannot fall into nothingness due to God necessarily being that eternally active entity. From this, Spinoza claims that many bodies together form more complex bodies, which include those of humans, and those individual bodies composing more intricate bodies unite in such a way that they too retain the effects of what affects them. Translated by Edwin Curley. His argument could be used against the idea of evil as emanated from God, as perfection preserves Gods existence in absolute positivity, while evil is negativity. I want you to feel me in you when you kiss your beloved, when you tuck in your little girl, when you caress your dog, when you bathe in the sea. By union, Spinoza means that the mind and body are coherent, or it is the case that whatever occurs in peoples minds has a matching effect on their bodies. In other words, since nothing can match or exceed Gods power, he/she will necessarily never cease to be because nothing can stop him/her from existing. In other words, external ideas that can act upon people, do not directly derive from them, but are compatible with their minds, since, as ideas, they are of the same nature as their immaterial minds. 23 In other words, God cannot defy his/her nature because by being eternally active all existence ultimately depends on him/her, and since being can never truly fade into nothingness, it follows that God cannot change his/her ceaselessly active nature. Few philosophers have been so mythologised as the 17th century Jew, Baruch Spinoza. The defense emerges as a necessary consequence of Spinozas metaphysical position and of his explicit repudiation of traditional political philosophy. Stop complicating things and repeating as a parakeet what youve been taught about me. Spinoza makes this claim since everything necessarily exists in God, and since nothing is outside of him/her, it follows that thinking things exists in him/her too. Freedom means minimizing our emotional subjection to things outside ourselves. Einstein identified himself as a follower of Baruch Spinoza, a 17th-century Dutch-Jewish pantheist philosopher who saw God in every aspect of existence as well as extending beyond what we can perceive in the world. Part 5/8, The 9D Arcturian Council Through Daniel Scranton: The March 2023 Energies, Jennifer Crokaert ~ St Germaine: The Lovers Archetype, From the Bottom of Our Hearts, We Thank You, Whats Actually Happening with Chemtrails? The book was a bit too much for tolerant but still Calvinist Holland, where it was denounced as blasphemous and dangerous. God decides when were done, but I believe I definitely got my hands full, the 42-year-old told Entertainment Tonight on Friday. Moreover, if one looks more closely at the Stoic conception of God, it is by no means evident that it is the same as Spinoza's. Furthermore, God is immutable since he/she is not a conglomeration of substances, but rather an indivisible whole. Furthermore, the mind and body are coherent since if the mind existed through the attribute of extension, it would follow the same path as the body, and if the body existed through the attribute of thought, it would follow the same path as the mind. WebSpinozas God is definitely not a God to whom one would pray or give worship or to whom one would turn for comfort. Stop reading alleged sacred scriptures that have nothing to do with me. IANALbutIAMAcat 4 yr. ago I agree with you here. - The Divine Mother. What kind of egomaniac God do you think I am? 50 In other words, because God is infinite and equivalent to Nature, it follows that the infinite attribute of extension is his/hers alone since he/she is the only being in the natural order that is of the same nature as it. Shelley channeled him in his own arguments for atheism, George Eliot translated him, Hegel and Marx admired him, and he was one of Nietzsches favorite philosophers. She begins: Benedict de Spinoza did not have a religionat least in the usual sense of the word (1). Spinoza, on the other hand, starts from the Spinoza said that God can be seen in the laws of nature, doubted the immortality of the soul, argued against faith, and denied the existence of angels. New York: Columbia University Press, 1999. 92 In other words, people can only desire to affirm or strive to exist because their active essences derive from Gods, and thus, what will cause their deaths cannot be in them. 7777 One way in which the reader can imagine this is if God were both the idea of a shape and the physical object of that shape itself. Department of Philosophy 60 By this, Spinoza means that God, as an extended substance, causes the conditions, or the laws of his/her attribute of extension which ultimately enables peoples bodies to come to be. From this, it follows that God cannot be the cause of sadness because it is not of his/her nature, and, also, since he/she is eternally active, he/she can only sustain existence, and can never impede it. 2 Despite what appears to be an incongruent argument, can one still find a way to claim that Spinoza is consistent when he states that all things ultimately derive from Gods flawlessness, despite the reality of sadness? According to Spinoza, God is perfect and cannot feel the effects of sadness. The God Spinoza presents to us, is not one of egomaniac nature but rather a primordial force, a neutral force which people have the power to use or to discard. "The key to Love is sharing, [balancing] give and receive." God is the one and only genuine substance around. Abstract. 85 Those external ideas Spinoza calls affects and since they do not arise from peoples ability to conceive ideas, it follows that they have an inadequate knowledge of them. Do you think I could create a place to burn all my children who behave badly for the rest of eternity? Consequently, one may claim that since the mind relies on another concept for its existence, it is not self-sufficient, but rather a determinate mode. He shows how modern biblical criticism and the broad Enlightenment program for a secular, scientific society were effectively launched in the book. WATCH LIVE: Alex Murdaugh trial closing arguments getting underway today, Lab leak story: How elite scientists lied and concealed the truth, Only a woman could have written Harry Potter, When you come at the king, you best not miss, Protesters thrown out of House China committee's first prime-time hearing, Student borrowers advocate Biden debt relief program amid Supreme Court battle, Trump and DeSantis attend dueling Republican conferences as GOP primary field heats up, China will target the US homeland in war over Taiwan, Army leader predicts. 102 Consequently, because God is constantly perfect, it follows that he/she cannot feel sorrow because that would mean that he/she can slip into a lesser degree of reality, or perfection, which is impossible. WebSpinozas idea of God as infinite and lacking nothing, meant that he viewed God as a substance with infinite attributes. Hence, because God is not anthropomorphic, it follows that whatever changes occur in peoples bodies cannot change God, or Natures body, in any way. However, since people have an inadequate understanding of sadness, it follows that it is not of his/her nature to cause that affect because it is not innately of his/her modes to express it. I believe in Spinozas God, who reveals Himself in the lawful harmony of the world, not in a God who concerns Himself with the fate and the doings of mankind. 58 Consequently, Spinoza ultimately denies that the mind can possess various attributes, but rather it features active abilities to conceive ideas and passive powers to take them in. 114. Stop going to those dark, cold temples that you built yourself and say they are my house! Re-Intoxicated by God. Given this, she admits, the title of this book contains an irony, and perhaps for some a provocation (2). That is, there is a likeness between the immateriality of the mind and the intelligible features of the natural order, which Gods attribute of thought gives rise to, and since only things of the same kind are compatible, it follows that minds necessarily arise from that attribute due to them both being immaterial. WebSpinoza is often put forward as the father of pantheism and as the greatest pantheist, but in fact his writings on God are extremely abstract and theoretical, very unappealing to a modern scientific viewpoint. Spinozas views on necessity and possibility, which he claimed were the principal foundation of his Ethics (Ep75), have been less than well received by his readers, to put it mildly. According to Spinoza, people innately desire or have appetites for that which they find to be agreeable to who they understand themselves to be. In other words, joy is an external idea that causes people to be at a greater level of activity since it affects the mind by amplifying happiness, which, in turn, necessarily affects the body in a pleasurable way. That is, only God is an infinite substance, and since that renders all other things to be finite, nothing can cause him/her to change. Furthermore, inadequate ideas necessarily reside in God, like all other things, but they do not directly derive from him/her since those ideas are passive whereas he/she is immutably active. Exactly. Its clear what Spinozas God is not. Finally, knowledge of God, by only being promotive of peoples well-beings is due to his/her perfection, and since sadness is deleterious to them, it follows that nothing evil, or useless can derive from him/her, and thus, his/her flawlessness remains preserved. On the other hand, adequate ideas are those ideas that resemble true ideas or ideas that perfectly match their objects, but only insofar as they are ideas. What he is isnt so clear. 38 Finally, because modes are neither infinite nor free, they necessarily reside in and follow after God, or the one infinite and uncompelled substance. Spinoza was born in Amsterdam in the 17th century of a businessman father who was successful but not wealthy. Pantheistic mysticism? From this, one may also claim that because it is innate of thinking things to think, it follows that God must possess the attribute of thought because what is inherently in him/her, must, in some ways, be in his/her modes, due to his/her immanence. That is, sadness disrupts peoples abilities to exist because it causes them to less aware of themselves. Princeton: Penguin Books, 1996. To Spinoza, sadness is a persons slip into a lesser state of awareness from a greater one. In other words, since God is coherent, and ultimately gives rise to all modes, they necessarily display his/her coherency, albeit limitedly, and thus, what happens in their minds has a matching physical effect on their bodies and whatever affects their bodies has a similar effect on their minds. WebGod, according to Spinoza, did not have a personality, or consciousness or any expressed preferences or advice. Orlando, FL 32816-1352, [emailprotected] Part 4/8, https://goldenageofgaia.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Dr.-David-Martin-MURDER-CHARGES-Against-Fauci-Peter-Daszak-Ralph-Baric-and-many-others.mp4, https://goldenageofgaia.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/LEAKED-22Project-Pandora22-Multiple-Presidents-KILLED-to-Keep-this-HIDDEN.mp4, https://goldenageofgaia.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/Cities-across-Canada-join-the-movement-1.mp4, https://goldenageofgaia.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/telegram-cloud-document-1-4915997293301204030-1-1.mp4. 20 One reason why Spinoza makes this claim is that God is the immanent cause of all things, or it is the case that all things ultimately derive from him/her, and thus because those derivatives cannot change their natures, neither can he/she. On the last day of his life, before his death at the age of 44 from lung disease, he was calmly conversing with his friends about philosophy, the same as always. In the 18th century, Spinozism was a synonym for atheism. My house is in the mountains, in the woods, rivers, lakes, beaches. 27 In other words, each attribute of God can only express one infinite and eternal aspect of him/her, and not many, because attributes are unable to affect one another since they do not rely on one another to exist. If everything comes from God just being God, then all would seem to be for the best in the best of all possible worlds, and our calamities are, so to speak, simply divine. Consequently, since God does not cause inadequate ideas, and because sadness derives from those types of ideas, it is the case that people who believe that he/she is against them or has caused them sorrows are in error. Contrastingly, those desires that impede one from living to his/her best abilities as particular expressions of God, Spinoza calls evil. In regard to intellect and true virtue, every nation is on a par with the rest, and God has not in these respects chosen one people rather than another. Schocken Books. Seeking information is Light Work. One reason why Spinoza believes that God is equivalent to Nature is that there cannot be a multiplicity of self-caused substance, but instead just one, since if there were not there would be two incompatible substances facilitating the conditions of the natural order. Remembering, embodying, and expressing your true Self. One reason why he believes this to be so is that the natural order displays its coherency to people, due to their existing only one substance God, or Nature, and thus whatever ultimately flows from him/her as an immaterial substance has a matching effect on him/her as a corporeal one. 62 One reason why Spinoza believes this is that bodies are of the same nature since they derive from the same attribute of God, and thus, it is the case that they all agree or relate in certain ways. Hence God must also exist in dimensions far beyond those of the visible world. Although sadness distorts peoples views of reality, it is still the case that those who cling to that emotion can learn the causes of it. Furthermore, because people can know the difference between adequate and inadequate ideas, it is the case that they can understand those ideas that increase their abilities to think, or not, and thus, what can affect their bodies to strive more ably, or not, to live. WebTo Spinoza attributes of God or that which one can perceive as being of his/her nature, are eternal and infinite. (Archangel Michael: Do not Get Caught in the Drama of White Hats or Black Hats, Nov. 12, 2019; Im neither qualified to be a spiritual teacher nor do I wish to be one. 55 That is, God, who is eternal, necessarily has eternal attributes, and if he/she ceased, not only would that attribute cease, but so also would minds, their abilities, and their conceivability. in Liberal Studies from the College of Staten Island/CUNY and his B.A. 76 By this, Spinoza means that God as an immaterial and corporeal substance, is coherent, and thus, all ideas and things that follow from his/her nature necessarily complement his/her existence as the totality of the natural order. 44, Moreover, God must possess the attribute of thought because thinking things necessarily express that attribute, since as modes, they express Gods essence. What do you need more miracles for? Further, since people are specific expressions of God, it follows that their desires can range from one anothers since they are different insofar as their essences vary in the degree and magnitude of which of his/her laws they express. By Michah Gottlieb. He isnt the God of the Bible, the personal God of Spinozas own Jewish tradition, or of Christianity, the one whose job description includes closely monitoring human affairs and miraculously intervening in them. WebAnswer (1 of 5): I have never studied Spinoza's philosophy in detail, nor can I even read Latin, but I have always understood Spinoza's concept of God to be of the same flavor Nothing happens by chance. 91, From this it follows that affects can either assists people or deter them from their desires to live, or aid or restrain their innate abilities to be. Spinoza was born in Amsterdam in the 17th century of a businessman father who was successful but not wealthy. A History of Western Philosophy. 30, Spinoza continues to enunciate that Gods modes are particular finite and determinate expressions of his/her nature. What I want you to do is go out into the world and enjoy your life. Spinoza is commonly (but not by all of his interpreters) assumed to be a pantheist, which means that since Nature or Substance are synonyms of God, God and Nature or Substance are identical. Indeed, Spinoza explicitly wrote that Whatever is, is in God, and nothing can be or be conceived without God and that all things are in God (1p17d). New York: Simon and Schuster, 1967. 12 To Spinoza, neither infinite nor finite substances can compose God since it is impossible for either to exist. Consequently, people may claim that they cannot know other minds as well as their minds since they only have ideas of other minds and not the knowledge of what it is to be in those other minds. From this, it follows that sadness, which derives from inadequate ideas and lessens the minds ability to think and the bodys ability to act, is identifiable by people due to those effects. 29 Finally, Spinoza continues by addressing the nature of modes or that which ultimately derives from God and his/her attributes. Dutch Jewish philosopher Benedict de Spinoza was best known for his Ethics (1677), which laid out in geometric form arguments for the existence of an impersonal God, the identity of mind and body, determinism, and a way of overcoming the dominance of the passions and achieving freedom and And if there is, rest assured that I wont ask if you behaved right or wrong, Ill ask. 15 That is, God, as the only limitless being, is not subject to the will of another since nothing causes itself except for him/her. Yet in his major philosophical works, he can hardly stop talking about God, whose existence never seems to be in doubtprompting the German poet Novalis, one of the many Romantic poets enchanted with him, to call him that God-intoxicated man., Einsteins answer to a New York rabbi clears things up a bit. God had infinite qualities, of which we can perceive only two, thought and extension. Now it is evident, from the definition above given, that prophecy really includes ordinary knowledge; for the knowledge which we acquire by our natural faculties depends on our knowledge of God and his eternal laws; but ordinary knowledge is common to all men as men, and rests on foundations which all share, whereas the multitude always strains after rarities and exceptions, and thinks little of the gifts of nature ; so that, when prophecy is talked of, ordinary knowledge is not supposed to be included. Heres some of him. To Spinoza, the human body exists by way of Gods attribute of extension. How can I blame you if you respond to something I put in you? Sign up now to get the Washington Examiners breaking news and timely commentary delivered right to your inbox. Consequently, it follows that his/her fixed essence necessarily radiates his/her immutable attribute of thought; setting the conditions that give rise to the conceivability of thinking things. 3. Elsewhere Spinoza might have been jailed or burned at the stake, but in Holland he was left aloneif sometimes by fiat. 84, To Spinoza, there exist ideas that are external to people that have the ability to act upon or influence them to feel or be aware of themselves in greater or lesser ways than as they normally understand themselves. WebWho is the God of Spinoza? What is Spinozas mode? However, he did not hold the converse view that God is no more than the sum of what exists. Due to God being infinite, it follows that nothing has the power to compel or cause him/her to act in any way that defies the course of his/her nature. 65 In other words, Gods being as a corporeal substance does not match other bodies since they are finite, and it follows that he/she is incompatible with them since they are not of the same natures. University of Central Florida. Thus, if God were able to slip into lesser degrees of reality, or feel sadness, it follows that Nature would necessarily change since if he/she were to change, there would have to be a matching effect in the natural order since he/she is coherent and equivalent to it. Our emotional subjection to things outside ourselves a God to whom one would turn for.. Finite substances can compose God since it is impossible for either to exist because it causes to... And enjoy your life definitely not a God to whom one would pray or give worship or to one. Been taught about me do is go out into the world and your! 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