BB A R U C HA R U C H S S P I N O Z AP I N O Z A

Have you ever stopped to think of yourself and your own life as part of a larger ‘cosmic’ context? Do you believe in the idea that we are a tiny part in the immense context of nature? Broadly speaking, these concepts were somewhat discussed by the 17th century philosopher Baruch Spinoza.

His Background

Spinoza (1632-1677) was born in Amsterdam, in Jewish immigrants family who came from Spain and Portugal. He followed the teachings of the Jewish community of Amsterdam but, at the age of 24, was expelled from the synagogue and his community for being heterodox – he was highly critical of the official religion.

Determinism and Pantheism

He held a relativist position, that nothing is intrinsically good or bad, except that it is perceived that way by each individual. Instead, as a determinist, he believed that ‘all things in nature are the result of a certain necessity.’ Nothing happens by chance, but necessarily, due to the essential nature or substance of things, in other words, God. He said that everything that exists in nature is: God/Nature/Substance. God is in everything that exists and everything that exists is in God. Because of this, Spinoza is described as a pantheist.

Freedom from the Passions

Spinoza’s ethics is one of liberation. He said that the mind is able to liberate itself from the hold that the passions (inadequate ideas) have over it, as it acquires knowledge (adequate ideas). Therefore, liberation lies in the acquisition of knowledge. We should liberate ourselves from our passions (desire, pleasure, pain, the main three) which prevent us from achieving happiness and harmony. We are free when we act rationally; we are slaves of our passions when we cannot control our emotions or act irrationally.

The Guidance of Reason

He expressed that man has a natural inclination for ‘the preservation of essential being,’ which can be achieved by the guidance of reason. Spinoza thus belongs to the rationalist tradition. So much so that he wrote an ‘Ethics demonstrated in geometrical order.’ Here he maintained that ethics can be based in axioms and propositions that follow each other with logical necessity. He wanted to show how man’s life is conditioned by the laws of nature, the rational system of the universe which is the expression of the only substance, God.  

Knowledge of God as the Highest God Reason strives only for adequate ideas and understanding. The greatest good or virtue that the mind can conceive is God, that infinite and eternal substance. Knowledge of God is the fulfilment of the mind’s striving to persevere in being.

According to Spinoza, if we acknowledge that everything happens out of necessity, we can intuitively understand nature as it is. Taking a ‘panoramic view’, we can see the context of all things as a huge One. As a consequence, we will be able to reach ultimate happiness and harmony of spirit.

Love God intellectually

Most people would not find a connection between God and our minds. However, Spinoza claimed that when a human being possess perception of God’s essence, we acquire what he called “knowledge of the third kind” Thus, in attaining this kind of knowledge the mind passes to its highest state of perfection that’s available and as the mind understands God to be the cause of it, it develops an active love to which Spinoza refers to as The Intellectual Love of God.

Eternal minds

 “The human mind cannot be absolutely destroyed with the body, but something of it remains which is eternal...”

Life after death is a controversial topic. Some people believe there’s nothing after our life on earth and some others believe real life starts once our steps on earth come to an end.

Benedict Spinoza made a distinction between two aspects of the mind: one which expresses the existence of the body and another which expresses the essence of the body. He proclaimed the aspect of the mind which represents the

existence of the body has a limited duration but not the aspect which represents the essence of the body as he thought the latter remain unaffected by the destruction of the body. He believed that human minds as eternal.

By Rodrigo Rouco & Silvia Kestanian (2007)

By Romina Melmenstain & Miriam Rodriguez (2008)