Betraying Spinoza: The Renegade Jew who Gave Us ModernityPart of the Jewish Encounter series In 1656, Amsterdam's Jewish community excommunicated Baruch Spinoza, and, at the age of twenty-three, he became the most famous heretic in Judaism. He was already germinating a secularist challenge to religion that would be as radical as it was original. He went on to produce one of the most ambitious systems in the history of Western philosophy, so ahead of its time that scientists today, from string theorists to neurobiologists, count themselves among Spinoza's progeny. In Betraying Spinoza, Rebecca Goldstein sets out to rediscover the flesh-and-blood man often hidden beneath the veneer of rigorous rationality, and to crack the mystery of the breach between the philosopher and his Jewish past. Goldstein argues that the trauma of the Inquisition' s persecution of its forced Jewish converts plays itself out in Spinoza's philosophy. The excommunicated Spinoza, no less than his excommunicators, was responding to Europe' s first experiment with racial anti-Semitism. Here is a Spinoza both hauntingly emblematic and deeply human, both heretic and hero--a surprisingly contemporary figure ripe for our own uncertain age. |
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Page 133
... Uriel da Costa , in the 1620s when Spinoza was a child , had been one such crisis that had lain uneasily on the collective conscience . His is a tragic , if also controversial , example of the confusions and disillusions that ...
... Uriel da Costa , in the 1620s when Spinoza was a child , had been one such crisis that had lain uneasily on the collective conscience . His is a tragic , if also controversial , example of the confusions and disillusions that ...
Page 135
... Uriel da Costa to perform an unhistorical leap into it . However vaguely and unwillingly , da Costa was aware that post - biblical Judaism was different from the original model . But he hoped and believed that the fluid New Jewish ...
... Uriel da Costa to perform an unhistorical leap into it . However vaguely and unwillingly , da Costa was aware that post - biblical Judaism was different from the original model . But he hoped and believed that the fluid New Jewish ...
Page 268
... Uriel da Costa is excommunicated for heretical understanding of Jewish law 1629 Descartes moves to Amsterdam 1632 Baruch Spinoza is born John Locke is born ( dies 1704 ) Inquisitorial denunciation of Galileo 1633 Uriel da Costa is ...
... Uriel da Costa is excommunicated for heretical understanding of Jewish law 1629 Descartes moves to Amsterdam 1632 Baruch Spinoza is born John Locke is born ( dies 1704 ) Inquisitorial denunciation of Galileo 1633 Uriel da Costa is ...
Contents
Baruch Bento Benedictus | 3 |
In Search of Baruch | 17 |
The Project of Escape | 67 |
Copyright | |
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Aboab argue Baruch Spinoza believe with perfect Benedictus Benedictus Spinoza born Catholic century chief rabbi Christian Church claim conceived continued conversos course death Descartes Deus sive natura divine Dutch Ein Sof emotions essence eternal Ethics excommunication existence experience explanations fact father final causes finite friends girls Ha-Shem halakha Hebrew heretic holy Ibid ideas infinite system Inquisition Israel Jan de Witt Jewish Jewish community Jewish identity Jews of Amsterdam Judaism kabbalah kabbalistic kherem knowledge laws Leibniz lived Lurianic Maimonides Marranos means Messiah metaphysics mind Moses Moslem mystical Nachmanides nature noza one's oneself perfect faith philosopher pleasure Portugal Portuguese proofs publish question Rabbi Morteira rational reality reason religion religious Rijnsburg Sabbatai Sabbatai Zevi salvation Schoenfeld scholar sense Sephardic soul Spain Spanish suffering synagogue Talmud teacher thing thinker thought tion Torah Tractatus Theologico-Politicus true truth understand Uriel da Costa Voorburg words write yeshiva young