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. |
From inside the book
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... MOSES Stephen J. Dubner BIROBIJAN Masha Gessen Jeremy Dauber JUDAH MACCABEE Jeffrey Goldberg YEHUDA HA'LEVI Hillel Halkin NACHMAN / KAFKA Rodger Kamenetz THE DAIRY RESTAURANT · Ben Katchor THE SONG OF SONGS ABRAHAM CAHAN THE EICHMANN ...
... MOSES Stephen J. Dubner BIROBIJAN Masha Gessen Jeremy Dauber JUDAH MACCABEE Jeffrey Goldberg YEHUDA HA'LEVI Hillel Halkin NACHMAN / KAFKA Rodger Kamenetz THE DAIRY RESTAURANT · Ben Katchor THE SONG OF SONGS ABRAHAM CAHAN THE EICHMANN ...
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... Moses and the books of the prophets . This impression was underscored not only by historia's being taught in the mornings , together with all the other religious subjects , but also taught in Hebrew , while our secular subjects were ...
... Moses and the books of the prophets . This impression was underscored not only by historia's being taught in the mornings , together with all the other religious subjects , but also taught in Hebrew , while our secular subjects were ...
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... Moses Mendelssohn , grandfather of the famous composer , both of whom were also mentioned as part of the extended cautionary tale . Moses Mendelssohn had urged that Jews not keep themselves intellectually and cul- turally separate . He ...
... Moses Mendelssohn , grandfather of the famous composer , both of whom were also mentioned as part of the extended cautionary tale . Moses Mendelssohn had urged that Jews not keep themselves intellectually and cul- turally separate . He ...
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... Moses Mendelssohn by a good century and a half , but Mrs. Schoenfeld spoke of him as a precursor . He was , she very rightly suggested , the first modern Jew . Spinoza headed the long line of yeshiva boys who were not as pious as they ...
... Moses Mendelssohn by a good century and a half , but Mrs. Schoenfeld spoke of him as a precursor . He was , she very rightly suggested , the first modern Jew . Spinoza headed the long line of yeshiva boys who were not as pious as they ...
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... Moses Mendelssohn studied the case of Spinoza a little bet- ter , he might have saved himself , his family , and the Jewish people a lot of tzurris.3 Mrs. Schoenfeld suggested that a lot could be learned from understanding the case of ...
... Moses Mendelssohn studied the case of Spinoza a little bet- ter , he might have saved himself , his family , and the Jewish people a lot of tzurris.3 Mrs. Schoenfeld suggested that a lot could be learned from understanding the case of ...
Contents
3 | |
17 | |
The Project of Escape | 67 |
Identity Crisis | 124 |
Epilogue | 258 |
Chronology | 265 |
Notes | 273 |
Acknowledgments | 285 |
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Common terms and phrases
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 explain 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 lives Lurianic Maimonides Marranos means Messiah metaphysics mind Moses Moslem mystical Nachmanides nature noza one's oneself perfect faith personal identity philosopher pleasure Portugal Portuguese proofs publish question Rabbi Morteira rational reality reason religion religious Rijnsburg Sabbatai Zevi salvation Schoenfeld scholar sense Sephardic soul Spain Spanish suffering synagogue Talmud teacher thing thinker thought tion Torah true truth understand Uriel da Costa Voorburg words write yeshiva young