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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... philosophers Netherlands- Biography. 3. Heretics, Jewish — Netherlands Biography. I. Title. II. Series. B2.997.G67 2006 i99'.+92 — dc22 2007040177 www.schocken.com Printed in the United States of America First Paperback Edition 2 + 6 8 ...
... philosophers Netherlands- Biography. 3. Heretics, Jewish — Netherlands Biography. I. Title. II. Series. B2.997.G67 2006 i99'.+92 — dc22 2007040177 www.schocken.com Printed in the United States of America First Paperback Edition 2 + 6 8 ...
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... philosophers Netherlands Biography . 3. Heretics , Jewish Netherlands Biography . I. Title . II . Series . B3997.G65 2006 199'.492 - dc22 www.schocken.com Printed in the United States of America First Paperback Edition 2 4 6 8 9 7531 ...
... philosophers Netherlands Biography . 3. Heretics , Jewish Netherlands Biography . I. Title . II . Series . B3997.G65 2006 199'.492 - dc22 www.schocken.com Printed in the United States of America First Paperback Edition 2 4 6 8 9 7531 ...
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... will have the most extensive freedom in philosophizing, which he believes you will not misuse to disturb the publicly established religion." The philosopher delicately declined: "if I had ever had any desire to undertake Betraying Spinoza.
... will have the most extensive freedom in philosophizing, which he believes you will not misuse to disturb the publicly established religion." The philosopher delicately declined: "if I had ever had any desire to undertake Betraying Spinoza.
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... philosopher that the Jews ever produced , which adds a certain irony to his questionable Jewishness . He was excommunicated at the age of twenty - three by the Portuguese - Jewish community in which he had been raised and educated . It ...
... philosopher that the Jews ever produced , which adds a certain irony to his questionable Jewishness . He was excommunicated at the age of twenty - three by the Portuguese - Jewish community in which he had been raised and educated . It ...
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... philosopher's life , but was rather a craft that drew extensively from Spinoza's seri- ous interest in the science of optics . The quality of his wares was highly valued by other scientists of his day . The impor- tant Dutch astronomer ...
... philosopher's life , but was rather a craft that drew extensively from Spinoza's seri- ous interest in the science of optics . The quality of his wares was highly valued by other scientists of his day . The impor- tant Dutch astronomer ...
Contents
3 | |
17 | |
The Project of Escape | 67 |
Identity Crisis | 124 |
Epilogue | 258 |
Chronology | 265 |
Notes | 273 |
Acknowledgments | 285 |
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