Is Spinoza an Atheist? (Prof. Mori)

Generally, and with a startling lack of originality, this conclusion is followed by quotations of Novalis’ celebrated definition of Spinoza as a ‘God-intoxicated man’ and by Hegel’s equally well-known dictum that Spinoza did not so much deny God as deny the world (a position known as ‘acosmism’) (See Novalis, Schriften, ed. L. Tieck and F. Schlegel, 2 vols (Berlin, 1837), vol.2, p.261, and G. W. F. Hegel, Enzyklopädie der philosophischen Wissenschaften im Grundrisse (1817-1830; Frankfurt, 1970), §50. The two quotations already appear together in the 1895 edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica, art. ‘Spinoza’, vol.22, p.404).

1. On the question of Spinoza’s atheism, see the very different points of view represented by: Robert Misrahi, ‘L’athéisme et la liberté chez Spinoza’, Revue internationale de philosophie 31:119-20 (1977), p.217-30; Jonathan Bennett, A Study of Spinoza’s Ethics (Indianapolis, IN, 1984); Roger Caillois, ‘Spinoza et l’athéisme’, in Spinoza nel 350° anniversario della nascita, ed. E. Giancotti (Naples, 1985), p.3-33; Jacqueline Lagrée, ‘Spinoza “athée et épicurien”’, Archives de philosophie 57:3 (1994), p.541-58; Bernard Rousset, ‘La querelle de l’athéisme spinoziste’, in Architectures de la raison: mélanges o!erts à Alexandre Matheron, ed. P.-F. Moreau (Fontenay-aux-Roses, 1996), p.269-81; Steven Nadler, ‘Is Spinoza an atheist?’ [unpublished speech], Association for Jewish Studies meetings, Washington, DC, December 2005; Steven Nadler, ‘Benedictus Pantheissimus’, in Insiders and outsiders in seventeenth-century philosophy, ed. G. A. J. Rogers, T. Sorell and J. Kraye (New York, 2010), p.238-56; Pierre-François Moreau, Problèmes du spinozisme (Paris, 2006); Edwin Curley, ‘Spinoza’, in Encyclopedia of philosophy, ed. Donald Borchert, 2 edn, vol.9 (Detroit, MI, 2006), http://caute.ru/spinoza/aln/curley. htm (last accessed 1 December 2020); Michael A. Rosenthal, ‘Why Spinoza is intolerant of atheists: God and the limits of early modern liberalism’, The Review of metaphysics 65:4 (2012), p.813-39; Maria José Villaverde, ‘Spinoza’s paradoxes: an atheist who defended the Scriptures? A freethinking alchemist?’, in Paradoxes of religious toleration in early modern political thought, ed. J. C. Laursen and M. J. Villaverde (Lanham, MD, 2012), p.9-38
2. Avoiding any such claim, let us begin by listening to Spinoza’s own words and asking what he thought of atheism and atheists. The point is relevant because, according to some authoritative scholars, one of the main reasons for denying Spinoza’s atheism is the (indisputable) fact that he did not consider himself an ‘atheist’. Bennett, A Study of Spinoza’s Ethics, p.35: ‘Spinoza did accept pantheism as a kind of religion, and apparently did not think of himself as an atheist […] I am sure that he thought of himself as discovering things about God rather than as revealing that there is no God.

This passage is taken from a letter from Spinoza to Henry Oldenburg in the autumn of 1665, written, that is, five years before he published his Tractatus theologico-politicus (but the composition of this work was evidently already under way, as the letter makes clear). The phrase ‘the common people […] never stop accusing me’ shows that Spinoza’s reputation as an atheist goes back a long way. It can be dated, in fact, to the second half of the previous decade, that is, to the last years spent by Spinoza in Amsterdam’s Jewish community – in other words, to a period long before he had written or published anything: in 1665, when he sent the above-cited letter, he had so far only published his Principia philosophiae Cartesianae together with the Cogitata metaphysica (in 1663)

According to the Inquisitors, Spinoza, along with another Jew excommunicated in Amsterdam, Juan de Prado, had reached ‘the point of atheism’. The two, it was alleged (the verb is used advisedly here), believed that souls died with their bodies and that ‘God exists only philosophically’ (See Nadler, Spinoza, p.136, 145).
If Spinoza was classed as an atheist long before he published anything, once he did publish something (the Principia philosophiae Cartesianae), the accusations certainly did not diminish: he was described as ‘an atheist, that is, a man who mocks all religions and is thus a pernicious element in this republic’ in a petition sent to the Delft municipal government in 1665, one from which, however, no actual consequences ensued (See Nadler, Spinoza, p.203). Spinoza denies outright the possibility of events contrary to the laws of nature (See Spinoza, Tractatus theologico-politicus, ch.6, in G, vol.3, p.87). Thus, as far as Spinoza was concerned, anyone who believed in miracles was an atheist, or at least supported a thesis that would ‘lead to Atheism’, because it called into question the existence of the divine laws of nature, hence e7ectively denying God’s omnipotence. This confirms Spinoza’s strategy: his is the true God, he argues, and the true atheists are the ones who deny him. The targets of his attacks are once again Scholastic theologians, but also in this case all good Christians who believe in the reality of miracles that contravene the order of nature: even Malebranche, the staunchest supporter of the laws of nature in Christian circles, was forced, some years later, to admit, at least verbally, the possibility of miracles.

In short: if, in order that Spinoza be freed from the charge of atheism, we accept the definition of atheism he proposes, we are also forced to ‘atheise’ (for want of a better word) virtually all previous theological thought. That is a necessary conclusion because, for Spinoza, all those who are not Spinozists, or rather all those who deny the absolute necessity of all events and admit the possibility of miracles or providential acts of God in the world, are in fact atheists. But, if we adopt the concept of atheism that prevailed throughout the early modern age, and which Velthuysen expresses precisely and spontaneously in his letter as according to Velthuysen, Spinoza is an atheist (1) because he does not make a real distinction between God and the Universe; (2) because he argues that everything happens as the result of a fatal necessity and not due to the free determination of a providential God (see G, vol.4, p.208-12). It becomes obvious that Spinoza fully deserves the title of atheist.

1. Spinoza doesn’t believe in the Trinity: Nor does it make any sense to argue that, when Spinoza asserts it is possible to be saved while believing false doctrines, he is not referring to the fundamental dogmas of his universal faith, but rather to the supposedly revealed beliefs of one Christian confession or another (the Trinity, the divinity of Christ, transubstantiation…) Needless to say, however, those dogmas were, for Spinoza, either false or contradictory. See, for instance, letter 72 (to Oldenburg), on the divinity of Jesus Christ: ‘As for what certain Churches add to this – that God assumed a human nature – I warned expressly that I don’t know what they mean. Indeed, to confess the truth, they seem to me to speak no less absurdly than if someone were to say to me that a circle has assumed the nature of a square’ (G, vol.4, p.309).