Jeremy Rosen
Was Spinoza a Jewish Philosopher?
Summary
Jeremy Rosen discusses the life and philosophy of Baruch Spinoza, a philosopher known for his pantheistic views. Rosen argues that Spinoza’s ideas have deep connections to Jewish mysticism and the concept of God as part of the universe.
Jeremy Rosen
Manchester-born Jeremy Rosen was educated at Cambridge University England and Mir Yeshiva in Jerusalem. He has practiced as an orthodox rabbi, as principal of Carmel College in the UK, and as professor at the Faculty for Comparative Religion in Antwerp, Belgium. He has written and lectured extensively in the UK and the US, where he now resides and was the rabbi of the Persian-Jewish community in Manhattan.
A lot of people think that charism was an influence on Spinoza to some extent, but Spinoza was not happy with the Bible, he didn’t want to be bound by it. So although the idea of charism created this ferment of ideas from Uriel Acosta and others, it wasn’t actually a serious influence on him, in my opinion, on his Jewish life.
He questioned the existence of God as this kind of superman in the sky or superwoman in the sky who intervenes when we are about to do something wrong, who intervenes in human history and punishes the bad and rewards the good. That kind of God he had no time for, and he certainly didn’t believe in that.
Cherems don’t have theological authority. A cherem simply means you’re not welcome in my community, so no, anybody can say to Spinoza, “Come into my community, I’d be happy to have him in my community to tell you the truth.” So the cherem is not in force, it’s not an everlasting curse, it’s simply saying we don’t want you in our community.