I see my philosophy research as
an organic, on-going, life-long process which means that I like to keep
revisiting and adding to my thoughts, rather than it being an open and shut,
linear process. The core of my research always remains the same, be it my
interpretation, purpose and so on, but it grows and develops over time. So, my
Spinoza Research Diary blog reflects this. Although I began formulating my
Analytic-Jewish interpretation of Spinoza back in 2014, I enjoy continually
updating my thoughts and arguments to support my research. Therefore, for
instance, although the controversy over Rabbi Dweck happened in 2017, I find
that it still informs my fundamental interpretative approach to Spinoza, which I
started to explore in 2014, and informs my papers, especially my 2015-2017
paper ‘Who Was Spinoza?’1.
Since my last blog post, the
ruling on Rabbi Dweck has decided that he can remain the Senior Rabbi for the
Spanish and Portuguese Sephardi Community. However, I think many details within
the decision about the restrictions Rabbi Dweck now consequentially has imposed
on him is of great concern for freedom of thought and speech, which is
something that Spinoza valued. As Frazer2 summarises:
“But Rabbi Dweck has had to pay a
high price — he has had to relinquish being a dayan on the Sephardi Beth Din,
and to agree to submit the contents of his public lectures to a member of the
review committee. He has also agreed not to return to his former congregation
in New Jersey to be a summer scholar-in-residence, as he has done for the past
three years.”
Limitations on
“intellectual freedom”3 was something that Spinoza was not prepared
to compromise which is why he declined an offer to be a professor at the University
of Heidelberg. So I don’t find it surprising that Spinoza didn’t fight to lift
his excommunication, or accept any job position which came with possible
censorship. We can see that even today, freedom of intellectual thought is
sometimes curbed by over-authoritarian institutions. Possibly Spinoza thought
that his synagogue would have only lifted the excommunication if there were
strings attached, given that it is rumoured that there was an attempt
previously “to bribe him into conformity. A pension of one thousand florins was
offered him if he would remain quiet and appear now and again in the
synagogue.”4 So I don’t think Spinoza’s apparent disinterest in
lifting the excommunication is surprising or indicative of any lack of
motivation for leading a Jewish life. It may simply have been, amongst other
things, to preserve his freedom of thought, especially his intellectual
thought, and to avoid potential censoring of his philosophy.
Indeed, Spinoza didn’t even see
such suppression as strictly speaking possible because he finds that “no one
can willingly transfer his natural right of free reason and judgement, or be
compelled so to do.”5 So it would be pointless for him, or any one
other, to renounce these freedoms. Furthermore, according to Spinoza’s
philosophy, as I understand it, it would be counterproductive and dishonest to
think one thing but to say another. It would also be unmanageable and risk
catastrophic outcomes because Spinoza argues that “…no one can abdicate his
freedom of judgement and feeling; since every man is by indefeasible natural
right the master of his own thoughts, it follows that men thinking in diverse
and contradictory fashions, cannot, without disastrous results, be compelled to
speak only according to the dictates of the supreme power. Not even the most
experienced, to say nothing of the multitude, know how to keep silence.”6
I find it interesting that Spinoza also extends freedom of thought and speech
to the realm of teaching as well, given his statements such as “…a government
would be most harsh which deprived the individual of his freedom of saying and
teaching what he thought; and would be moderate if such a freedom were granted.”7
This passage in Spinoza’s TTP made me realise that perhaps the freedom to teach
what you think may be an undervalued and often overlooked freedom and is more a
part of academic freedom as well as freedom of thought and speech than is
recognised. I suspect pedagogical freedom also functions in a similar manner to
other freedoms, for instance, it should not involve the promotion or spreading
of hatred. So these passages in Spinoza have inspired me to write a paper on
Spinoza on freedoms, speech, virtues and vices, including the freedom to teach
what one thinks8.
I find the interference with
Rabbi Dweck’s freedom of thought and speech, by checking and possibly censuring
his views in his public lectures, together with terminating his
scholar-in-residence, unacceptable. When learning about Spinoza and the 17th
century context he was in when he wrote about freedom of thought and speech, it
is easy to assume that society has sufficiently progressed since then that,
although freedom of speech and thought are still highly relevant and
problematic these days, there is somehow more consensus on their value and less
authoritarian restrictions imposed upon it, other than when it is very needed,
for instance, to prevent clear cases of hate speech. We assume that Spinoza’s
fears about publishing his thoughts in his treatises and censorship is
something that would not have been an issue had Spinoza lived in the 21st
century. Yet the case of Rabbi Dweck shows otherwise. He has to now second
guess what he is and is not allowed to express as an opinion in 2017 and
beyond. He did not commit hate speech, but rather was attempting to increase
toleration and good-will and prevent homophobic prejudice. His heart was
genuinely in the right place and he was putting forward a sincerely held
rational argument with the aim of combatting hatred and bigotry. So I think he
fulfilled Spinoza’s general stipulation concerning political philosophy that “he
may even speak against them, provided that he does so from rational conviction,
not from fraud, anger, or hatred…”9. Yet this ruling does not include
any sanctions on those who spoke with contempt and hatred against him despite
Judaism being strongly opposed to what is called lachon hara, broadly equating
to gossiping and “scandal-mongering”10, mainly because they often
have very detrimental effects on both individuals and groups or society. Given
this Jewish aversion to spreading and listening to idle and mostly negative
gossip, I am surprised that anyone in the Jewish community would have listened
to or believed the gossip that the two people from his synagogue came back with
after they grilled Spinoza about his religious outlook11. Following
Jewish tradition, it is the disparaging and malicious gossip that the Jewish
community should have treated with suspicion, rather than any beliefs Spinoza
was claimed to have held.
I worry about the implementation
of justice. A person is punished for sincerely expressing views which are both
supportive of feminism and the LGBT community, so intending to alleviate
prejudice and hatred against certain sections of society. Yet those who openly
attack someone simply because their views differ from theirs are not held to
account. Spinoza’s wise observation that “Every man’s understanding is his own,
and that brains are as diverse as palates”12 is still not widely appreciated
today, both within and outside of religious debates. This is also completely
unnecessary in a religion such as Judaism which does not have any set doctrine
and has a tradition of studying and celebrating Rabbinic dispute and the
conflicting interpretations it contains on scripture and religious law. If it
is possible that a case, such as Rabbi Dweck with all his knowledge and
experience, can occur in the UK in 2017, then it is still more plausible that
when Spinoza’s community brandished his views as heretical, these claims about
Spinoza may not only have been grossly distorted but also prejudiced against
his liberal-mindedness and more due to a lack of toleration of diverse opinions
than Spinoza holding any unacceptable or un-Jewish thoughts. Indeed, Spinoza
wisely sums up such controversies when he declined the professorship at
Heidelberg University:
“ ‘religious quarrels’, he added,
‘do not arise so much from ardent zeal for religion, as from men’s various
dispositions and love of contradiction, which causes them habitually to distort
and condemn everything, however rightly it may have been said. I have
experienced this in my private and secluded station;….”13
1 Kaucky, L.,
2015-2017, ‘Who Was Spinoza?’, available at:
2 Frazer, J., 19/07/2017,
12:10 pm ‘Rabbi Dweck can stay as Sephardi leader after rabbinic ruling’
available at:
3Scruton, R., (1986) ‘Spinoza’, Past Masters, Oxford
University Press, p14
4 White, H. W. (2001)
translator’s preface to Spinoza, ‘Ethics’, Wordsworth Editions limited, pXXI in
Spinoza, Benedict de., ‘Ethics’, translated by White, W. H., revised by
Stirling, A. H., Wordsworth Classics of World Literature, Wordsworth editions,
(2001)
5Spinoza, Benedict
de., A Theologico-Political Treatise and A Political Treatise, Dover
Philosophical Classics, Dover Publications Inc Mineola New York (2004) p257
6ibid p258
7ibid
8my project outline is
available at:
In a forthcoming paper, I shall
also be examining Spinoza on vices and the virtue of freedom of thought:
“…what question was ever settled
so wisely that no abuses could possibly spring therefrom? He who seeks to
regulate everything by law, is more likely to arouse vices than to reform them.
It is best to grant what cannot be abolished, even though it may be in itself
harmful. How many evils spring from luxury, envy, avarice, drunkenness, and the
like, yet these are tolerated – vices as they are – because they cannot be
prevented by legal enactments how much more then should free thought be
granted, seeing that it is in itself a virtue and that it cannot be crushed!”
Spinoza, Benedict de., A
Theologico-Political Treatise and A Political Treatise, Dover Philosophical
Classics, Dover Publications Inc Mineola New York (2004) p261
9Spinoza, Benedict
de., A Theologico-Political Treatise and A Political Treatise, Dover Philosophical
Classics, Dover Publications Inc Mineola New York (2004) p259
10 for more details
see:
11Scruton, R., (1986) ‘Spinoza’, Past Masters, Oxford
University Press, p7-8
12Spinoza, Benedict
de., A Theologico-Political Treatise and A Political Treatise, Dover Philosophical
Classics, Dover Publications Inc Mineola New York (2004) p257
13Scruton, R., (1986) ‘Spinoza’, Past Masters, Oxford
University Press, p13-14
