Happy Birthday to Spinoza!
Today, I just want to briefly
summarise my Spinoza research thus far and give a glimpse of how my approach to
Spinoza is inspired by his wisdom.
“Be not
astonished at new ideas; for it is well known to you that a thing does not
therefore cease to be true because it is not accepted by many.”1
I’ve been researching Spinoza for
3 years now and have written 4 papers, 1 long abstract, 2 handouts for my
conference presentations and begun writing a blog about him. When deciding who
to research there’s just one simple rule: Does the philosopher ‘speak’ to you,
resonate with you, do you ‘click’ with them, do you feel you can get into their
minds? If the answer is ‘yes’ then you start reading their texts in depth, as
well as secondary literature.
“…surrender to what is real within you, for
that alone is sure....”2
And in addition to this rule, you
think a lot. You live, breathe the philosopher. The same would work in other disciplines,
eg in literature, an author who you ‘click’ with; in history, an historical
figure that fascinates you. It doesn’t matter whether the culture or religion
that writer or historical figure comes from is the same as yours or not, if
they ‘speak’ to you then that’s the person you’ll enjoy researching. This is
essential to ensure freedom of imagination and thought. Of course, if it’s
transcultural, then it requires more work on your part, you have to be able to
empathise with the other. This sums up how I feel about the philosophers I take
an interest in/research - I feel I get to know them, identify with them, their
experiences and their philosophical thinking on different levels. This doesn’t
happen overnight, it takes intense reading over a fair amount of time. However,
learning to understand Spinoza is rewarding. Here are some of his words on
understanding that I like:
“The highest activity a human being can
attain is learning for understanding, because to understand is to be free.”3
“I
have made a ceaseless effort not to ridicule, not to bewail, not to scorn human
actions, but to understand them.”4
“The endeavor to understand is the first
and only basis of virtue.”5
I was first introduced to Spinoza
at Uni by Susan James’s lecture on him back in 2010. I bought a copy of the TTP
beforehand to prepare for the lecture and I still use that book today. It’s a
worn out copy now but I love it. So, in effect, I’ve been reading and thinking
about Spinoza ever since, which amounts to well over 7 years. Did I understand all
of his philosophical ideas immediately? No. Luckily, Susan James is excellent
at making stuff understandable, even though Spinoza is, nonetheless, very
difficult and she had the impossible task of conveying such a complex
philosopher in only 1 lecture, within a given topic area and in our first year
of UG. So, it still took a great deal of effort on my part to build on what she
taught us so I could go from appreciating and understanding Spinoza’s place in
the history of philosophy and within specific topics to grasping the entirety of
his works. But it’s not until one gets the ‘aha’ moment that the research takes
off. In order to truly appreciate Spinoza I did a huge amount of other study so
I could enter his mind. For various reasons, I also set about studying the Hebrew
Bible with one eye on the Hebrew text rather than just an English translation
of it. My knowledge up till then was very child-like and patchy. It needed a
re-vamp! I decided to learn biblical Hebrew when the opportunity presented
itself and generally made an in-depth study of Judaism from many angles not
just the usual simplistic view people grow up with. Although Spinoza was not
the main reason for doing so, it certainly helped me understand him and I drew
on my experiences, both educational and personal, for my interpretation.
However, an interpretation has to
be one that you really believe in, are convinced is getting close to the truth
and can find evidence for in the philosopher’s writings. I was fortunate that 3
well-known Spinoza philosophers, Eric Schliesser (2015), Martin Lin (2016) and
Michael Rosenthal (2016), found my interpretation plausible and one, in
particular, really challenged me to defend my interpretation. This was not just
extremely helpful but gave me great confidence to continue my research on
Spinoza. If I hadn’t had this positive feedback would I have continued with
Spinoza? Most definitely yes. Not
through arrogance but because I think my interpretation makes a valuable
contribution to research on this oft misunderstood, complex, genius philosopher. Besides, no matter how you
construct your interpretation of a philosopher, there will always be another
side someone can put forward.
“No matter how thin you slice it, there
will always be two sides.”6
There will, also, always be
people who are critical or negative about your research, it’s par for the
course. By all means listen to their point of view. If you agree, then take it
on board, if you don’t, ignore it because their motives may be less than
sincere.
“What Paul says about Peter tells us more
about Paul than about Peter”7
For my papers, handouts etc on
Spinoza, which deal with worship, politics and the controversial idea that
Spinoza’s Conatus foreshadows, somewhat, Darwin’s complex theories and scientific research on genomes, see my
academia page. However, these papers have since been revised and extended and will
be coming out very soon because I have already re-written them.
“If you want the present to be different
from the past, study the past.”8
1 quote from Goodreads,
2 Ibid
3 Ibid
4 Ibid
5 Ibid
6 Ibid
7 Ibid
8Ibid
