Applicability of Spinoza I
Baruch Spinoza was born in 1632 in Amsterdam. At the
age of seventeen he was excommunicated
from the Jewish
community for his beliefs concerning God and
existence.
While some of Spinoza’s ideas seem far fetched, they are
highly adaptable to modern times and other philosophical
view points.
Spinoza believed that God existed, but his
interpretation of God was far different than what most
believed during his time. He believed that God was not
a
personal being, but that He contained within him all
things
in existence. This meant that God had every attribute;
every quality known to exist was in fact God’s quality
and
attribute. Spinoza believed that there could exist in
the
universe no two things that were exactly alike for he
felt
one could find an attribute that they did not share such
as
location. Even if two things appeared to be the same in
every way imaginable, they could not share the same
space
and therefore were not the same. Spinoza also said that
were you to find two things that shared every attribute
exactly, they would not actually be two things but were
one
thing. Spinoza in short, was a pantheist.
Spinoza’s beliefs on God came into conflict with every
other belief to date regarding God and human existence,
for
in stating that God is the universe itself, he was also
explaining our own existence as simply being a part of
God,
and not controlled by or created by God.
Just as it has been with all philosophers, others
tried to show that Spinoza was wrong by posing
objections to
his theories. Though many believe these objections to
be
valid, if combined with modern ideas and logic as well
as
Spinoza’s own ideas of the time, they are easily proven
insufficient to break Spinoza’s philosophy down. Many
ask,
“If God has every attribute, then what of the attribute
of
not being God?” This is easily answered when you
realize
that ‘not being God’ is not an actual attribute of
anything,
it is a concept. The definition of this must first be
understood and then it is easily seen that nothing has
such
an attribute, as all things in existence are God. This
brings into question the attributes of being infinite
and
finite at the same time, for how can God contain within
itself both of these qualities. The answer to this is
also
quite simple and ties into the ideas of modern science
as
well. Let’s say we are looking at something within God
(the
universe) and call it a finite
substance. When that
substance “ceases to exist” it does not actually cease
to
exist but transforms its energy. This all fits in with
the
well knows rule “energy is neither created nor
destroyed”.
Nothing within God is actually finite at all, it simply
changes form. And in regards to things other than what
we
know, we must also take into consideration that time in
itself is a concept, so the idea of things either ending
or
continuing on forever, is not something the human mind
can
grasp.
Next are the objections pertaining to location. “How
can
God have the attribute of only being here, but only
being
there at the same time?” Take for example two people
standing in a room. One person is against the wall, the
other stands five feet away at the door. Both have the
attribute of being only where they are. So if all
things
are God, how can this be? Well look at the hand of the
human being. Consisting of five fingers, the thumb and
the
index finger are in two separate places and one is not
the
other but, they are all a part of your hand. Just as
fingers assist the hand, we are extensions of God,
individual pieces, but part of a whole. Lastly, there
is
the objection that if there can be or be conceived no
other
substance but God, how can it be infinittely finite?
This
ties into the objection formerly mentioned, infinity is
not
an object, nor is the concept of being finite. It is
simply
a concept and isn’t substance, and it is therefore God’s
concept since all is God.