tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8708273719674528189.post6054289569808456933..comments2024-03-22T00:20:38.510-07:00Comments on Adam Riggio writes: Thinking the Divine II: The Satisfaction of an Easy Answer, Jamming, 04/11/2014Adam Riggiohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14606510835439580828noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8708273719674528189.post-19992428534137052972014-11-05T08:06:58.366-08:002014-11-05T08:06:58.366-08:00Well, you got me there.
I think what most shocke...Well, you got me there. <br /><br />I think what most shocked me when I was reading through the first half of the TTP was how much of his intellectual energy was devoted to refuting literalist interpretations of the Torah and Bible. There were way more complicated politics involved in his excommunication, not only everything you said, but the way the Jewish community was squeezed in the conflict in Holland between the republicans and the monarchists. <br /><br />I'm writing something for tomorrow that will look at more detail in the religious attitudes that were popular at his time and in the couple of centuries after Spinoza's death. TTP has an argument for religious pluralism with what strikes me as a very pious foundation, that in the context of his own time (and a lot of attitudes in ours) would have been called apostasy or worse.Adam Riggiohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14606510835439580828noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8708273719674528189.post-43054086405780014882014-11-05T07:26:02.270-08:002014-11-05T07:26:02.270-08:00You've over-simplified Spinoza's being put...You've over-simplified Spinoza's being put into cherem. He denied a lot more than just the biblical literalism, but also rejected the mitzvot and concepts like the eternal soul in this world and the next. He drew no meaning from tradition, and that combined with elements of living during the Enlightenment distanced him from Torah practice and his community.<br /><br />There is also speculation that the community was trying to protect themselves from further persecution, so getting rid of him was an easy solution for them.<br /><br />I love you, Adam, but I'll be the first to say you have no idea what you're talking about when you make such a bold claim that the Jewish people of that time made their beliefs about the divinity of the universe so simple and easy. The practice of intense study and debate of Torah in yeshivot has been a tradition for millenia in Judaism. You've heard it yourself when I played for you that shiur and the students were all arguing with their rabbi.<br /><br />-Your loving girlfriendAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com