LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Baruch Spinoza: Amsterdam Holland
built 630 days ago
Baruch Spinoza (or Benedict Espinoza or Bento Spinoza) (November 24, 1632 – February 21, 1677) was a Jewish philosopher and one of the first Jewish secularists. Spinoza was born to a Marano family in Amsterdam Holland. Fleeing the Spanish Inquisition, his ancestors had settled in Portugal, only to flee the inquisition when it came to Portugal and find shelter in Holland, along with numerous other Spanish and Portuguese Jews, the remnant of the glorious Jewish community that had once flourished in Spain under the Muslims.
Source:
It was in Amsterdam that Baruch Spinoza found the freedom to reject the Judeo-Christian notion of God. Elsewhere, he might have been killed for his rejection of God. As it was, in 1656, at the age of 24, he was "excommunicated" from (shunned by) the Jewish community. The writ of excommunication accused him of 'abominable heresies' and ‘monstrous deeds’ and then leveled a series of curses against him. Most importantly, it forbid other Jews from communicating with him, doing business with him, reading anything he wrote, or even being physically near him!
Source:
It was on this date, November 24, 1632, that Portuguese-Jewish philosopher Baruch Spinoza was born in Amsterdam to a family settled in Holland. The family were Portuguese crypto-Jews — that is, Jews forcibly converted to Christianity while secretly remaining Jewish. Spinoza was a bright student in the Talmud Torah school and might have become a rabbi. His father died when he was 21, and Spinoza's career path took a sudden turn when his open skepticism about the nature of God, the existence of angels, and the immortality of the soul prompted an attempt to silence him for "monstrous deeds" and "abominable heresies." Failing in that, on 27 July 1656, the rabbis issued on Spinoza a writ of cherem, or excommunication — showing that Jews can be just as intolerant of Freethought as Christians.
Source:
Baruch Spinoza was born to Portuguese Jews living in exile in Holland, but his life among the Marranos there was often unsettled. Despite an early rabbinical education, he was expelled from the synagogue at Amsterdam for defending heretical opinions in 1656. While engaging privately in serious study of medieval Jewish thought, Cartesian philosophy, and the new science at Rijnburg and the Hague, Spinoza supported himself by grinding optical lenses, an occupation that probably contributed to the consumption that killed him. Private circulation of his philosophical treatises soon earned him a significant reputation throughout Europe, but Spinoza so treasured his intellectual independence that in 1673 he declined the opportunity to teach at Heidelberg, preferring to continue his endeavors alone.
Source:
Benedictus de Spinoza (November 24, 1632 – February 21, 1677), was named Baruch Spinoza by his synagogue elders and known as Bento de Espinosa or Bento d'Espiñoza in his native Amsterdam. He is considered one of the great rationalists of 17th-century philosophy and, by virtue of his magnum opus the Ethics, one of the definitive ethicists. His writings, like those of his fellow rationalists, reveal considerable mathematical training and facility. Spinoza was a lens crafter by trade, an exciting engineering field at the time because of great discoveries being made by telescopes. The full impact of his work only took effect sometime after his death and after the publication of his Opera Posthuma. He is now seen as having prepared the way for the 18th century Enlightenment, and as a founder of modern biblical criticism.
Source:
The statement about Spinoza's neutrality toward Judaism is the result of Strauss's historical-critical analysis of the TPT, which he began with "Cohen's Analysis of Spinoza's Bible Science" and completed in his book on Spinoza's Critique of Religion. In the latter work, Strauss highlighted the distance between Spinoza and his original community as a peculiar and essential component of his philosophical work[36]. In this respect, Strauss argues that Cohen was wrong to maintain that Spinoza had a vengeful attitude towards Judaism because of the ban of the Amsterdam community, but at the same time Cohen was right that Spinoza had no legitimate place within the Amsterdam community, and therefore the Amsterdam community was justified in sanctioning Spinoza's distance through a public ban. As to Spinoza's neutrality, Strauss infers it from Spinoza's well known statement in the third chapter of the TPT that "(i)f the foundations of the Jewish religion have not rendered the minds of the Jews effeminate (…), then I would absolutely believe that someday, given the opportunity and human affairs being so changeable, they (the Jews) will once again establish their empire and God will elect them anew"[37]. This is, according to Strauss, Spinoza's "political testament" and a "neutral consideration of the possibility condition [Möglichkeitsbedingung] for the restoration of the Jewish state"[38]. In other words, with this statement Spinoza did not express any wish or desire for a possible restoration of the Jewish state, but merely discussed the condition of its possibility.
Source:
MORE ABOUT
Amsterdam Holland