*Politics, Prophecy, and Interpretation*:

the problem of potential philosophers in the theologico-political
writings of Maimonides and Spinoza



Peter Steinberg

96 Mansfield Street

New Haven, CT 06511

\(203\) 782-2768

July 1992

\* \* \* \* \* \*

In chapter 7 of his *Theologico-Political Treatise*, Spinoza presents to
his readers a new way to read Scripture. As opposed both to the
skeptics, who have no trust in reason and seek to assimilate it to
scriptural doctrines, and to the dogmatists, who impose rationality upon
scripture, Spinoza presents a third way. Noting the confusion and strife
brought about by the clash of these opposing hermeneutics, he tries to
transcend mere human conjecture and ground biblical exegesis in
something more certain. Thus, he bluntly asserts a new fundamental
principle: "Our knowledge of Scripture must...be looked for in Scripture
only."[^1] I will examine this maxim more carefully in a later section,
but it serves to guide us into a fascinating aspect of the genealogy of
Spinoza's thought.

After setting out the virtues of his exegetical method, Spinoza
concludes his discussion by examining "the opinions of those who differ
from me."[^2] He easily dispenses with the skeptics, showing their
inconsistency in using a "supernatural" method to arrive at common-sense
results. Spinoza finds a much greater challenge, however, in refuting
the ideas of Maimonides. Spinoza is disdainful of his predecessor's
admission that a philosophical proof could bring him to reject the
actual words of Scripture. As an example, he cites Maimonides' carefully
worded admission that, if philosophy could prove the eternity of the
world, he would then be obligated to re-interpret Scripture in order to
agree with it. To Spinoza, the implication of this example is that of
Maimonides placing the ultimate authority on scriptural matters in the
hands of the philosophers.

This idea angers Spinoza for two reasons. The first is that such a
position would deny that generations of uneducated Jews and Gentiles
should be seen as not having "understood" their Law. In the face of a
three thousand year history of Judeo-Christian devotion to God, the Jews
and Christians would have to been seen as never having grasped the
"intrinsic reason of what was preached."[^3] The second problem is that
it would deny understanding of scripture to the unphilosophical masses
even in the present day, leaving Scriptural authority in the hands of a
philosophical elite. From these arguments, Spinoza concludes that
Maimonides' doctrine is "harmful, useless, and absurd."[^4]

The main thrust of this essay will be to show how this criticism of
Maimonides is superficial at best, and appears to miss the point
entirely. The arguments Spinoza presents, while seeming to oppose
Maimonides, have results which are in substantial accord with the *Guide
of the Perplexed*. Maimonides' text is concerned with societies based
upon revealed law, and seeks to establish the necessity of rational
inquiry in determining such a law's validity in the eyes of those who
follow it. That is, he seems most concerned with the individual
conscience. Spinoza is also concerned with the role of philosophical
inquiry in a society based upon the tenets of organized religion, but
frames the problem in explicitly political terms. He seems more
concerned with the unity of the state. I hope to show that Spinoza's
critiques of Maimonides cannot be accepted at face value. In fact,
Spinoza and Maimonides are addressing the same "problem," at least as it
appears in their respective historical milieus.

To shed some light on this "problem," I propose to work backwards at
first, moving from Spinoza to Maimonides. This is not necessarily to
work anachronistically, however, applying modern categories to
pre-modern texts. As has been shown by several scholars, the structure
and terminology of many of Spinoza's arguments have clearly been
influenced by Maimonides. Thus, this essay will take, as its starting
point, Ze'ev Levy's and Leo Strauss' (not unrelated) observations that
where Maimonides wrote for an elite of actual philosophers, Spinoza
addressed "'potential' philosophers."[^5] This reflects a widely held
perception of Spinoza as a paradigmatic figure of the Enlightenment, who
saw the potential for rationality to be inherent in all individuals.
Still, however universalistic such a view sounds at first, I argue that
potential rationality is a characteristic of only his intended audience.
In order to gain some certainty as to Spinoza's view, then, it will be
necessary to examine Maimonides' treatment of such "potential
philosophers." To reveal prematurely a conclusion which I hope
subsequently to demonstrate more conclusively, it seems that the problem
of the "potential philosopher" (a term I will use throughout) associated
with Spinoza is in fact also a central problem addressed by Maimonides.
This conclusion seems most plausible in the context of the latter's
political theory, made explicit in the discussion of prophecy in Part II
of the *Guide*.

\* \* \* \* \* \*

Maimonides is on well-trodden Aristotelian ground when he asserts
without proof at the beginning of chapter 40 that "man is political by
nature and that it is his nature to live in society."[^6] He seems more
original, however, when he goes on to note that people, in
contradistinction to animals, are distinguished by their diversity of
interests. Any two human individuals, so alike physically, might be so
different "with regard to every moral habit" that they appear to belong
to two different species altogether.[^7] This situation can only be
mitigated by the actions of an individual who, acting like Plato's
statesman in accordance with Aristotle's golden mean, compensates for
the excesses and defects of each individual. Such a man is a prophet, or
at least one who follows prophetic guidance. By prescribing "actions and
moral habits" to be followed equally by each individual, he subsumes the
diversity of social life under many "points of conventional accord so
that the community becomes well ordered."[^8]

What must be noted here is that the political law, as such, is not
necessarily rational. Being based upon the natural, hence diverse,
faculties and shortcomings of humans, the social arrangement it
establishes will most likely reflect nothing deeper than political
necessity. It needs only to reflect a utilitarian or pragmatic
arrangement to achieve the best social life possible for a given
community. But these arrangements often *appear* as more than merely
natural. Maimonides alludes to this strange status of law when he notes
that "the Law, although it is not natural, enters into what is
natural."[^9] Though law builds upon (or emerges from) the natural, it
adds to it a distinctly supra-natural order, which is surely not
isolated from rationality.

These observations are most germane in response to Spinoza, whose
criticism of Maimonides seems to imply that obedience requires
understanding. What seems clear is that Maimonides portrays obedience on
the part of the general run of men as independent of their understanding
of why the law comes about. As long as the law satisfies their
immediate, personal interests they will have no problems existing within
its confines. With regard to philosophers, however, Maimonides notes
that they might care about the reasons for the law, if they choose to
remain within the city. This last proviso seems doubtful if we take
seriously Maimonides' characterization of the philosophical attitude as
that of detachment from and disdain for the everyday world of men.[^10]
Thus, neither the general run of men nor the philosophers have any
reason to care about the rational content of Law. If understanding has
no place in Maimonides' conception of political life, such a result
would seem to drain Spinoza's critique of all its force.

This is not the case, however. This analysis clearly leaves out a
certain subset of the population of any city. The masses are
characterized by their self-interest and indifference to truth. On the
other hand, the philosophers are concerned with truth to the point of
indifference to the city. It takes only a small stretch of the
imagination to construct an individual who partakes of both worlds. He
lives within the confines of traditional Law, and yet he might wonder as
to the Law's ultimate justification. In other words, he wants a
philosophical understanding of the Law, which the Law as such does not
seem to supply. This individual is what Maimonides might have called a
"potential philosopher." Implicit in Maimonides' account is a strong
conviction that the spiritual crisis faced by such individuals is one of
the most pressing political problems faced by any community founded upon
revelation. In light of the political problem defined by the notion of
potential philosophers, Maimonides' prophetology becomes a central
teaching of the Guide.

Prophecy presents the theoretical possibility of a person, albeit an
extraordinary person, who has developed his intellect and his
imagination to an equal extent. In the *Guide*, Maimonides defines
prophecy as

> an overflow overflowing from God\...through the intermediation of the
> Active Intellect, toward the rational faculty in the first place and
> thereafter toward the imaginative faculty. This is the highest degree
> of man and the ultimate term of perfection that can exist for his
> species.[^11]

This definition must not have been completely taken for granted by
Maimonides' readership. Otherwise he would not have had to defend it so
carefully against various other conceptions of prophecy, which seem to
have been widely accepted at the time of his writing. In particular,
Maimonides discusses three commonly held "opinions" about prophecy.

The first opinion is essentially "imaginative," and is most in line with
the traditional notions about prophecy in his time. God chose whomever
He liked and turned them into prophets, sending them forth as "preachers
who called upon the people to obey the Law of Moses, threatened those
who rejected it, and held out promises to those who were firm in
observing it."[^12] Though a prophet is generally considered to have "a
certain goodness and sound morality," his ignorance or knowledge of
speculative matters has no bearing on his political efficaciousness. The
second opinion, clearly opposed to the first, is that of the
"philosophers," represented best by Maimonides' immediate intellectual
precursors Al-farabi and Avicenna. They teach that prophecy is a
"certain perfection in the nature of man."[^13] It is achieved only
after rigorous training of the intellectual faculty, provided no
non-intellectual obstacle due to "temperament or to some external cause"
hinders the individual's progress. Thus, where the imaginative
interpretation stresses the notion of the prophet as God's elect, the
philosophers seem to believe that prophecy follows necessarily upon
correct training.

Maimonides presents the third opinion as "the opinion of our Law and the
foundation of our doctrine."[^14] By this account, a prophet achieves a
synthesis of the first two doctrines by perfecting both his or her
intellect *and* imagination through training. Prophecy is thus seen, on
one hand, as a fundamentally "natural" faculty of the same type as the
faculty of moving one's hand. Still, it is bestowed in the same fashion
as miracles, and is thus wholly dependent on God's "divine will."[^15]
While this view of prophecy as a quasi-natural faculty differs in most
ways from Spinoza's "naturalism," it is an important feature of
Maimonides' theory. Most important, it creates a bridge between prophecy
and the law, as it is described above. Prophecy is a "natural" faculty
which partakes in the nonnatural, making use of both reason and
revelation. The law delivered by such prophets is also described as
"natural" several times. Thus, law might also be seen as making a
similar sort of connection between two human faculties in seeming
opposition with one another.

The exact nature of this connection, however, is not clear from the mere
comparison of prophecy and Law. It can only be supplied by Maimonides'
interpretive method, as presented in the last several chapters of his
prophetology. There are numerous textual examples that would seem to
disprove his grand unified theory of prophecy. But in each instance,
Maimonides exhorts his reader to "distinguish and differentiate between
the various matters by means of your intellect. Then you will know
clearly."[^16] In other words, any time a scriptural text conflicts with
reason, it must be interpreted figuratively. In this manner, the
interpreter can, and should, make irrational elements compatible with
reason so as to arrive at intellectual, speculative truth.

Such a doctrine implies that prophecy and Law have similar structures.
Prophecy has an outer shell which is imaginative, and hence political.
Its inner content can be found only by rational interpretation. What is
never established, however, is an exact link between this outward form
and its inner content. The two can exist simultaneously, and possibly
independently of one another. Thus, prophecy brings together politics
and philosophy within the same individual, but allows them to be
fundamentally separate at the level of public expression. As Strauss
notes, Maimonides sees the prophetic teaching as "partly or wholly above
reason but never against reason."[^17] The interpretive method allows
Maimonides to claim, without inconsistency, that a generally accepted
law can also be a source of "true opinions" about God and the angels.
Consequently, it gives him the analytical tools to develop a conception
of a "divine law" which serves to instill two different sorts of human
perfection, one for the body and one for the mind.

The "divine law" is distinguished from the *nomoi* of past religious
communities by the fact that it "takes pains to inculcate correct
opinions with regard to God...and with regard to the angels, and that it
aims to make man wise, to give him understanding, and to awaken his
attention."[^18] Where the *nomoi* only deal with the "ordering of the
city" and the "relations among one another and provisions for obtaining
that which is deemed happiness,"[^19] the divine law actively seeks to
improve men's intellectual faculties through the dissemination of true
opinions. Such opinions include matters on which the Bible itself is
often vague or contradictory---the attributes of God, for instance, or
the mysteries of metaphysics. These subjects are similar in that one
cannot prove them by direct appeals to Scripture, but reason demands
knowledge of them. Thus, "true opinions" are generally separated from
the "manifestly useful"[^20] by virtue of their association with a
private, non-political rationality.

Seen from the standpoint of a potential philosopher, however, the notion
of divine law can assume an essentially public, and political, role. I
will now argue that for Maimonides, the whole point of giving rational
justification of the Law is to address those living under the Law who
might come to question its intrinsic validity apart from its role in
governing the irrational desires of men.

This aspect of the Law is presented most strikingly in Maimonides'
account of Moses' appeal to God in Book I, chapter 63 of the Guide.
Moses is worried about two things: first that "they," the Israelites,
will not accept God's existence demonstratively unless it is proven by
argument, and second that even if some of them do, the rest will have no
incentive to follow, since they will have no tangible proof. According
to Maimonides, Moses "says as it were" that "no one is ignorant of Your
essence and true reality; if, however, I am asked about Your name, what
is the meaning indicated by that name?"[^21] Maimonides explains this
comment as stemming from the need to avoid saying a "reprehensible
thing" to God. Saying otherwise would imply that not everyone has
demonstrative knowledge of God's attributes. Even still, the
conditional, "if I am asked," seems to be the genuine concern that
motivates Moses' request. The divine aspect of the law is thus meant to
prevent the theologico-political crises that might develop among some
members of the community. For the rest, a miracle was the necessary and
sufficient condition for assent. This example displays how even the
speculative parts of Mosaic law have a distinctly political aspect. In
addition to Maimonides' religious injunction that the best law should
contribute to the perfection of man's soul, divine law also addresses
the political necessity of addressing the few who might question the law
and seek to understand it.

Up to this point, we have seen that the division of law and prophecy
into two aspects, the public and the private, is related to the problem
of potential philosophers within the community. It remains for us to
understand just how these concerns apply to the teachings of the *Guide*
itself. The body of the work shows how the concern for potential
prophecy is manifest in Scriptural tradition. The introduction, however,
offers express political instructions to the potential philosopher.
Maimonides notes explicitly that

> ...my speech in the present Treatise is directed...to one who has
> philosophized and has knowledge of the true sciences, but believes at
> the same time in the matters pertaining to the Law and is perplexed as
> to their meaning because of the uncertain terms and the parables.[^22]

Thus, from the outset, Maimonides says that his book has two purposes,
"to explain the meanings of certain terms" as well as "to explain the
very obscure parables" occurring in books of prophecy. These two aims
are not necessarily different from one another. But the distinction is
important, as it implies that there might be individual words that have
meaning outside the context of a parable. Maimonides, recalling the
golden apples lined with silver, constantly reminds us that parables are
of two kinds. Some demand that we understand the meaning of each word;
others require us to ignore the words in order to understand the inner
content of the whole parable more clearly.

We have already seen how prophecy is considered a "natural" human
faculty. Only God's will can prevent the individual who has developed
his intelligence and imagination to the highest levels from prophesying.
But Maimonides implies that the interpreter is endowed with an equally
"natural" faculty. He characterizes the interpretive act as "removing a
screen from between the eye and a visible thing."[^23] Interpretation is
always referred to as an act of the intellect. But its object is, by
most definitions, the intractable objects in the world. Thus,
interpretation serves to bridge a gap between a material reality and a
speculative truth. This situates the potential philosopher qua
interpreting agent in the same conceptual "plane" as the law and the
prophets.[^24]

In this way, the Maimonides' interpretive method bridges the gap between
reason and revelation, through what appears to be an assimilation of one
to the other in a dogmatic fashion. But even if we might be stretching
this reading somewhat, it also seems to be the case that Maimonidean
interpretation does not have to join the one (the single term) and the
many (the whole). The individual reader may interpret a text in a way
not acceptable to the general understanding of it within his own
society. But he could be well aware that Mosaic Law is somewhat
inhospitable to those who deny its ultimately revelational character.
This is the "perplexity" which the Guide seems intended to address. It
is a political perplexity. The interpreter knows that his interpretation
might serve to undermine religious authority. Therefore, in a similar
manner to the prophets, he must hide the rational content of his
thoughts underneath the veneer of socially proper speech. The
pedagogical purpose of the Guide is to teach the methods of such
concealment.

Maimonides' aim, then, is to protect the interpretive autonomy of the
potential philosopher without sacrificing his desire to be part of a
coherent religious community. The prophet and the Law must conceal their
rational content so as not to offend or confuse those who are not ready
to understand it. By analogy to law and prophecy, as well as to the
separation of the part and the whole, the method of concealment is
conveyed by the *Guide* to the potential philosopher. Maimonides'
doctrine implies that the interpreting individual has no obligation to
harmonize his interpretations with the generally accepted and
"manifestly useful" opinions. Instead, the interpreter, having learned
how to read so well, must learn how to write in a similar fashion. His
public expression may suggest answers to the questions which he asks so
fervently, but they must be concealed from those who have no interest in
such matters.

This reading of Maimonides sees one of Maimonides' central motivations
in writing the *Guide* as pedagogical. That is, he wrote his treatise to
educate the potential philosophers about the concealment of radical
views through what others have called a "dual-language."[^25] This would
probably elicit numerous criticisms. The central problem, the critics
would say, is that it prioritizes the practical and political aspects of
Maimonides' writings over the theoretical. Maimonides clearly states in
many parts of the Guide that theoretical perfection is the ultimate end
of man. That is why he wrote his book for a small, elite group of
philosophers who have little interest in politics. Such critics would
also point to Strauss' conclusion that Maimonides' overtly "political"
prescriptions, especially in the last chapter which establishes the
political realm as man's highest end, are rhetorical fictions to avoid
persecution by a law-abiding and non-philosophical Rabbinic
community.[^26]

The doctrine which I attribute to Maimonides in this essay should be
seen as "dogmatic," in that it advocates a place for speculative inquiry
in the religious realm. But in the last analysis, within the religious
communities of his time, there is no real separation between the
religious and political. Thus, he is motivated by an nonrational and
ultimately political consideration, the fear of confusing the masses
untutored in philosophy. Such "politicization" of Maimonides might also
elicit criticism from those who claim that he was truly writing for a
philosophical elite. Granted, it cannot be denied that Maimonides is
writing for philosophers. But as we have seen, it seems that
philosophers would already know most of the secrets which Maimonides
gleans from Scripture.

On the other hand, Maimonides clearly does not imagine potential
philosophers to constitute a very large population within a community.
Thus, he could be seen as making an exception to his general principles
in order to address a political problem. While he never diverges from
his view that philosophy is the highest end of man, perhaps he is
willing to sacrifice his philosophical priorities to address this
special case---for the sake of expediency. Thus, one could say that he
is just trying to show how a philosophical tendency might be integrated
into a society through an essentially prophetic method of interpreting
the law. Still, Maimonides says himself that if the political realm is
not more important than the theoretical, it is, at the very least,
temporally prior to it.[^27] Thus, I would argue that for Maimonides,
the potential philosophers threat to the integrity of the social order
is to be seen as a real problem. If their doubts are not assuaged, their
personal perplexity might lead to external violations of laws that they
cannot justify through speculation on divine matters.

\* \* \* \* \* \*

In the previous discussion, I have shown how certain paradoxes within
Maimonides' doctrine can be reconciled if they are read with a view to
addressing "potential philosophers." Neither the philosophers, nor the
masses, are deeply concerned about the relationship of Law to Truth.
Thus, Maimonides' doctrines are intended to address a person who belongs
to neither faction within a society . Spinoza has been attributed, by
Yovel and others, with speaking to a similar audience. He has
furthermore been associated with a species of universalism, which sees
all men as, to some extent, potential philosophers. After some
preliminary comparisons between Maimonides and Spinoza, I will argue in
the next section that Spinoza's arguments in the *Treatise* also
presuppose the existence of potential philosophers. While this reading
reconciles certain oppositions in his thought, taking it seriously
undermines his professed universalism, as it brings to light the
implicit limits of his political theory.

Spinoza and Maimonides are in agreement concerning their most general
aims. Most fundamentally, both strive to make the political realm
tolerant of speculative philosophers. They perceive the same dangers in
that the general run of men live within the law only insofar as it
benefits them. But while Spinoza believes that the mass sees blasphemous
philosophers as a genuine political threat, Maimonides believes that the
mass will only suffer great confusion from unrestrained speculation.
Thus, each in his own way, both thinkers acknowledge the possibility of
men who will demand rational justification and proof of many of the
dogmas upon which the political order rests.

Their doctrines diverge on the most central point, however. Maimonides
presents prophecy as a model for the potential philosopher trying to
live within society. Using the interpretive method, he shows that
prophets have great leadership qualities as well as well-developed
intellects and knowledge of the highest truths. This same method also
allows potential philosophers to express themselves without danger,
through the use of contradictions and dissembling, on the public level.
Thus, potential philosophers can be integrated into the community and
not absorbed by it.

Spinoza rejects this politically holistic and philosophically
particularistic methodology since it compels men to become hypocrites,
forced as they are to lie about their beliefs. He proposes a literal and
radically particular interpretive method which avoids reconciling the
contradicting elements in scripture with reason. Consequently, Spinoza
denies prophets the gift of powerful intellects, with wide political
ramifications. Law does not need philosophical justification, but only
serves to maintain the safety of the antagonistic elements in society.
Thus, Spinoza sees the force of the sovereign as the most effective
means by which to separate Faith and Philosophy altogether. This is the
only way to protect the rights of the philosophizing individual. But at
what cost?

\* \* \* \* \* \*

In the *Treatise*, Spinoza presents "superstition" as the driving force
in the lives of most men.[^28] This term comprehends the irrational
motivations that characterize a life shaken by fear as well as the
concern merely for one's personal welfare. In such a state of
superstition, terror reigns and prophets become the most powerful among
the masses. Religious orthodoxy, then, becomes the standard of truth,
and irreligionists and blasphemers are punished severely. Interestingly
enough, Spinoza does not see this state of affairs as one which is
entirely undesirable. People are susceptible to control, and most men
are happy in a world of ceremonies, so long as their immediate desires
are satisfied. Spinoza's objection stems from the sovereign's power to
restrict philosophical speculation. When the state can legislate the
content of a person's mind, no matter how ideas are reflected in
practice, all philosophers are potential victims of persecution as
heretics.

Faced with such a situation, Spinoza seeks to separate politics and
truth on the most radical level possible. Thus, his argument starts at
exactly the point where Maimonides brought them together in the first
place: with the methodology of reading prophetic texts. Maimonides had
suggested that interpretation could bring nature in accordance with
reason. In this way, he could establish a connection from prophecy to
politics, claiming that these realms could be seen to be rational, even
if their "inherent reason" was hidden. Spinoza has no faith in such a
system. Law must be understandable to everybody, or else the mass will
see itself as subject to the interpretive whims of philosophers. Spinoza
never conjectures explicitly what the effect might be if philosophers
assumed ultimate interpretive authority. One hypothesis is that such
philosophers, who have no genuine political authority, would become the
targets of hatred. Thus, "nature" must once and for all be separated
from "reason" through a new method.

This new method, discussed briefly above, is put succinctly by Spinoza
in chapter 7 of the Treatise: "Our knowledge of Scripture must... be
looked for in Scripture only."[^29] This maxim prompts him to examine
Scripture in a way "that does not widely differ from the method of
interpreting nature."[^30] It treats each word and phrase of Scripture
as an individual datum, to be understood only by means of principles
internal to the text. Only statements that are explicitly stated, and
unambiguous to ordinary reason, are considered genuine "facts."
Contradictions must be reconciled in the light of such "facts," whether
or not they correspond to rational principles. That "God is jealous" and
"God is a fire," taken together, imply a non-rational conclusion (e.g.
God has a material form) is irrelevant. They are both explicit Mosaic
proclamations. Thus, the word "fire" must be read as "jealous," although
such notions of God are contrary to Maimonides' conception of reason.

With the tie between reason and revelation broken by his methodological
fiat, Spinoza has no motivation to extract the rational, and universal,
content of prophecy from the prophets' biblical testimonies. Instead, he
finds that the prophetic accounts of speculative issues contradict one
another, and reflect entirely different notions about the world. This
rendered in Maimonides' categories, the prophets' lack of speculative
knowledge denies them the ability to harmonize truth and politics
through interpretation. They can only supply "moral certainty" with
regard to political matters. Such certainty has nothing to do with the
speculative or demonstrative knowledge expressed by philosophy or "true
opinions." Quite the opposite, the purpose of prophecy is mainly that of
exhorting men to obedience. Prophets, then, are merely men with
"unusually vivid imaginations, and not with unusually perfect
minds."[^31]

Considered as a model for interpretation, Spinoza's prophets inspire men
to understand the political order merely by its own principles. As
perceived by a prophet, these principles are biblical and require
obedience to God. This is the "sure knowledge revealed by God to
man,"[^32] which normal men in their everyday lives cannot hope to
aspire. Instead, the prophetic message should convey just enough
information to superstitious men to elicit their "simple faith" and
obedience in God. But Spinoza also intends this obedience in God to
bring about obedience to the obedience of the laws of the sovereign.
Thus, the prophet stands opposed to the potential philosopher implicit
in the Maimonidean project. Where this individual who desires to
philosophize within the religious community uses the prophetic model as
a guide for hiding his philosophy, Spinoza's prophet offers no such
help. The potential philosopher is left to his own devices, unable to
conceal his tendency to interpret from the mass. Thus, he is reliant
upon the law to protect him from political persecution.

Spinoza addresses what might be seen as the "normative" sections of the
Treatise specifically to this problem, and proposes a new role for the
law. Instead of enforcing breaches of religious doctrine, the political
laws should only proscribe behavior that endangers the unity of the
state. This is well in line with his exegetical method. Just as
Scripture is read in the light of Scripture, law should be interpreted
for the sake of political, and not philosophical, ends. Spinoza calls
such a law that demands only faith and obedience a "divine law," By
using Maimonides' term, he retains the essential feature of a universal
law superior to that of any particular state, even as he excludes what
had been its corresponding rational content.

Such a reformulation of "divine law" is necessary to Spinoza's argument
because its justification is internal : "The highest reward of the
Divine Law is the Law itself."[^33] To the masses, the older divine law
appeared as a *nomoi*, a type of law which had governed relations
between man and man in religious communities for centuries. For the
philosophical intellect, however, it is said to contain "true opinions"
about speculative matters. That is, it supplies external justifications
for obedience. Spinoza's fundamental critique of Maimonides is his
attack upon this notion of Law. For him, the Divine Law is "universal or
common to all men, for we have deduced it from universal human
nature."[^34] Thus, there is no need for men to be philosophers in order
to follow it. Divine knowledge consists solely in obedience to God,
which is as accessible to philosophers as it is to the masses. Spinoza
"proves" this by the fact that the Jewish people were clearly able to
obey the dictates of God communicated through Moses. Universal obedience
to the divine law, then, clearly does not require the use of reason. In
fact, it is needed precisely because Spinoza perceives reason as a
weaker faculty than the human passions.

The other, more problematical, aspect of Spinoza's universalism emerges
in his theory of state formation, wherein individuals cede their natural
rights to the state. Religious obedience arises from non-rational and
self-interested considerations. Spinoza, however, seems to indicate, in
a political theory reminiscent of Hobbes, that men choose life in a
polity out of an explicitly rational evaluation of its benefits as
compared to the natural state. Since reason "bids us choose the lesser
of two evils," men cede their "natural rights," determined by "desire
and power," to the state, which repays them with democratic
equality.[^35] There would seem to be a contradiction here. On this
subject, Shlomo Pines has remarked that

> \...there exists a discrepancy between Spinoza's anthropological
> doctrine concerning the average man on one hand, and certain of his
> statements concerning ordinary people as they are in the state of
> nature or as members of a democratic community, on the other\...\[I\]n
> this theory which seems to posit an essential rationality of man in
> the mass, superstitious religion is not regarded, *prima facie*, as a
> constitutive element of the non-theocratic societies; it does not
> figure as a significant factor in Spinoza's accounts of the origins
> and functioning of such societies. Normative democratic ideology has
> no place for it. We have seen, however, that this ideology is
> inconsistent with Spinoza's anthropology.[^36]

In other words, Spinoza speaks on one hand of collective rationality
with regard to a democratic state, by which people choose rationally to
restrain their passions. On the other hand, in the preface to the
*Treatise* he depicts the average man as a slave to self-interested
superstition.

To resolve this apparent paradox, the notion of a potential philosopher
proves to useful, since it requires us to ascertain Spinoza's intended
audience from clues in the text. Clearly, the *Treatise* is not
addressed to the masses, of whom it speaks so disparagingly.
Furthermore, it does not seem to speak to philosophers, at least those
belonging to the Greek tradition. Strauss has noted that "the authority
of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle did not carry much weight" with
Spinoza.[^37] Pines noticed his general lack of interest in philosophers
offering grandiose Platonist political doctrines.[^38] Moreover,
classically influenced philosophers who prefer contemplation to
participation in the political community do not even seem to be an issue
for him. The last paragraph of the Preface addresses itself to the
"Philosophical Reader" and not to philosophers directly.[^39] Just as in
Maimonides' system, only a person who wishes to philosophize within
political society elicits Spinoza's concern.

Thus, he does seem to be addressing this small but important third
audience. Perhaps this is the key to this "anthropological paradox"
pointed out by Pines. I will now argue that the preface of the
*Treatise* displays his most fundamental anthropology, while the
references to "all men" in the body of the text actually refer to all
"readers." Such individuals are the theologians and potential
philosophers whose notions of truth might run contrary to orthodox
religion.

Spinoza's political doctrine is meant to guarantee freedom of thought
and speech by deeming certain modes of expression outside the political
sphere altogether. Such reform would be brought about through mass
acceptance of Spinoza's "universal" or "catholic" religion, and
institutionalized through the sovereign power who would have final
authority over all public religious concerns. Finally, this faith would
reflect seven "dogmas" which, as Arthur Hyman demonstrates, take their
form from Maimonides' "true opinions," but are intended to serve only as
"necessary beliefs."[^40] That is, the specific details concerning God
are unimportant to the state, but it is the duty of

> \[e\]very man\...to adapt these dogmas to his own way of thinking, and
> to interpret them according as he feels that he can give them his
> fullest and most hesitating assent, so that he may the more easily
> obey God with his whole heart.[^41]

Men are allowed to interpret Scripture to their heart's content, so long
as these interpretations reinforce faith and obedience to God, or His
representatives on earth, the sovereign. Such interpretations need not
conform to any strictures, except that expressed opinions cannot be
"those which by their very nature nullify the compact by which the right
of free action is ceded."[^42] That is, opinions cannot be "unfaithful"
(in the sense of the word coined by J. L. Austin) to the institutions
which allow them to be expressed in the first place. If such a practice
became "universal, the ruin of states would surely follow."[^43]

Though this condition is strong, it does not immediately detract from
the intuitive appeal of Spinoza's doctrine. As long as an interpretation
does not inhibit obedience, it can be tolerated by the state. This
appears similar to what the modern era calls "freedom of speech." What
must be kept in mind, however, is that this faculty of interpretation is
not possessed by everybody, especially in Spinoza's doctrine. While it
is clearly denied to the masses, it is denied to prophets as well. Thus,
just as prophecy for Spinoza no longer serves as the means to arrive at
a rational interpretation of law, the law, as represented by the
sovereign, is itself insulated from interpretation.

But Spinoza's whole point is that this state of affairs is ultimately
desirable for potential philosophers. Such individuals are generally
concerned with issues of truth that are beyond politics. The state, on
the other hand, is concerned less with the private truth of opinions
than with their public meaning. Thus, "freedom of thought and
speech"[^44] must really be seen as only the freedom of philosophy.
Though such "freedom" could seem to apply to all men, the aspects of
Spinoza's argument inherited from Maimonides renders this possibility
doubtful. It seems that the Enlightenment project as envisioned in the
*Treatise* is intended primarily for the benefit of only a few---the
potential philosophers.

Bringing the notion of potential philosopher from the analysis of
Maimonides' work suggests a plausible resolution to the apparent paradox
in Spinoza's political anthropology. At the same time, it brings to
light some fundamental limitations of Spinoza's theory. His universal
arguments seem to refer mainly to his readership, the potential
philosophers. And by his own admission, they are very few. Hence, even
as his criticisms of Maimonides seem intense and rhetorically piercing,
his description of his predecessor's doctrine is incorrect about the
most important point. Where Spinoza claims that Maimonides requires a
philosophical understanding of the law before true obedience to it, he
ignores Maimonides clear intention to shield those who understand the
law and the religious community from each other through a "dual
language." It is as if Spinoza is trying to conceal something under his
barrage of polemics. Perhaps he has not made as clean a break with his
predecessor as he would have liked.

Though the attainment of their common aim, to make the world safe for
free philosophical expression, would be achieved through quite different
measures and for different reasons, there is ultimately not much
difference between Maimonides' and Spinoza's conceptions of free
*political* expression. It becomes clear that the results of their
efforts would be indistinguishable to the community. This is revealed by
the examination into the problem of potential philosophers, since their
role is precisely that of questioning the legitimacy of political
authority. Maimonides would have potential philosophers squirrel their
concerns away in apparent contractions and corresponding "hints" to
protect the community from perplexity. Spinoza would require their
silence so as to maintain the public legitimacy of the sovereign. Either
way, nothing is said. One cannot be but intrigued by the implications of
this---that Spinoza, a lauded avatar of modern liberalism, appears to be
more restrictive about free political inquiry than Maimonides, who has
been aligned more often with a species of philosophical elitism.

[BIBLIOGRAPHY]{.underline}

Hyman, Arthur, "Spinoza's Dogmas of Universal Faith in the Light of
their Medieval Jewish Background," *Biblical and Other Studies*, ed.
Alexander Altmann (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1963), pp.
183-195.

Levy, Ze'ev, *Baruch or Benedict*. (New York: Peter Lang, 1989.)

Maimonides, *The Guide of the Perplexed*. (Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1963), volumes I & II.

Pines, Shlomo, "Spinoza's 'Tractatus Theologico-Politicus,' Maimonides
and Kant," *Scripta Hierosolymitana* 20 (1968): 12.

Spinoza, Benedict de, *A Theologico-Political Treatise*. (New York:
Dover Publications, Inc., 1953.)

Strauss, Leo,*Persecution and the Art of Writing*. (Chicago: University
of Chicago Press, 1980.)

Yovel, Yirmiyahu, *Spinoza and Other Heretics*. (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1989.)

[^1]: Spinoza, Benedict de, *A Theologico-Political Treatise* (New York:
    Dover Publications, Inc., 1953), chap. 7, p.100. (*TPT* hereafter)

[^2]: *TPT*, chap. 7, p. 114

[^3]: *TPT*, chap. 7, p. 116.

[^4]: *TPT*, chap. 7, p. 118.

[^5]: Levy, Ze'ev, *Baruch or Benedict* (New York: Peter Lang, 1989) ,
    p.41. Strauss, Leo, "How to Study Spinoza's *Theologico-Political
    Treatise*" in *Persecution and the Art of Writing*, (Chicago:
    University of Chicago Press, 1980) (PAW)

[^6]: Maimonides, *The Guide of the Perplexed* (Chicago: University of
    Chicago Press, 1963), p. 381. (*GP*)

[^7]: *GP*, part II,40, p. 382.

[^8]: *GP*, part II,40, p. 381.

[^9]: ibid.

[^10]: *GP*, part II, 36, p. 372. With regard to the philosophical
    aspect of prophets, Maimonides says that they "should regard all
    people according to their various states with respect to which they
    are indubitably either like domestic animals or like beasts of
    prey."

[^11]: *GP*, part II, 36, p. 369.

[^12]: *GP*, part II, 39, p. 380.

[^13]: *GP*, part II, 32, p. 361.

[^14]: ibid.

[^15]: ibid.

[^16]: *GP*, part II, 48, p. 409. (emphasis added)

[^17]: PAW, p. 200.

[^18]: *GP*, part II, 40, p. 384.

[^19]: *GP*, part II, 40, p. 383.

[^20]: *GP*, part III, 28, p. 513.

[^21]: *GP*, part I, 63, p. 155.

[^22]: *GP*, part I, Introduction, p. 10. (emphasis added)

[^23]: *GP*, part I, Introduction, p. 12.

[^24]: The term "plane" in this context comes from Strauss (1935). It
    refers to the set of notions shared by the opposing sides in any
    debate. By Strauss' view, to critique a thinker using terms from
    outside his plane is really not to critique at all. It fails to
    address the thinker on her own terms and thus gives her no reason to
    change her mind.

[^25]: For a detailed study of Spinoza's use of a similar dual-language,
    see Yovel's discussion in *Spinoza and Other Heretics, Vols. I & II*
    (New Jersey: Princeton, 1989.)

[^26]: PAW, 90-92

[^27]: *GP*, part III, 27, passim.

[^28]: *TPT*, preface, p. 3.

[^29]: *TPT*, chap. 7, p. 100.

[^30]: *TPT*, chap. 7, p. 99.

[^31]: *TPT*, chap. 2, p. 27.

[^32]: *TPT*, chap. 1, p. 13.

[^33]: *TPT*, chap. 4, p. 63.

[^34]: *TPT*, chap. 4, p. 61.

[^35]: *TPT*, chap. 16, pp. 205, 201.

[^36]: Pines, Shlomo, "Spinoza's *Tractatus Theologico-Politicus*,
    Maimonides and Kant," p. 40.

[^37]: Strauss, "How to Study Spinoza's *Theological-Political
    Treatise*," p. 152.

[^38]: Pines, p. 13.

[^39]: *TPT*, preface, p. 11.

[^40]: Hyman, Arthur, "Spinoza's Dogmas of Universal Faith in the Light
    of their Medieval Jewish Background," *passim.*

[^41]: *TPT*, chap. 14, p. 188. (emphasis added)

[^42]: *TPT*, chap. 20, p. 260.

[^43]: ibid.

[^44]: *TPT*, chapter 20, passim.