BENEDICT DE SPINOZA: Theological-Political Treatise

Theological-Political Treatise
God appeared again to Samuel in Shiloh, because God was manifested to
Samuel in Shiloh by the word of God.’ This might mean that the appearance
of God to Samuel was nothing other than God manifesting himself to
Samuel by a word or Samuel hearing God speak.Yet because we are compelled
to distinguish between the prophecy of Moses and that of the other
prophets, we must conclude that the voice Samuel heard was imaginary.
This can also be inferred from its resemblance to the voice of Eli, which
Samuel was very used to hearing, and thus could even more easily be
18 imagined: when he was called by God three times, he thought he was being
called by Eli.
[10] The voice Abimelech heard was imaginary; for it is said at Genesis
20.6,‘and God said to him in sleep’, etc.Therefore it was not when he was
awake but only in his sleep (a time when the imagination is naturally most
inclined to imagine things which do not exist) that he was able to imagine
the will of God.
[11] Some Jews are of the opinion that the words of the Ten Commandments
or Decalogue were not spoken by God. They think that the
Israelites merely heard an inarticulate noise without words, and whilst
this continued, they conceived the laws of the Decalogue in their own
minds alone. I too thought this at one time, because I saw that the words
of theTen Commandments in Exodus di¡er from those of theTen Commandments
in Deuteronomy. It seems to follow from this that the Decalogue
does not intend to give us God’s actual words but only the
meaning of what he said. However, unless we are willing to do violence to
Scripture, we must concede without reservation that the Israelites heard
a real voice. For Scripture expressly says (Deuteronomy 5.4),‘God spoke
to you face to face’, etc., that is, in the manner in which two men normally
communicate their thoughts to each other by means of their two bodies.
It seems therefore more in accord with Scripture to acknowledge that
God really created a voice by which he revealed theTen Commandments.
(For the reason why the words and justi¢cations of the one passage di¡er
from the words and justi¢cations of the other, see chapter 8.)
[12] Admittedly, though, this does not altogether remove the di⁄culty.
For it seems quite contrary to reason to assert that a created thing
depending upon God in the same way as other created things, could
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