BENEDICT DE SPINOZA: Theological-Political Treatise

Theological-Political Treatise
In the same way, we ¢nd Isaiah depicting the destruction of Babylon in
94 chapter 13: ‘For the stars of heaven and their constellations will not
illuminate with their light, the sun will be dark at its rising and the
moon will not give out the splendour of its light’. 6 I certainly do not
think that anyone believes that these things actually happened at the fall
of that empire, nor what he adds just after: ‘therefore I will make the
heavens tremble, and the earth shall be moved from its place’. 7 So too in
Isaiah 48, in the last verse but one: ‘And they did not thirst, he led them
through the desert, he made water £ow for them from the rock, he cleft
the rock, and the waters gushed out’. By these words assuredly he simply
means to say that the Jews will ¢nd springs in the desert (as sometimes
happens) to assuage their thirst; for when they made their way to Jerusalem,
withCyrus’consent,it is agreedthat no such miracles occurred.There are any
number of things like this in theBible whichwere merely ¢gures of speech of
theHebrew,andthere is no need to detail them here.
Iwould though like to make the general point that the Hebrews were not
only accustomed to use these phrases for rhetorical adornment but also
and particularly for the sake of devotion. This is why we even ¢nd in
Scripture,‘bless God’ for ‘curse God’ (see 1 Kings 21.10 and Job 2.9). It was
for the same reason that they ascribed all things to God, and this is why the
Bible appears to relate nothing but miracles even when it is talking of the
most natural things, of which we have already given some examples above.
So when Scripture says that God hardened the heart of Pharaoh, we have
to understand that it simply means that Pharaoh was in£exible. 8 Andwhen
it is said that God opened the windows of the heavens, it just means that a
lot of rain fell, and so on. 9 If one attends carefully to such details and notes
that many things are reported in Scripture only very brie£y, without detail,
almost in an abbreviated manner, one will ¢nd virtually nothing in the
Bible that can be shown to contradict the light of nature. On the contrary, in
this way one will be able to grasp and readily interpret, with just a modest
intellectual e¡ort, many things which at ¢rst seem extremely obscure.With
this I think I have fully enough demonstrated what I proposed.
[21] But before ending the chapter, there is something more I need to
mention: I have used a very di¡erent method here than I followed in the
95 case of prophecy. There I asserted nothing concerning prophecy which
6 Isaiah 13.10.
7 Isaiah 13.13.
8 Exodus 4.21; 7.3.
9 Genesis 7.11.
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