BENEDICT DE SPINOZA: Theological-Political Treatise

On the interpretation of Scripture
In order to know whether or not Moses believed that God is ¢re, we
certainly must not argue on the basis of whether this statement agrees or
con£icts with reason but only from other statements made by Moses himself. 101
For example, since Moses also plainly teaches, in many passages, that God
has no similarity with visible things in the sky or on earth or in the water,
we must conclude that either this statement or all the others have to be
interpreted metaphorically. But we should depart as little as possible from
the literal sense, and therefore we must ¢rst ask whether this unique expression,‘God
is ¢re’, admits any but a literal sense, i.e., whether the word ‘¢re’
has any other meaning apart from natural ¢re. If we do not ¢nd it signifying
anything else in normal linguistic usage, that is how we must interpret the
expression, however much it may con£ict with reason. All the others, however
much they agree with reason, will have to be accommodated to this
one. Where linguistic usage does not permit this, such statements are irreconcilable,
and hence we must suspend judgment about them. Now the
word ‘¢re’ also stands for anger and jealousy (see Job 31.12), and therefore
Moses’ statements are readily reconciled, and we are justi¢ed in concluding
that they are one and the same. Again, Moses plainly teaches that God is jealous
and nowhere teaches that God lacks emotions or mental passions. Hence,
we must evidently deduce that this is what Moses believed, or at least what he
wanted to teach, however much we may think this statement con£icts with reason.
For, as we have already shown, we are not permitted to adjust the meaning
of Scripture to the dictates of our reason or our preconceived opinions; all
explanation of the Bible must be sought from the Bible alone.
(3) Finally our historical enquiry must explain the circumstances of all the
books of the prophets whose memory has come down to us: the life, character
and particular interests of the author of each individual book, who exactly he
was, on what occasion he wrote, for whom and in what language. Then the fate
of each book: namely how it was ¢rst received and whose hands it came into, how
many variant readings there have been of its text, by whose decision it was
received among the sacred books, and ¢nally how all the books which are now
accepted as sacred came to form a single corpus. All this, I contend, has to be
dealt with in a history of the Bible.
It is important to know of the life, character and concerns of eachwriter,
so that we may know which statements are meant as laws and which as 102
moral doctrine; we are more readily able to explain someone’s words, the
better we know his mind and personality. It is also crucial to know on what
occasion, at what time and for what people or age the various texts were
written so that we may not confuse eternal doctrines with those that are
merely temporary or useful only to a few people. It is essential, ¢nally, to
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