BENEDICT DE SPINOZA: Theological-Political Treatise

Theological-Political Treatise
meditating at leisure in an academy. I would also believe along with Ibn
Ezra that this text was translated from another language, since it seems
to aspire to emulate gentile poetry. The father of the gods twice calls a
council, and Momus, here called Satan, criticizes God’s words with the
greatest freedom, etc.; but these are only conjectures and not solidly based.
[9] I pass to the book of Daniel, which without doubt, from chapter 8 on,
consists ofwritings by Daniel himself. I do not know where the seven earlier
145 chapters were drawn from: since they were composed in Chaldaic (except
chapter 1), we may suspect that they come from Chaldean chronicles.Were
this clearly established, it would be the most convincing possible evidence
proving that Scripture is sacred only in so far as we understand through it
the things signi¢ed there, but not as regards the words, or language and
forms of discourse, in which the things are expressed. Furthermore, it
would prove that all books expounding and teaching the highest things are,
no matter what language they are written in ^ or by whom, equally sacred.
As it is, we can at least take note that these chapters were written inChaldaic
[i.e. Aramaic] and yet are as sacred as the rest of the Bible.
[10] The opening book of Ezra is so closely connected with the book of
Daniel that it is easy to tell that it is the same writer continuing his orderly
narrative of the a¡airs of the Jews from the time of the ¢rst captivity.
Likewise, the Book of Esther, I have no doubt, is connected with this book.
The conjunction with which Esther begins can refer to no other text. For it
is not credible that this is the book that Mordecai wrote. In 9.20^2, a third
person, referring to Mordecai, records that he wrote letters and indicates
what they contained. Then at verse 31 of the same chapter, he states that
Queen Esther con¢rmed by edict the arrangements pertaining to the festival
of the Lots (Purim), and that this was written in ‘the book’, i.e. (as the
Hebrew expression implies) in a book that was known to everybody at that
time to contain these things. Ibn Ezra concedes, as everyone must, that
this book perished along with others. Finally, the chronicler refers us,
for Mordecai’s other activities, to the Chronicles of the Persian Kings.
Hence, there is no doubt that Esther too was penned by the same narrator
who wrote the books of Daniel and Ezra, as well as that of Nehemiah, 8
since that is called ‘the second book of Ezra’. Consequently, these four
8 Spinoza’s footnote: see Annotation 23.
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