BENEDICT DE SPINOZA: Theological-Political Treatise

Theological-Political Treatise
(Epistle to the Romans 3.28), and ‘for I think’ (8.18), and many more.There
are other turns of phrase which stand far removed from prophetic
authoritativeness as, for example,‘and this I say as a weak man and not by
command’ (see 1 Corinthians 7.6),‘I give my advice as a man who by the
152 grace of God is trustworthy’ (see 1 Corinthians 7.25), and many others of
the sort.
[2] Note too that when Paul remarks in the same chapter that he has,
or does not have, an instruction or command from God, that he does not
mean an instruction or command which God had revealed to him but
simply the teachings which Christ gave to his disciples on the mountain.
Moreover, if we now turn to the manner in which the Apostles convey
the teaching of the Gospel in these Epistles, we shall see that this too
diverges very widely from the prophetic manner. For the Apostles always
employ arguments, so that they seem to be engaged in a debate rather
than prophesying. By contrast prophecies contain nothing but dogmas
and decrees, since in them it is God who is presented as speaking, and
God does not engage in discussion but issues edicts on the absolute
authority of his nature. Equally, prophetic authority does not permit
participation in argument, for whoever seeks to con¢rm his dogmas by
means of reason is thereby submitting them to the judgment of each
individual for decision.This is what Paul seems to have done by engaging
in debate, for at 1 Corinthians 10.15 he says,‘I speak to you as to intelligent
men; judge for yourselves what I say’. Finally, as we showed in
chapter 1, the prophets did not receive revelations by virtue of the natural
light, i.e. by a process of reasoning.
[3] Although some conclusions in the Pentateuch appear to be reached
by inference, anyone who studies them will see that they can in no way be
taken as conclusive arguments. For example, when Moses admonished
the Israelites (Deuteronomy 31.27), ‘If you have been rebellious against
God while I have lived with you, you will be much more so after I am
dead’, we should not see this as Moses attempting to convince the Israelites
by a process of argument that they will necessarily turn away from
the true worship of God after his death. For the argument would be
false, as could be shown from Scripture itself. The Israelites remained
constant in the time of Joshua and the elders and even later in the time
of Samuel, David, Solomon, etc. For this reason these words of Moses
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