BENEDICT DE SPINOZA: Theological-Political Treatise

Theological-Political Treatise
It is certain, though, that it perished or was burnt along with the Temple,
although there was nothing more sacred or venerated among the Hebrews.
Hence, Scripture too is sacred and its discourse divine in the same
way, that is so long as it moves people to devotion towards God. Should
it become completely neglected, as it once was by the Jews, it is thereby
rendered nothing but ink and paper and becomes absolutely devoid of
sanctity and subject to corruption. If it is then perverted or perishes,
it is not true to say that God’s word has deteriorated or perished, just as
it would be false to say in Jeremiah’s time that it was the Temple of
God, as the Temple had been until then, that perished in the £ames.
Jeremiah himself says the same thing of the Law when rebuking the
impious men of his time in these terms: ‘How can you say, we are
trained in the Law of God and are its guardians. Assuredly, it has been
written in vain, vain is the scribe’s pen!’ 2 That is, even though the
Scripture is in your hands, you are wrong to say that you are guardians
of God’s Law, now that you have rendered it ine¡ective.
So too when Moses broke the ¢rst tablets, it was not the word of God
that he cast from his hands in anger and broke (who could imagine this
of Moses or of God’s word) but only the stones. They had been sacred
before because the covenant under which the Jews bound themselves to
obey God was inscribed upon them. But as they subsequently negated
that covenant by worshipping a [golden] calf, the stones no longer possessed
any sanctity whatever. It is for the same reason that the second
tablets 3 could perish with the ark. It is thus wholly unsurprising that
Moses’ original texts are no longer extant and the process we described
in the preceding chapters could have happened to the books which we do
possess, given that the true original of the divine covenant, the most
sacred thing of all, has totally perished.
Let [my opponents] therefore cease accusing us of impiety. We have
said nothing against the word of God, nor have we corrupted it. Let them
rather turn their anger, if they have any justi¢ed anger, against the ancients
whose wickedness profaned the ark of God, the Temple, the Law and all
162 holy things, and rendered them liable to corruption. Equally, if as the
Apostle says, in 2 Corinthians 3.3, they have a letter from God within
themselves, written not in ink but by the spirit of God, not on tablets of
stone but on tablets of £esh, on the heart, let them cease worshipping the
2 Jeremiah 8.8.
3 Exodus 34.
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