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BENEDICT DE SPINOZA: Theological-Political Treatise

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Sovereign powers and religion<br />

these men into companies and chose leaders for them, so that each<br />

company might perform its service at the proper time in a regular rotation<br />

(see 1 Chronicles 23.5). Likewise, he divided the priests into so many<br />

companies, but I do not want to review every single detail one after the<br />

other, and I refer the reader to 2 Chronicles 8.13, which says ‘the worship<br />

of God as Moses instituted it was practised in the Temple by the command<br />

of Solomon’ and, in verse 14, ‘that he himself’ [i.e. Solomon]<br />

‘established the companies of the priests in their ministries and the<br />

companies of the Levites . . . according to the command of David, the<br />

man of God’. Finally in verse 15, the historian testi¢es ‘that they did not<br />

turn aside from what the king had commanded the priests and Levites in<br />

any matter, nor in the management of the treasuries’.<br />

[22] From all of this and from other histories of the kings, it most<br />

evidently follows that the entire practice of religion and the sacred ministry<br />

ensued from the commands of kings. I said above that they did not<br />

possess the right that Moses had, of choosing the high priest, of consulting<br />

God directly or of condemning prophets who prophesied while<br />

they were still alive. I mention this simply because the authority which<br />

the prophets had gave them the right to choose a new king, and to pardon<br />

parricide, but not to summon a king to court, if he dared violate the<br />

law, or take legal proceedings against him. 9 That is why if there had been<br />

no prophets who could safely grant pardon to parricide by a special<br />

revelation, the kings would have had complete authority over all things,<br />

both sacred and civil, without restriction. Consequently, sovereigns<br />

today, who do not have prophets and are not obliged by law to accept<br />

them (for they are not bound by the laws of the Hebrews), have and<br />

always will retain this authority [over sacred matters] absolutely, even<br />

though they are not celibate, provided they do not allow religious dogmas<br />

to proliferate or become confused with knowledge.<br />

9 Spinoza’s footnote: see Annotation 39.<br />

249

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