Debt & Penance : Benedictus Spinoza

From my latest book “Debt & Penance”.

“All excellent things are difficult as they are rare as well.”

“How else than possible it is that salvation could be accepted in the most easy way without too much effort, and anyhow it is neglected by so many people ?”

That’s what Spinoza said at the end of his “Ethica”. The public disquiet Spinoza caused was mainly based upon his view of God. His visions were more based upon a neutral monistic conception of some God. God was no Creator of the world, the world was part of a divine creation. Miracles are no proof of the existence of a divine power; it is the nescience of mankind. He based it upon the duality of religions dealing with “good and evil”. In the way Thomas de Acquino interpreted it that evil was the absence of the Go(o)d.

Regarding Hannah Arendt I discover lots of similarities with her points of view. In her quote “The greatest evils in this world are committed by nobody’s” there is this analogy as Spinoza and De Acquino meant. As we don’t know the causes of our actions, then we deal with free will, for Spinoza however the effects were the results of nescience. Nescience is the biggest obstacle for the ambition of a virtuous life ~ non-egoism. The transition from passivity into activity is always overwhelming, liberating and joyful.

For Spinoza the virtue is not avoiding evil actions based upon fear because of some penance or because of hope for its reward. Happiness is no reward of the virtue; the virtue it is itself ~ Aristotle. By living that way we experience joy. If mankind acknowledges its being as a part of nature, of the universe and consequently subjected to the relevant laws, then (s)he would stop trying to explain the world in human terms and views ~ the so-called “anthropo-centrism”. “Ethics” ~ “Ethos” (Gr) ~ “Etheos” ~ ”E-Theos” – (out of the) manner or habit of God ~ has a scathing criticism of all forms of anthropo-centrism and finalism, which implies that nature services mankind. So “Ethica” truly is about morality, ethics and behaviorism and the way to gain happiness.

He is convinced this routing exists, but for mankind hard to go. Mostly it has to do with the unilateral way of life nowadays; the world of data, facts and figures. All based upon the 5 senses ~ physio-biological or physio-mechanical. The world of dissonance while the 6^th sense ~ intuition ~ is about the resonance ~ energetically speaking. The analytical world with its 2 perculations within Autism; Paranoia and Schizophrenia ~ not willing or capable dealing with and integrating the information from the associative world. Enforced by the drive for power & control as an example of 2 mental mechanisms.

Who imagines to be unable to achieve something, won’t do it and that results into inability ~ “trying = doing”. Not the objects determine the power of passion, it’s the experience, the transition into the subjectivity ~ Spinoza’s “de imaginatio” – “Ethica”. Imagination is a necessary and indispensable part of the acknowledge-process, but only produces chaotic and coincidental and therefore confused knowledge for the individual itself. So “de imaginatio” is restricted, partial and subjective. As Carl Jung told us in his “Red Book” (a quote) : “For Jung, the initial irruption of psychic disturbances that he later came to describe as a result of a process of “active imagination” were more traumatic than constructive.”

To me imagination is ~ like dreams are as well ~ an important process in the way of supporting and empowering one’s intuition; it carries personal value in it ~ empathy & sympathy. Like a new and free born baby that doesn’t know good or evil as dual terms. Every duality is based upon subjectivity, upon a general point of view ~ let’s say in a democratic way a point of acceptance. Especially these processes of generalization makes that people are not stimulated to think, imagine and reflect for themselves, and more specific concerning money and morality, “debt and penance”.

Do you have debts and do you feel you are to be punished for now ?

This chapter was written by me as a tribute to Spinoza and the book itself.