Espinoza, nature, God

Baruch de Spinoza (Hebrew: ברוך שפינוזה‎ Baruch Spinoza, Portuguese: Benedito or Bento de Espinosa, Latin: Benedictus de Spinoza) and later Benedict de Spinoza (in all mentioned languages the given name means "the Blessed") (November 24, 1632 – February 21, 1677) was a Dutch Jewish philosopher.^[1] Revealing considerable scientific aptitude, the breadth and importance of Spinoza's work was not fully realized until years after his death. (Wikipedia)

Espinoza was a philosopher whose thought is now finding relevance because of what is happening to the environment specifically the destruction brought about by humanity’s abuse of natural resources and the pollution created as a by-product of progress. Among the religion of the world, Christianity has developed this idea that nature is under the service of humanity; nature is there to serve humanity’s needs and purpose. The story of in Genesis where God has given Adam the dominion over creation has become an impetus for humanity especially the Christians to think that the earth was made to provide for his needs alone.  See, I have given you every herb that yields seed which is on the face of all the earth, and every tree whose fruit yields seed; to you it shall be for food. Also, to every beast of the earth, to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, in which there is life, I have given every green herb for food.'” (Gen. 1:28-30)

For many centuries nature was abused and it is now only later when environmental crises begun to cause catastrophes and even threaten our existence that the thought of re-thinking our relationship with nature is given the attention it needs.

Now here the thoughts of Spinoza provided some suggested answer to how we may relate to nature. Espinoza was a Jewish philosopher who was excommunicated by the Jews for many thoughts that were considered heretical during his time.

The central idea in Espinoza’s philosophy is that there is one substance, and that substance we can conceive of as either Nature or God.

Now this presented problems to the Jews and even to the Christians for the obvious reason that this meant that God is the soil we walk on, God is the tree, God is the table, God is the chair, God is the air we breathe etc. He was really misunderstood by religious leaders thus he was excommunicated and banished by the Jews and he was hated even by the Christians and branded as an atheist despite the fact the he was called the “God intoxicated man.”

This idea of the unity of the universe also presents problem with the question of evil, but that’s another thing. Anyway, his though was branded as pantheistic, panentheistic, and to some even, atheistic. But central to his idea is that nature or the world we live in, or the place of where we exist including the galaxies and the universe is directly related to God. There are two thoughts about this:

1. Pantheism: God and nature (or the universe) are identical. This idea does not sit well with theists especially the Christians for this meant that God is an impersonal being.
2. Panentheism: Simply stated, the whole is in God. This is the idea that the whole everything is in God thus God is not one with nature or the universe, but reality or the universe is in God. This idea is reconcilable with Christian theology and two theolgians, ina way, affirmed this. Tillich for one has this idea that God is the ground of all being. Tillich idea is that of a somewhat an impersonal God but let’s leave it at that. Another theologian is Jurgenn Moltmann who thinks that reality was created by God with-in-himself. Anyway, the idea is that all and everything is inside God.

  Anyway, my break is up...write something more about his idea later.