Spinoza's 'Theological-Political Treatise' A Critical Guide [Hardcover]

This book explores the debates surrounding Spinoza's Theological-Political Treatise, covering topics such as political theory, metaphysics and religious toleration.Spinoza's Theological-Political Treatise was published anonymously in 1670 and immediately provoked huge debate. This new Critical Guide presents essays by well-known scholars in the field and covers a broad range of topics, including the political theory and the metaphysics of the work.Spinoza's Theological-Political Treatise was published anonymously in 1670 and immediately provoked huge debate. This new Critical Guide presents essays by well-known scholars in the field and covers a broad range of topics, including the political theory and the metaphysics of the work.Spinoza's Theological-Political Treatise was published anonymously in 1670 and immediately provoked huge debate. Its main goal was to claim that the freedom of philosophizing can be allowed in a free republic and that it cannot be abolished without also destroying the peace and piety of that republic. Spinoza criticizes the traditional claims of revelation and offers a social contract theory in which he praises democracy as the most natural form of government. This new Critical Guide presents new essays by well-known scholars in the field and covers a broad range of topics, including the political theory and the metaphysics of the work, religious toleration, the reception of the text by other early modern philosophers, and the relation of the text to Jewish thought. It offers valuable new perspectives on this important and influential work.List of contributors; Acknowledgements; List of abbreviations; Introduction Yitzhak Y. Melamed and Michael Rosenthal; 1. Spinoza's exchange with Albert Burgh Edwin Curley; 2. The text of Spinoza's Tractatus Theologico-Politicus Piet Steenbakkers; 3. Spinoza on Ibn Ezra's Secret of the Twelve Warren Zev Harvey; 4. Reflections of the medieval Jewish-Christian debate in the Theological-Political Treatise andl3