Benedict Spinoza

Expressions researched:
"Spinoza"

Philosophy Discussions

Philosophy Discussion on Benedict Spinoza:

Hayagrīva: Spinoza. Spinoza says that "The infinite God must possess infinite attributes." He is saying that God, being the basis of all existence, cannot be described in a material way. He is a pantheist in the sense that he believes in the one substance. However, he believes that God has infinite divine attributes, and only two of these attributes fall within the realm of human experience, and these are thought and extension, or mind and matter.

Prabhupāda: So, so far God is concerned, and undoubtedly He is unlimited and His qualities are unlimited. So His one of the most important quality is called Bhakta-vatsala. He is very much dear to His devotee, Bhakta-vatsala. So He has unlimited devotees and unlimited dealings with them; therefore He is unlimitedly expanded. That is pantheism. But it does not mean because He is unlimitedly expanded, His personality is lost. He is person always, even though He is unlimitedly expanded. That is the Vedic version: pūrṇasya pūrṇam ādāya pūrṇam eva avaśiṣyate (Iso Invocation). He is complete, and if another complete form expands from Him, still He remains complete. He is not lost. The material conception is if one unit, if something is taken from it, then it becomes less of that thing. But God is so complete that you can go on taking from Him unlimitedly, still He remains unlimited. That is pantheist. I think they are impersonalist.

Hayagrīva: Yes. Spinoza is impersonal. He asserts that God cannot be a remote cause of the creation. He says that the creation flows from God in the same way that conclusions flow from principles in mathematics. God is free to create, but He is the eminent cause. That is to say, the creation is an extension of Himself.

Prabhupāda: Yes. That is, He creates by His energy. Just like in the Bhagavad-gītā it is stated,

bhūmir āpo 'nalo vāyuḥ

khaṁ mano buddhir eva ca

bhinnā me prakṛtiḥ aṣṭadhā

(BG 7.4)

These eight kinds of material elements—earth, water, air, fire, sky, mind, intelligence and ego—they are material energies, and this material world is made of these material elements. So because it is made of God's energy, therefore it is called created by God. But this is creation of His energy. Prakṛtiḥ pradhāna, upadhāna, pradhāna. The ingredients are coming from Him, and prakṛtiḥ, nature, creates. This is the idea of creation. So God is a remote cause and a eminent cause also, because these elements, they are God's energy. So the eminent cause is the energy. Therefore it is confirmed in the Bhagavad-gītā, mayā tatam idaṁ sarvam: "By Me, everything is expanding." So when He says "By Me," then He is the eminent cause. There are two causes: remote and eminent.

Hayagrīva: Yes.

Prabhupāda: So both, He is remote cause and eminent cause.

Hayagrīva: Both remote and eminent.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Philosophy Discussion on Benedict Spinoza:

Hayagrīva: Yes. Spinoza is impersonal. He asserts that God cannot be a remote cause of the creation. He says that the creation flows from God in the same way that conclusions flow from principles in mathematics. God is free to create, but He is the eminent cause. That is to say, the creation is an extension of Himself.

Prabhupāda: Yes. That is, He creates by His energy. Just like in the Bhagavad-gītā it is stated,

bhūmir āpo 'nalo vāyuḥ

khaṁ mano buddhir eva ca

bhinnā me prakṛtiḥ aṣṭadhā

(BG 7.4)

These eight kinds of material elements—earth, water, air, fire, sky, mind, intelligence and ego—they are material energies, and this material world is made of these material elements. So because it is made of God's energy, therefore it is called created by God.

Philosophy Discussion on Benedict Spinoza:

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Hayagrīva: Or, as Spinoza would put it, by turning toward God's extensions. He calls them God's extensions.

Prabhupāda: No.

Hayagrīva: Because he is pantheistic.

Prabhupāda: This is..., expansion also we accept. What is called, there is technical name, pracāra (?). Expansion, that is stated in Bhāgavatam, mayā tatam idaṁ sarvam: "By Me everything is expanded." This very word is used. Mayā tatam idaṁ sarvam (BG 9.4). So expansion is also God, but at the same time in expansion there is no God. "No God" means not in person. The expansion is imperson, but expansion is from the person. Just as a government, this is impersonal, but the governor is person. So government means under the control of the governor. So impersonal expansion of God is controlled by the personal God. This is like pantheism. And pantheism, so I think that because everything is God, that God has no personal existence. Is it not?

Philosophy Discussion on Benedict Spinoza:

Hayagrīva: Continuation of Spinoza. Spinoza considered good and evil to relate only to man. They have no basis in God, who is beyond good and evil.

Prabhupāda: Right. But as everything is God, as Spinoza thinks that his... What is his position of bad? What is his conception?

Hayagrīva: That God is beyond good and...

Prabhupāda: God is beyond, but what is his position of evil? Evil is there, but he said that God has no evil. Then wherefrom the evil comes?

Philosophy Discussion on Benedict Spinoza:

Hayagrīva: Spinoza's God is clearly not a personal God. Spinoza is an impersonalist, and his love for God is more intellectual or philosophical than theistic or religious. Being an impersonalist, Spinoza believed in the identity of the individual soul with God. This is not to say that he believed that the individual soul is infinite, but that it is not distinct from God. He writes, "Thus that love of the soul is a part of the infinite love with which God loves Himself." He sees the soul's intellectual love of God and God's love for the individual soul, which is within man, to be one and the same love.

Prabhupāda: Love is five kinds of love: śānta, dāsya, sākhya, vatsalya, mādhurya. The beginning of love is awe and adoration: "Oh, God is so great. God is everything." When he understands God's potency, unlimitedness, the soul adores Him. That adoration is also love. When that adoration is further advanced, then he serves God as master and servant. When the service is more intimate, then friend to friend—as one friend renders service to other friend, the other friend renders to other friend, like that, reciprocal. Then further expanded, the love is turned into paternal love, and further expanded it is expanding into conjugal love. So there are different stages of love. So Spinoza is touching only the beginning of love, simply adoring, appreciating God's power, expansion, that much. But when this love of adoration expands, that is called dasya-rasa, sākhya-rasa, vatsalya-rasa, madhurya-rasa. So he is on the beginning state of loving God. He has not advanced farther.

Philosophy Discussion on Benedict Spinoza:

Prabhupāda: Yes, naturally. It is the benefit of the demon.

Hayagrīva: Spinoza writes, "No sorrow can exist with the accompanying idea of God. No one can hate God."

Prabhupāda: Therefore He is sac-cid-ānanda. That is the description of Vedic literature, ānanda-mayo 'bhyāsāt, by nature is always full of pleasure. He is the source of pleasure. We therefore see Kṛṣṇa's picture when He is dancing with the gopīs, He looks very pleasing, and when He is killing some demon He looks very pleasing. Not that He is morose that His is killing, because you know that He is not killing; He is giving him salvation.

Philosophy Discussion on Benedict Spinoza:

Hayagrīva: Spinoza writes, "The more we understand individual objects, the more we understand God." Is this the proper process? Wouldn't you say that the more we understand God the more we understand individual objects? Which is uh...

Prabhupāda: Anything you take, that is perfection of knowledge in God. Which thing is not related with God? Everything is related with God. In the material world anything you will take it is made of the five elements, but these five elements, they are expansion of God's energy. So intelligent person sees in everything with reference to God's expansion of energy. That is the position of devotee. He does not think anything separate from God. And as he is lover of God, devotee of God, he wants to engage everything, because if everything is God's property, that should be used for God's benefit. This is devotee's conception. The asuras, they have no conception of God.

Philosophy Discussion on Benedict Spinoza:

Prabhupāda: Anything you take, that is perfection of knowledge in God. Which thing is not related with God? Everything is related with God. In the material world anything you will take it is made of the five elements, but these five elements, they are expansion of God's energy. So intelligent person sees in everything with reference to God's expansion of energy. That is the position of devotee. He does not think anything separate from God. And as he is lover of God, devotee of God, he wants to engage everything, because if everything is God's property, that should be used for God's benefit. This is devotee's conception. The asuras, they have no conception of God. Neither they are obedient to God, neither lover of God. He thinks the material world is for his enjoyment. He cannot see the material world is expansion of God's energy. Therefore anyone who uses the material product for his personal benefit, he is called a thief. Just like I have created something. If somebody use up that something and does not think of the proprietor, he is a thief. Thief means, in our childhood we got a definition of thief, that anything taken without the permission the property is theft. That is very nice. So anything in this world has reference to the expansion of energy of God. So if you do not take everything as prasādam, then you are thief and you are punishable. A thief is always punished. So therefore those who are enjoying things without reference to the God, they are all demons and they are punishable. They are thieves.

Hayagrīva: That's all on Spinoza.

Philosophy Discussion on Thomas Henry Huxley:

Hayagrīva: When Huxley became a Darwinist he rejected a supernatural God and the Bible. In For Argument from Design... He believed in, previously he believed in a Christian God as the designer, but he believed that Darwin's theory gave this Christian conception its death blow. He did not accept a pantheistic God, like Spinoza did, as being identical... Excuse me. He did accept a pantheistic God, like Spinoza did, as being identical with nature. That is, he saw God as nature, and he believed in the divine government of the universe. He believed that the cosmic process is rational, not random...

Prabhupāda: How it becomes rational?

Hayagrīva: ...but he rejected a personal God concerned with morality.