Modes of the Divinity 225

Chapter 6 Modes of the Divinity

Just as is the unique substance in Spinoza, conceived in itself and through itself, according to the Infinite is an unlimited and empty vastness that allows to guess that multiplicity is only metaphorically given. Nothingness beyond existence, the Infinity remains imperturbable as if diversity does not introduce any difference from its side. The many in their innumerable forms of existence are not really produced, but they are self-manifestations of it (for Spinoza, determinations are negations, according to the pivotal Ep50), insofar as they are contemplated from the perspective of infinitude, the only one linked to the real existent. From the so called inner door’s view, God is the unity of nothingness. According to it, God is more a verb than a substantive, and the divine name can be translated as “was-is-will be”. In the The Guide of the Perplexed, as Broadie observed: “There is an indication […] that even the term ‘exist’ must not be understood in its customary way when predicated of God, for in discussing maqom (place), used sometimes to signify the mark of God’s existence, his place in the order of things, Maimonides writes that “there (is) nothing like or similar to that existence (i, 26).”1 Broadie concludes that “the multitude who believe that God exists, have a false in this sense, that though the proposition ‘God exists’ is, on a given interpretation, true, that interpretation is not the one given to it by the multitude.”2 According to this scholar, what Maimonides has in when talking about the necessary exis- tence of God is linked to The Great Tautology: “Reference was made to the fact that the repeated verb in the Great Tautology is a first person form of the verb ‘to be’ of which the Tetragramaton YHWH, appears to be the third person caus- ative form, meaning, therefore, ‘He causes to be’, or ‘He brings into existence’.”3 Broadie claims that “it is not clear how it should be translated…The problems are plain. The most conspicuous concerns the fact that ’Ehyeh is no the imper- fect form, which in classical Hebrew is not a tense. Instead the form commonly signifies the ongoingness of the action. It can be rendered by a past, present, or future tensed form of a verb, and translators usually rely upon the context to determine which tense to employ. Unfortunately the context of the Name

1 Broadie, Alexander, “Maimonides on the Great Tautology. Exodus 3, 14,” Scottish Journal of 47 (1994): 475–488. Here 475. 2 Broadie, Alexander, “Maimonides on the Great Tautology..,” 475. 3 Broadie, Alexander, “Maimonides on the Great..,” 483.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2016 | doi 10.1163/9789004315686_008 226 Chapter 6 provides no help.”4 Maimonides, in Guide i, 63, argues that the name, for the Israelites, introduces the true notion of divine existence: “The whole secret consists in the repetition in a predicative position of the very word indicative of existence,”5 concluding that “Maimonides’s belief (is) that the fundamental categories applicable to God are those of agent and act. Whatever the nature of God’s existence, we know him only in so far as he is an agent, and to say that his existence is necessary is therefore to point to something special about God’s agency.”6 In TTP13 Spinoza also emphasises that the patriarchs did not know God by his name YHVH, which “is to be found to indicate the of God, as unrelated to created things,”7 and proceed, in a not negligible passage, to assert: “That is why the Hebrews contend that this is, strictly speaking, God’s only name, the other names being forms of address; and it is a fact that the other , whether substantive of adjectival, are attributes belong- ing to God insofar as he is considered as related to created things, or manifested through them,”8 affirming that it is not necessary to know Him to believe, since the faith necessary for the salvation of the majority does not require a knowl- edge of the divine attributes: “the commandment [to one’s neighbour as himself] is the one and only guiding for the entire common faith of mankind, and through this commandment alone should be determined all the tenets of faith that every man is in duty bound to accept.”9 In consequence of this, “each man’s faith, then, is to be regarded as pious or impious not in respect of truth or falsity, but as it is conducive to obedience or obstinacy […] Hence it follows that a catholic or universal faith must not contain any dogmas that a good man may regard as controversial, for such dogma may be to one man pious, to another impious, since their value lies only in the works they inspire. A catholic faith should therefore contain only those dogmas which obedience to God absolutely demands, and without which such obedience is absolutely impossible.”10 Knowledge of God’s nature is not included between these last dogmas, Thus, the concealed God revealed to had not even been known by the patriarchs through His name. It is concluded, therefore, that “the patriarchs

4 Broadie, Alexander, “Maimonides on the Great..,” 450. 5 Maimonides, Moses, The Guide of the Perplexed, volume one, i, 65, 154. 6 Broadie, Alexander, “Maimonides on the Great..,” 483. 7 TTP13. SO 3, 169, 7–9. Shirley 511. 8 TTP13. SO 3, 169, 9–13. Shirley 511. 9 TTP14, SO 3, 174, 33–35, 175, 1. Shirley 515. 10 TTP14, SO 3, 176, 33–35, 177, 1–10. Shirley 517.