Customer Reviews

Routledge Philosophy GuideBook to Spinoza and the Ethics (Routledge Philosophy GuideBooks)

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Genevieve Lloyd's introduction and commentary to Spinoza's _Ethics_ has become one of my favorites. If you want a general introduction to Spinoza, I recommend starting with Roger Scruton or (second choice) Diane Steinberg. But if you're going to try to read the _Ethics_, you can't ask for a better companion than Lloyd.

It's wonderful to see how much she gets right. For example, in just a few short paragraphs, she not only adopts Martial Gueroult's suggestion to regard Spinoza as a panentheist (correctly, in my opinion), but _also_ explains the main hazard of this view (that we may forget Spinoza's God is fully expressed in each of his attributes). It's nice to see such excellent philosophical sense compressed into two pages of text.

She also takes Jonathan Bennett to task, quite rightly, for his reading in _A Study of Spinoza's Ethics_. I really like Bennett's commentary and I think every philosopher deserves a critic of his caliber. But he reads Spinoza, indeed expressly sets out to read Spinoza, only to find out what he has to say that is of interest to the modern academic philosopher, and he thereby winds up missing the point a lot. Lloyd sets him straight on several issues -- not least his failure to appreciate that Spinoza's development of collaborative ethics from self-regard depends on a new understanding of the self.

She's pretty good on the subject of the mind's eternality, too. I won't try to summarize her claims on this overworked subject; let's just say that she provides a fairly sound reply to Bennett's claim that the second half of Book Five doesn't have anything important to say to us.

There are several other good commentaries on the _Ethics_, of which I personally recommend Curley's _Behind the Geometrical Method_ and Bennett's aforementioned _A Study of Spinoza's Ethics_. (Among older ones, I still like Joachim's best.) But if you want a commentary suitable for both introductory and advanced readers that does a nice job of letting Spinoza speak for himself, Lloyd's is it.

This book is an erudite discussion of Spinoza's philosophy which presupposes a lot of previous knowledge of his doctrine. To take but one example, the first chapter does not explain the central notions of substance, modes and attributes, but discusses them, which is mainly done by comparing the points of view of several Spinoza scholars. All in all, this so-called "guidebook" is in fact a kind of dialogue the author is having with other specialists.
Therefore, if you want to get acquainted with Spinoza and undestand the basics, don't buy this book. I recommend Robert Duff's "Spinoza's Political and Ethical Philosophy" instead.