Getting his hands dirty: Spinoza's criticism of the rebel

Abstract

This chapter argues that the reconciliation of Spinoza's egoism with the case of the rebel requires both a reconceptualization of the way in which the Principle of Sufficient Reason (the PSR) shapes Spinoza's account of normativity. For Spinoza, it is right and good for each of us to preserve herself, and indeed each of us has the right to seek her own advantage and to seek to control and even kill others if doing so would aid in her preservation. One can see how Spinoza's criticisms of the rebel and of the liar are not out of keeping with Spinoza's general egoism, but rather are dictated by that egoism, by the concern to meet the standards set by one's own nature. From God's point of view, the action in question is not fundamentally an action of the rebel, but rather an action of God.