D1: Atheism is the belief that there is no god or that god does not exist (I take both sides of this conjunction to mean the same thing)
Cor: there is another definition of atheism, which is that it is the belief that the God of the world Religions does not exist, but since I believe that we would all agree that this is Spinoza’s opinion (see the TTP), it would be pointless to use this definition in this debate.
D2: Pantheism is the belief that nature is God
D3: The term God in both cases refers to some thing that is worthy of worship.
Schol: I use the term thing so that any conception of god would apply to it. This is not to be confused with the concept of God itselfs, which would cause this discussion to get bogged down into a discussion of God, which is not completely relevant.
I think that we can all agree on the above definitions (if not that will come up at some point in this debate) yet it seems that more clarification is needed. So the question seems to be whether or not Spinoza believes that god is worthy of worship. If he does, then he would be a pantheist, if not, then he is an atheist. The first step seems to be that the term worship needs to be clearly defined. Once that task is completed, it will be possible to look at Spinoza’s work and determine whether or not he is an atheist or a pantheist.
While we often think that worship has a religious connotation, there are many types of worship. Beyond worshiping god, there is worship of idols, there is worship of monarchs and heads of states, and there is even to one’s boss. It is also often the case that in intimate relationships between two people, one or both parties worship the other. The question then becomes what is common to all these types worship. In some sense it seems that it is some internal acknowledgement of the greatness of the worshiped, it seems that the important part of this is the public aspect of this acknowledgement. It seems that one can not be said to worship a monarch without publicly showing it. In order to truly worship some thing or some one, there must be some public aspect to this worship. there also seems to be another part of worship where one admits his or her subservience to that thing. In the case of a monarch it is acknowledging your place under the monarch. In the case of a lover, it’s your devotion to that person. So, I propose that worship is the the public acknowledgement of the the greatness of some thing, and your subservience to it.
Given that i can now show how Spinoza is an Atheist. Spinoza never publicly acknowledged the greatness of his conception of God nor did he make any public claims to be subservient to it. In fact the only type of worship Spinoza did in his life were in the form Judaic and Christian religious services. Now the claim might be made that Spinoza’s ethics were in it of themselves a form of worship. However this claim does not apply to Spinoza. This claim could be made of a person who intends to have his work published. For example, it might be legitimate to say that Einstein's work was a form of worship to Spinoza’s conception of God. However, Spinoza’s ethics was his private sentiments, which he never had any intention of publishing and were not written in an easily accessible language. Only after his death was his work published by friends of his. This privateness of his ethics makes it clear that Spinoza’s God was a private sentiment and not something that needed to be worshiped. As such, following from the definitions about, Spinoza was an Atheist.
