Religion and Power in Spinoza

The Tractatus Theologico-politicus was published anonimously in 1670, thereby challenging a moderately tolerant Dutch Republic (Pierre Bayle’s great arch of the refugees). The defence of libertas philosophandi (freedom of speech and thought) put forward by Spinoza, along with the underlying analysis of the fundamentals of religion and political power, were received as a radical proposal in Modern Europe, though despite prompting severe criticism and considerable amount of refutations, it circula