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Ethics and Education

ISSN: 1744-9642 (Print) 1744-9650 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/ceae20

The moral fallibility of Spinoza’s exemplars:

exploring the educational value of imperfect

models of human behavior

Johan Dahlbeck & Moa De Lucia Dahlbeck

To cite this article: Johan Dahlbeck & Moa De Lucia Dahlbeck (2020): The moral fallibility of Spinoza’s exemplars: exploring the educational value of imperfect models of human behavior, Ethics and Education, DOI: 10.1080/17449642.2020.1731106

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/17449642.2020.1731106

© 2020 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

Published online: 18 Feb 2020.

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ARTICLE

The moral fallibility of Spinoza

’s exemplars: exploring the

educational value of imperfect models of human

behavior

Johan Dahlbeck aand Moa De Lucia Dahlbeck b

aFaculty of Education and Society, Malmö University, Malmö, Sweden;bSchool of Business, Economics and Law, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden

ABSTRACT

While Spinoza stipulates an ideal moral person in the proposi-tions on the‘free man’ in Ethics IV, this account does not seem to be intended to function as a pedagogical tool of political rele-vance. Hence, it does not seem to correspond to the purpose of moral exemplarism. If we look for that kind of practical guidance, Spinoza’s political works seem more relevant. Interestingly, when we approach Spinoza’s political theory with moral exem-plarism in mind, wefind that instead of constructing his exem-plar on the idea of a supremely moral person, he emphasizes the concept of ingenium to chisel out an imperfect model of human behavior. We argue that the purpose of this is to avoid a utopian and inefficient political theory and to work out a moral practice that is capable of assisting people and communities in ethical self-transformation.

KEYWORDS

Spinoza; moral exemplarism; ingenium; moral education; political theory

1. The problem, purpose, and method of moral exemplarism

The underlying discussion giving rise to and motivating the argument devel-oped in this article is a discussion present in moral philosophy, in philosophy of education, as well as in political and legal philosophy. It concerns the problem of making moral theories apt to serve the twofold purpose of establishing and justifying certain values on the one hand, and of making people moral on the other (Zagzebski 2013, 193). In other words, it deals with how to make virtue theories about what is good for us work, and with being able to ground one’s account of virtue in a realistic understanding of human nature and human behavior. Taking this problem seriously leads us quite naturally into a discussion of exemplars and exemplary narratives. As Linda Zagzebski argues: ‘Narratives are useful for the purposes of moral education and improvement because they engage our motives much more than abstract theories (. . .)’ (ibid). According to Zagzebski’s conception of moral exemplarism,1exemplars are to be understood as ‘supremely admirable persons who show us the upper

CONTACTJohan Dahlbeck johan.dahlbeck@mah.se

https://doi.org/10.1080/17449642.2020.1731106

© 2020 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduc-tion in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way.

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reaches of human capability, and in doing so, inspire us to expect more from ourselves’ (2017, 1). Exemplars, from this definition, can be said to refer to (1) persons who exhibit human excellence in some aspects (they are ‘admirable persons’), (2) proposed standards by which to measure our own human cap-ability (they‘show us the upper reaches of human capability’), and (3) pedago-gical tools for envisioning and enabling human perfectibility or improvement (they ‘inspire us to expect more from ourselves’). The driving force of the pedagogical aspect of the exemplar is, according to this scheme, the emotion of admiration. Exemplars are persons who can invoke admiration in us so that we may begin to strive to become more like the posited exemplar through emulation. The experience of admiration is here understood to be the practical means through which we identify human excellence. In slightly more technical terms, Zagzebski proposes that‘admiration can serve the function of system-atizing our moral judgments in a way that makes it potentially much more powerful for moral theory and practice than other moral emotions’ (2017, 31). The benefit of grounding exemplarism in admiration is, on Zagzebski’s account, that it is an emotion ‘that most people trust’ (2013, 198) and intuitively know, unlike abstract theoretical concepts that usually serve the purpose of grounding moral theories.

As the practical aim of Zagzebski’s moral exemplarism is to ‘produce a theory that can be used to actually make persons moral’ (2017, 3) by way of the experience of admiration, it is clear that exemplarist moral theory is construed as being inherently educational. In this way, we take education to be (in one way or another, and to different degrees) always concerned with the formation of moral persons. The assumption that education connects deeply with moral formation is not very controversial. Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle all worked– in different ways – from the basis of this premise and it has continued to shape educational thought ever since. Recent examples of the continued currency of this general position in educational theory include David Carr, who suggests that ‘it is hard to deny that education involves improving people in a sense that extends beyond mere coaching or training in information and skills to wider personal formation’ (2003, 77), and Michael Hand, who has recently suggested that ‘[t]he crucial educational task is the formation of responsible moral agents (. . .)’ (2018, 6).

Although Zagzebski’s gaze is aimed primarily at its contemporary expres-sion and her concern is principally practical in nature, her observations about the origin of exemplarism and the problem to which it responds indicates the rich history of the notion of exemplarity within moral philosophy. Conceived broadly, the historical roots of Zagzebski’s moral exemplarism are linked to virtue ethics. Traditionally, virtue ethics is more focused on the individual than on collective/social institutions when dealing with the practical challenge of making people moral. Because of this, the standard critique against virtue ethics is that it fails to provide a functioning method by which to transform individuals who are by necessity naturally bound up in complex social

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configurations. Following this line of critique, the problem easily leads to an either/or question: either we opt for an individualistic model where the moral concern trumps social issues, or we opt for a political model where moral concerns are politicized and thereby treated as effects of social reforms. In both cases, morality seems to be treated as a purely theoretical endeavour with little or no practical relevance. The appeal of a practical moral theory, then, is to avoid such a dualism in order to be able to conceptualize the necessary social aspects of human nature in light of the fundamental ethical concern of human well-being.

We argue that Spinoza is particularly interesting in this context as his main concern is to devise a practical guide towards a moral life for the individual without either ignoring or overemphasizing the role of civic institutions such as education and law (TIE §14-15/Spinoza 1985a). In Spinoza’s work explicitly dedicated to political organization– the TP – he starts off by grounding politics in ethics. However, rather than referring to the sections of the Ethics in which he explicitly deals with the composition of a virtuous individual (cf. E4p18s, GII/223/ 15-20; E4p19-37),2he emphasizes the importance of paying close attention to a realistic depiction of human nature, one that recognizes the many limitations and imperfections of humans. What makes this interesting is that it motivates Spinoza to respond to the practical problem of how to make people moral by making this problem entirely dependent on principles of political organization. This is done so as to avoid both an unrealistic political theory and a moral ideal that is rendered impotent on account of its unattainability.

As such, Spinoza introduces his principles of political organization by approach-ing the roots of the very moral problem at the basis of exemplarism as the over-arching motivation for political philosophy. He does this in a way that illustrates how a functioning moral theory must be conceived in terms of a well-balanced political philosophy. Spinoza’s rationale for thinking this is rooted in his conviction that ethics is a metaphysical concern insofar as ethics concerns the natural striving towards perfectibility, which, in turn, corresponds with one’s degree of intellectual understanding‘without error and as well as possible’ (TIE §16). Hence, the ethical striving towards perfectibility is entirely dependent on functioning civic institutions, ‘[f]or if men were not willing to give mutual assistance to one another, they would lack both skill and time (. . .) to do the many other things necessary to support life– not to mention now the arts and sciences which are also supremely necessary for the perfection of human nature and for its blessedness.’ (TTP 5[18–19]). From this point of view, morality becomes a purely political affair insofar as morality concerns the social and political organization necessary for enabling the ethical striving of the individual.

While the interplay between the safekeeping of the political community and the promotion of the individual’s ability to act according to a given virtue theory can be conceived in a number of ways, we argue that Spinoza’s use of exem-plars – considered against the background of his understanding of human

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sociability – is particularly interesting. This is so as it provides the necessary balance between a considered account of the highest good and a realistic understanding of human nature. Spinoza’s account of human nature, framing both his ethics and his political theory, provides the basis for an exemplarist moral theory that addresses and explains the dual normative challenge of establishing a stable community so that the formation of moral persons can be promoted. In TP 1[1] he writes:

Philosophers conceive the affects by which we’re torn as vices, which men fall into by their own fault. That’s why they usually laugh at them, weep over them, censure them, or (if they want to seem particularly holy) curse them. They believe they perform a godly act and reach the pinnacle of wisdom when they’ve learned how to bewail the way men really are. They conceive of men not as they are, but as they want them to be. That’s why for the most part they’ve written Satire instead of Ethics, and why they’ve never conceived a Politics which could be put to any practical application, but only one which would be thought a Fantasy, possible only in Utopia, or in the golden age of the Poets, where there’d be absolutely no need for it. (TP 1[1], G III/273/4-17, emphasis added).

In this passage, Spinoza clearly grounds the problem of ineffective or (worse even) naïve applications of moral theories in a philosophical misconception of human nature. A careful discussion of both the TP’s account of the origin of this problem, as well as the various explicit and implicit endorsements of the use of narratives and examples for countering the problem of disharmony between theory and practice which can be found throughout Spinoza’s work, can help us evaluate contemporary ideas about how to formulate a moral theory that is sensitive to the pragmatic conditions under which it has to work.

2. Spinoza’s use of exemplars

The standard place to begin an investigation of Spinoza’s use of exemplars are the passages in the Ethics that are commonly classified as the normative guidelines following from his metaphysical account of human well-being. More specifically, this refers to the sections in Part 4 and 5 that describe the free man (the perfectly rational person) and the wise man (the relatively rational person).3 While the sections on the free man describe the model (ideal) of human nature, the sections on the wise man offer practical guidelines so that the less-than-perfect being can approximate this ideal. Both, however, relate to an understanding of human perfection (and thus the exemplary human being) as constituted by pure reasoning (E4p68d), because the true good of a human being is‘whatever leads to under-standing’ (E4p26-27). Judging by these sections, then, Spinoza appears to posit an ideal image of a perfect human being as a model to pursue. Indeed, these sections are often taken to be Spinoza’s version of a moral theory with direct practical implications for the organization of the human social and political world.

Karolina Hübner, for instance, takes Spinoza’s model of human nature (the free man) as an action-guiding principle applicable in real-life situations. Acknowledging

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the metaphysical nature of Spinoza’s model, Hübner writes: ‘This doesn’t mean that a particular reader cannot relate to Spinoza’s model through the imagination – not as a representation of certain abstract truths but as a future goal, something to be emulated, a source of practical maxims to memorize’ (2014, 139). On Hübner’s reading, Spinoza’s model of human nature should be considered a moral exemplar to be applied in all instances of life by every kind of individual person, irrespective of their affective constitution (2014, 124). Taking this a step further, Susan James relies on the same passages of the Ethics in order to argue for the use of the model human being as a founding principle of political philosophy (2014, 156–159). James under-stands Spinoza’s model of human nature as framing an ‘idealized community of the wise’ (2014, 156–157). On this understanding, in the same way as the free man makes for a practical ideal to strive for in terms of the moral striving of the individual, the model also functions as an ideal to guide the social organization of communities. Accordingly, if we follow this reading of Spinoza’s Ethics as the normative basis of a practical moral theory, it seems that we end up with a version of moral exemplarism that fulfills Zagzebski’s criteria. Spinoza’s free man is an image of (1) a person who exhibits human excellence, and (2) who offers standards by which to measure human capability, and (3) who inspires us to expect more from ourselves.

However, the viability of this reading seems to require the bracketing of fundamental aspects of Spinoza’s philosophy. The problem with this reading is not that it misrepresents the free man in Spinoza or the tight connection it makes between being rational and moral perfectibility, but rather that it seems to over-look Spinoza’s explicit conclusion at the end of the metaphysical account of the Ethics (E4p37s2) stating that morality is the exclusive concern of the state. While it is true that, for Spinoza, human perfection and highest good amount to a fully rational being, it is also true that no fully rational human exists or even can exist (E4p4c and E4p6). Because humans are always subject to external affects, human actions will always be determined by the affective power of ideas rather than their degree of truth (E4p7 and E4p17c). In TTP 5 Spinoza explains why the idea of the free man should not be read as a response to the demands of practical morality:

Now if nature had so constituted men that they desired nothing except what true reason teaches them to desire, then of course a society could exist without laws; in that case it would be completely sufficient to teach men true moral lessons, so that they would do voluntarily, wholeheartedly, and in a manner of a free man, what is really useful. [21] But human nature is not constituted like that at all. It’s true that everyone seeks his own advantage– but people want things and judge them useful, not by the dictate of sound reason, but for the most part only from immoderate desire and because they are carried away by affects of mind which take no account of the future and of other things. [22] That’s why no society can continue in existence without authority and force, and hence, laws which moderate and restrain men’s immoderate desires and unchecked impulses. (TTP 5[20-22], G III/73/27-74, emphasis added)

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The sections in the Ethics that describe the free man and the wise man are specifically concerned with outlining the human path towards perfection such as it would be if humans naturally followed the precepts of reason (E4p18s). But it should not be forgotten that Spinoza also emphasizes that this path does in no way come naturally to human beings whose affects will be restrained ‘not by the true knowledge of good and evil insofar as it is true but only insofar as it is considered as an affect’ (E4p14). In the second scholium of proposition 37 (in Part 4 of the Ethics), Spinoza deduces an important, but often overlooked, consequence from these metaphysical conditions.

In this way Society has the power to prescribe a common rule of life, to make laws, and to maintain them– not by reason, which cannot restrain the affects (by P17s), but by threats. This Society, maintained by laws and the power it has of preserving itself, is called a State, and those who are defended by its law, Citizens. (. . .) But in the Civil state, of course, it is decided by common agreement what is good and what is evil. And everyone is bound to submit to the State. Sin, therefore, is nothing but disobedience, which for that reason can be punished only by the law of the State. On the other hand, obedience is considered a merit in a Citizen, because on that account he is judged worthy of enjoying the advantages of the State. (. . .) From this it is clear that just and unjust, sin and merit, are extrinsic notions, not attributes that explain the nature of the Mind. (G II/238).

Against the background of E4p37s2 and TTP 5[20–22], it is difficult to see how one could extrapolate a practical moral theory from Spinoza’s accounts of the free man and/or the wise man. Given the exclusive right of the state to decide what is good for everyone, a practical guide aimed at making people achieve this goal must reasonably be in compliance with this right and not with what is known to be the true good. Indeed, it is the failure to distinguish between morality as the exclusive concern of the state and ethics as a metaphysical account of the true good that is the main object of Spinoza’s harsh critique of idealistic moral and political theories (delivered in TP 1[1]). It is not that indivi-dual human beings stop making value judgments once they are within a society, it is rather that these judgments remain a private affair (see TP 3[3]). Within the state, morality must be monopolized by the body politic in order to constitute the practical (political) means for achieving the social stability neces-sary for the successful ethical striving of individual human beings (E4p37s2; TP 1[5] and 3[3]). As such,‘it doesn’t make any difference to the security of the state in what spirit men are led to administer matters properly, provided that they do administer them properly. For freedom of mind, or strength of character, is a private virtue. But the virtue of the state is security’ (TP 1[6]).

Further on in the TP, Spinoza elaborates on how the distinction made between human virtue as freedom of mind and the virtue of the state as security is a necessary consequence of the affective nature of human beings. Accordingly, Spinoza asserts that ‘this Right of Nature – that each person is his own judge – necessarily ceases in the civil order’ (TP 3[3]). However, considering Spinoza’s

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commitment to strong naturalism this cannot mean that human beings in the civil order somehow cease to be governed by the order of nature. The sophisticated nature of the relationship between a person being subject to nature’s order and the civil order’s monopoly over its subjects’ value judgments reads: ‘Both in the natural state and in the civil order, man acts according to the laws of his own nature and looks out for his own advantage’ (ibid). This, together with the fact that in all situations‘man is guided by hope or fear, either to do or not to do, this or that action’ (ibid), is the starting point for all human behavior, according to Spinoza. ‘The principal difference’ he clarifies

between the two conditions is that in the civil order everyone fears the same things: for everyone there is one and the same cause of security and principle of living. This, of course, does not eliminate each person’s ability to judge. Whoever has resolved to obey all the commands of a Commonwealth, whether because he feared its power or because he loves peace, is surely looking out for his own security and his own advantage, according to his own mentality [ingenio]. (ibid).

In this passage, it is clearly shown how morality turns out to be a question of security within the civil order and how this, in turn, is an absolute precondition for exercising the natural and individual right to look out for oneself and to live according to one’s own mentality. The same is reiterated in 3[5] and 3[6] where what appears to be a paradox is resolved by reference to this distinction between human virtue and the virtue of the state. TP 3[5] stipulates that everyone within a civil order is subject to this order’s full control since there is no room reserved for individual decisions, not even concerning questions of good and evil, in the constitution (natural or not) of this very order. In TP 3[6] Spinoza remarks that this may look like a contradiction with respect to the principle stating that seeking one’s own advantage is a law of nature and the fact that reason (and not the state’s legislation) represents what is objectively most advantageous for all indi-vidual human beings. He resolves this seeming contradiction in the following way:

[S]ince reason teaches nothing contrary to nature, sound reason cannot dictate that each person remain his own master, so long as men are subjects to affects (by i, 5), i.e. (by ii, 15), reason denies that it can happen [that reason should dictate that each person remain his own master].

Moreover, reason teaches us without qualification to seek peace, which certainly can’t be obtained unless the common laws of the Commonwealth are observed without violation. So, the more a man is led by reason, i.e. (by ii, 11), the more free he is, the more steadfastly he will observe the laws of the Commonwealth and carry out the commands of the supreme‘power to which he is subject. (TP 3[6], G III/286/17-25, square bracket in original).

In light of the above, it seems quite clear that as exemplars – given their exclusive focus on the private affair of freedom of mind – the free man and the wise man are of limited value for a practical morality within the civil order. If the reading of Spinoza as a moral exemplarist seems to be unexpectedly halted by this conclusion, we may ask whether Spinoza has anything at all to offer an

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exemplarist moral theory? Whereas the examined passages of the Ethics cer-tainly do concern the true virtue of the individual, they are approached in a manner that clearly disregards the affective vulnerability and natural socia-bility of human beings (their ingenium), as clearly indicated in the TP. If we look for practical examples of exemplars that are better reflections of the actual conditions of a human life– which is always lived out in a social setting – and more effective tools for securing the virtue of the state, it seems we must look elsewhere than in the passages on the free man and the wise man.

There are indeed good reasons for turning to Spinoza as a resource for thinking about moral exemplarism, but that in order to see this, we need to look closer at his political writings. A consequence of looking in this direction, rather than at the passages on the free man and the wise man, is that the notion of moral exemplarism offered by Zagzebski needs to be modified so as to come across as less idealistic. While the free man and the wise man are clear examples of supremely admirable persons (in that they are always guided by reason), this characteristic renders them unattainable and ultimately unfit as practical tools of moral influence. We in fact argue that it is the moral fallibility of the exemplars Spinoza offers in his political writings that makes them more apt to serve this purpose.

Returning to the above quoted passage from TP 3[3], Spinoza provides a valuable hint indicating what to look for in the search for useful exemplars. As far as we understand it, the connecting point for Spinoza between political governance of any kind and a functional moral theory resides in the concept of ingenium (ingenio/ingenia) which, in the quoted passage from TP 3[3], is translated as mentality and in other places as temperament (c.f. E3p31s; E4p70d). Recalling that for Spinoza, human nature is not naturally inclined towards reason (E4 pre-face and TTP 16[7]), but necessarily also subject to the‘bondage’ of passions, it follows that a person’s ingenium must be understood in terms of his or her specific composition of affective components – passive as well as active. Because a person’s behavior is determined by his or her ingenium, and because an‘affect cannot be restrained or taken away except by an affect opposite to, and stronger than, the affect to be restrained’ (E4p7), the upshot of this is that an effective exemplar (one that does not idealize the affective composition of a human being) should draw on people’s experiences and appeal to their imagi-nation (TTP 5[35–37]). The way to do this, according to Spinoza, is to employ narratives that may‘affect and fill [people’s] fantasy and imagination’ (TTP 6[49]) since a poetic and ethical narrative‘will move them very much’ (TTP 6[50]). The benefit of using narratives grounded in experience is that experiential knowledge depends on people’s memory and ‘common people are accustomed to explain natural things, viz. by falling back on memory to recall some other similar thing (. . .)’ (TTP 6[14]).

In addition to being attuned to the affective composition of different indivi-duals, Spinoza’s account of ingenium has the benefit of explaining why the

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accounts of the wise man and the free man shouldn’t be directly applied to the human social and political condition as well as illustrating the smooth transition that runs from his account of the affective nature of humans to the normative thrust of his political writings. In contrast to those readings that hinge their interpretation of Spinoza’s moral exemplarism directly on the sections on the free man and the wise man, a reading that takes as a starting point the notion of ingenium avoids having to confront an inexplicable gap between Spinoza’s ethics and his political theory. As such, it is telling that Spinoza himself relies on the notion of ingenium when he goes from explaining the affective nature of humans to the governance of a people:

It follows that if someone wants to teach a doctrine to a whole nation– not to mention the whole human race– and wants everyone to understand him in every respect, he is bound to prove his doctrine solely by experience, and for the most part to accommodate his arguments and the definitions of his teachings to the power of understanding of ordinary people, who form the greatest part of the human race. (TTP 5[37], emphasis added).

Since human nature is inherently affective (and thus necessarily varying from individual to individual), effective government depends on the capacity of the governing body to (a) correctly read the affective nature of the governed people, and (b) to convince the people– on their own imaginative terms – of the benefits of its laws, norms and guidelines. A people’s ingenium describes what the governing body needs to grasp, which is the common direction of the affections of a diverse group of individuals. Moreau describes it as enabling us to affirm the irreducibility of individuals whilst keeping in mind their variation (2009, 7). What is needed for this kind of persuasion is neither scientific evidence nor logical arguments, but relatable narratives that are rooted in the particular experience of a role model. The exemplarity of this kind of role model is not based on its supremely admirable character but rather in its proximity to the character of the people to be persuaded. Spinoza elaborates:

The common people, then, are bound to know only those narratives which are most able to move their hearts to obedience and devotion. But they themselves are not very well able to make a judgment [about which narratives those are], because they take more pleasure in the narration, and in the particular and unexpected outcomes, than they do in what the narratives teach. So, in addition to reading the narratives, they need Pastors or minister of the Church as well, who will teach them according to the weakness of their understanding. (TTP 5[44], emphasis added, square bracket in original)

Spinoza points to Moses as an illustration of a teacher that through his ability to understand the weakness of his people’s understanding could teach a moral ‘doctrine to a whole nation’ (ibid.). In a chapter dedicated to explaining Spinoza’s conception of ingenium formation, Justin Steinberg notes that Moses ‘was able to effectively govern the people because he was a realist, acknowledging the actual constitutions of his subjects and adopting prudent

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means of guiding them in light of these conditions’ (2018, 37, emphasis added). Since the ingenium of a people is dynamic and contingent (affective), what is a prudent means of guidance necessarily differs from people to people and from context to context. Hence, there can never be afixed formula for what amounts to good governance. The kind of governance called for is always determined by the kind and intensity of the passions involved in a given people’s ingenium. This is so as human affects will never be restrained ‘by the true knowledge of good and evil insofar as it is true but only insofar as it is considered as an affect’ (E4p14c). So, understanding the affective composition of the Hebrew people is a precondition for appreciating Moses’s role as protector of the Hebrew people rather than as a teacher of principles of universal ethics:

For example, Moses does not teach the Jews as a teacher or Prophet that they should not kill or steal, but commands these things as a lawgiver and prince. For he does not prove these teachings by reason, but adds a penalty to the commands, which can and must vary according to the mentality [ingenio] of each nation, as experience has sufficiently taught. [8] Similarly, the command not to commit adultery concerns only the advantage of the republic and the state. For if he had wanted to teach this as a moral teaching, which concerns not only the republic, but also the peace of mind and true blessedness of each person, he would not condemn only the external action, but also the consent of the mind itself, as Christ did, who taught only universal teachings (see Matthew 5:28). (TTP 5[7-8])

Unlike Christ, who is described as supremely wise (he ‘perceived the things revealed truly and adequately’ (TTP 4[32], G III/65)) and concerned with the blessedness of all people (i.e., universal ethics), Moses is not an exemplar due to his degree of human excellence but due to his powerful imagination. This enabled him to perceive the affective constitution of his people so that they could be compelled to act in accordance with the needs of the Hebrew state.

He also perceived the way that people could best be compelled to obedience. But he did not perceive, and it was not revealed to him, that that way is best– or even that the goal they were aiming at would necessarily follow from the general obedience of the people in such a region of the world. [30] So he perceived all these things, not as eternal truths, but at precepts and institutions and he prescribed them as laws of God. That’s why he imagined God as a ruler, a lawgiver, a king, as compassionate, just, etc., when all these things are attributes only of human nature, and ought to be removed entirely from the divine nature. (TTP 4[29-30]).

Confronted with this passage one possible objection to the idea of Moses as a moral exemplar is that he does not seem to be concerned with morality at all. In addition, unlike Christ he does not seem to have the cognitive characteristics of a wise man which seems to be a precondition for being truly moral. However, if we recollect Spinoza’s conclusion that the security of the state – rather than individual rationality– is an absolute precondition for human flourishing, then the role of Moses is indeed central to the morality of the Hebrew people. Interestingly, this means that it is Moses’s imperfection (his likeness to the

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imaginative thinking of ordinary people) that makes him effective as an exem-plar. Insofar as moral exemplarism is concerned with what makes people moral, and given that an individual’s ethical striving is a private affair entirely depen-dent on a stable social context, a functioning exemplar must be directed not towards the content of morality but towards securing its external conditions.

3. The educational value of imperfect models of human behavior

At this point, there are two things in particular that we would like to highlight before wrapping up the argument by going back to Zagzebski’s conception of the moral exemplar. First of all, it is worth emphasizing that exemplars for Spinoza are neither necessarily constant nor universally valid. There is no one-size-fits-all model when it comes to an ideal powerful enough to move a people towards becoming moral since moving a people (for whatever reason or towards whatever end) is a political, rather than a strictly moral or ethical, affair. Our extended argument to prove this point in the section above may be summarized as follows: (1) Even though ethical development is a private affair, human individuals are by nature conditioned by a mutual dependence. (2) This being the case, a single individual will always benefit more from social security than from good– i.e., true – ethical advice since without a stable social structure a single individual will be lacking the power to pursue the ethical advice, irrespective of that individual’s capacity to appreciate it. (3) In order to ensure social security, it is essential that the moral incitements to act in a given way are adapted to the cognitive abilities of the majority of individuals within the collective rather than to a posited ideal of a supremely moral person, because affective powers generating activity are only combated by stronger affective powers and not by truths. (4) Since a collective of individuals will always be moved more by passions than by truth, and because passions are necessarily contingent andfluctuating, it is important that the moral incitements to act in a given way (the narrative implied by the images and models used) are attuned to the particular configuration of the passions at work in a given community.

Our second conclusion concerns the apparent paradox in Spinoza’s explana-tion of how to make people moral insofar as this explanaexplana-tion involves a moral model with clear tendency towards moral fallibility. What we wish to emphasize with regards to this is that in order to understand Spinoza’s ethical message we should not overlook the importance of his political writings. As our reading above has shown, the relationship between his ethical and political works seems to parallel his view on the metaphysical relationship between ethics and politics. A good configuration of the latter is a precondition for a successful achievement of the former, but what is good/successful must in each instance be measured entirely according to its own terms. The ethical goal cannot affect the determi-nation of what amounts to good political means although these means ulti-mately, of course, serve the ethical goal. This, we argue, stands clear if Spinoza’s

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double use of the exemplar– that of the free man and the wise man in the Ethics and that of the model leader of a people in the TTP– is carefully studied. What is more, following through on the function of the imperfect moral model for the purpose of attaining the overall ethical goal in Spinoza’s metaphysical account has the additional benefit of bridging the otherwise inexplicable gap between Spinoza’s metaphysics, cast as it is in terms of hard determinism, and the psychological realism of his political philosophy.

Against the background of this summary, we propose that Spinoza does indeed have something valuable to offer an exemplarist moral theory. In addi-tion, we propose that what he has to offer helps us see how educational endeavors can benefit from working with exemplars insofar as the aim is to make those who are being educated moral. In order to see this, it helps to return to Zagzebski’s proposed definition of a moral exemplar. Zagzebski’s theory of moral exemplarism requires that an exemplar is a supremely admirable person who shows us the upper reaches of human capability and, by doing so, offers standards by which to measure human actions. As we have seen, Spinoza does have a conception of a supremely moral person (described in the passages of the free man). However, insofar as Spinoza equates moral excellence with human perfection which, in turn, amounts to a fully rational being, it is clear that a supremely moral person is an ineffective moral ideal since such a person would be unaffected by the passions that influence ordinary people (to varying degrees). That is, Spinoza’s free man is completely unimpeded by the normal cognitive and epistemological limitations that help define the finite human being. It is precisely this cognitive superiority that renders the free man supre-mely moral. The free man illustrates the upper reaches of human capabilities such as these would appear removed from the necessary constraints of every-day reality. On this reading, the free man (despite being morally supreme) is not conceived of as a moral ideal to be realized in normative practices but as an illustration of the cognitive limitations and moral fallibility of ordinary people.

In his political works, in contrast, Spinoza is no longer concerned with describing the metaphysical landscape of human perfection, but with working out a practical guide for the governance of human societies based on a realistic understanding of our psychological nature. This approach is no less mindful of metaphysics as it is firmly grounded in a universal law of human nature, but it emphasizes the neces-sary limits of human nature so as not to risk politicizing an unattainable version. On Spinoza’s account, the basic premise for human psychology is that

no one neglects to pursue what he judges to be good, unless he hopes for a greater good, or fears a greater harm. Nor does anyone submit to any evil, except to avoid a greater one, or because he hopes for a greater good. Between two goods, each person chooses the one he judges to be greater; between two evils, the one which seems to him lesser. (TTP 16[15])

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Moses, for Spinoza, is exemplary in the sense that he was perfectly attuned to the mentality of his people, and that he was able to communicate moral guidelines based on the political needs of the Hebrews (TTP 5[26]). Rather than embodying an ideal (and admirable) version of a human being, Moses is exemplary insofar as he perfectly reflects the ingenium of his people. Based on this attunement, he legislates in a way that is persuasive for them in their actual context since he realizes that their ethical striving is conditioned by the fact that‘no society can continue in existence without authority and force and hence, laws which moderate and restrain men’s immoderate desires and unchecked impulses’ (TTP 5[22]). After briefly describing (TTP 5[26–28]) the ingenium of the Hebrews (as ‘unsophisticated in their mentality and wea-kened by wretched bondage’), Spinoza goes on to demonstrate how Moses applied this knowledge:

He did not permit these men, accustomed as they were to bondage, to act just as they pleased. For the people could do nothing without being bound at the same time to remember the law, and to carry out commands which depended only on the will of the ruler. For it was not at their own pleasure, but according to afixed and determinate command of the law, that they were permitted to plow, to sow, to reap. (TTP 5[30])

Spinoza’s political exemplars can inspire people because they are attuned to their ingenium, not because they are supremely admirable or because they offer true standards of human conduct. Faithful to his own warning in TP 1, Spinoza’s exemplars of choice in the TTP reveal that the most important thing for effective influence is to remain sensitive to the ingenium of the people, rather than to scrutinize the moral adequacy and admirability of the exemplar itself. It appears, then, as if Spinoza’s use of exemplars emanates, not from the substance and constitution of the exemplar, but from a good understanding of the psycholo-gical and external conditions of a people.

To conclude, if the aim is to identify a method for making people moral with the help of the various civic institutions of a state, then Spinoza’s contribution to such an endeavour can be summarized as follows:first, he explains the futility of identifying moral exemplars since the ability to judge what is moral (good) in another person hinges upon the ability to judge this in relation to oneself. Because the starting point of all human judgment is that we are affective beings who make decisions, not based on reason and sound judgment, but mostly on external impulses that we are completely unaware of, it makes little sense to construe a practical framework that assumes the efficacy of this ability in relation to others (i.e. exemplary persons). This is why Spinoza states:

Now if nature has so constituted men that they desired nothing except what true reason teaches them to desire, then of course a society could exist without laws; in that case it would be completely sufficient to teach men true moral lessons, so that they would do voluntarily, wholeheartedly, and in a manner worthy of a free man, what is really useful. (TTP 5[20])

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Second, judging another person’s behavior as admirable or not (as good or evil) will therefore suffer from the same cognitive limitations as those afflicting the judgment of one’s own behavior as it hinges on the same cognitive mechanisms. We can only perceive in others what we perceive in ourselves. Any attempt to construe an exemplar based on its admirability will fail to inspire those in need of inspiration because it assumes that it is possible for a person to circumscribe his or her own affective nature, as explained by Spinoza in the passage quoted above. If this was possible then there would be no need for exemplars to begin with. The purpose of the exemplar is precisely to correct the tendency to judge things, not according to sound reason, but‘for the most part only from immoderate desire and because they are carried away by affects of mind which take no account of the future and of other things’ (TTP 5[21]).

Third, this means that useful exemplars must be grounded in the unreliability of human judgment. That is, an exemplar is only effective insofar as it engages with the passionate nature of a people, and passions are– by definition – never adequately understood. It is not the virtuous behavior of Moses that makes him into an exemplar, but his ability to understand and communicate in accordance with the ingenium of the Hebrews. Drawing from this we see that a method for making people moral should (a) pay close attention to the affective nature and previous experiences of the addressed group, and (b) make use of narratives that involve exemplars representing the same nature and experiences in order to prescribe guidelines that are primarily aimed at securing social stability. The educational value of imperfect models of human behavior, then, lies in their immediate recognizability (as they are based in common experiences), and in their normative power (as they are closely attuned to the affective nature of a particular group or people).

Notes

1. In this article, we will use Zagzebski’s exemplarist moral theory as representative of a standard understanding of contemporary exemplarism.

2. References to the Ethics (Spinoza 1985b) are abbreviated according to the following standard method: Ethics (E), axiom (a), corollary (c), definition (d) before proposition, demonstration (d) after proposition, lemma (L), proposition (p), postulate (post), scho-lium (s), explanation (exp). Example: E2p7s = Ethics, part 2, proposition 7, schoscho-lium. References to the non-geometrically ordered passages from the Ethics, as well as refer-ences to the Political Treatise (TP) (Spinoza2016a) and the Theological Political Treatise (TTP) (Spinoza2016b) are sometimes supplemented by references to Gebhardt’s edition Spinoza Opera according to the following form: G II/208/25-30 = Gebhardt, Vol. 2, page 208, lines 25–30.

3. See LeBuffe’s taxonomy of Spinoza’s normative ethics in Chapter 10 of his From Bondage to Freedom (2010) for a helpful and systematic overview of the relevant passages.

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Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Funding

This research was supported by The Swedish Foundation for Humanities and Social Sciences (Riksbankens Jubileumsfond) [Grant: Dnr F19-1018:1].

ORCID

Johan Dahlbeck http://orcid.org/0000-0003-1669-7132

Moa De Lucia Dahlbeck http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8641-8269

References

Carr, D.2003. Making Sense of Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy and Theory of Education and Teaching. London: Routledge.

Hand, M.2018. A Theory of Moral Education. London: Routledge.

Hübner, K.2014.“Spinoza on Being Human and Human Perfection.” In Essays on Spinoza’s Ethical Theory, edited by M. J. Kisner and A. Youpa, 124–142. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

James, S.2014.“Spinoza, the Body, and the Good Life.” In Essays on Spinoza’s Ethical Theory, edited by M. J. Kisner and A. Youpa, 143–159. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

LeBuffe, M.2010. From Bondage to Freedom: Spinoza on Human Excellence. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Moreau, P.-F.2009.“El Concepto De Ingenium En La Obra De Spinoza.” INGENIUM. Revista De Historia Del Pensamiento Moderno, No 1: 3–12.

Spinoza, B.1985a.“Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect (TIE)“. In The Collected Works of Spinoza vol.I, translated and edited by E. Curley, 3–45. Princeton US: Princeton University Press.

Spinoza, B.1985b.“Ethics: Demonstrated in Geometric Order and Divided into Five Parts (Ethics).” In The Collected Works of Spinoza vol.I, translated and edited by E. Curley, 408–617. Princeton US: Princeton University Press.

Spinoza, B.2016a.“Political Treatise (TP).” In The Collected Works of Spinoza vol.II, translated and edited by E. Curley, 503–604. Princeton US: Princeton University Press.

Spinoza, B.2016b.“Theological Political Treatise (TTP).” In The Collected Works of Spinoza vol.II, translated and edited by E. Curley, 65–354. Princeton US: Princeton University Press. Steinberg, J.2018. Spinoza’s Political Psychology: The Taming of Fortune and Fear. Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press.

Zagzebski, L. 2013. “Moral Exemplars in Theory and Practice.” Theory and Research in Education 11 (2): 193–206. doi:10.1177/1477878513485177.

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