Baruch Spinoza? Nay, Baruch Hashem.
Baruch Spinoza
History’s most famous God-intoxicated Jew
Is famous for his pantheism–
The idea that God is everything
Spinoza was also famously a heretic
Which is to say he was wrong
But our inheritance from Spinoza–
The Enlightenment–
Is also wrong
Because we are wrong
In thinking Spinoza was right
And I–
The internet’s least famous caffeine—intoxicated Jew—
Am here to set the record straight:
Post-Enlightenment secular materialists
Believe that Spinoza was right because
He went just far enough
For Spinoza’s pantheism is
In the light of day
Just a gussied-up materialism
Since it allows us to grasp everything–
This is our disappointing inheritance
As day gives way to our endless night
But the Jews who rejected Spinoza’s heresy
Were the ones in the right–
Spinoza was wrong
And he didn’t even get close to the truth
Because none of us can
Since the truth is
None of us, including Spinoza, can ever go far enough
All we can say is that God is everything and more
And if you want to call that panentheism
I’d say there’s still more to it
For God is always more
Yet God is (never more than) one
