Contents

Acknowledgments

List of Abbreviations

Introduction

Chapter 1

The Ontology of Gate of Heaven and Spinoza’s Substance

1.1 An Interpretation of Spinoza’s Substance

1.2 Spinoza’s Nominalism

Chapter 2

Early Considerations of Spinoza’s Kabbalism

2.1 Arguments, in the Elucidarius, on the Consensus between Spinoza and the Kabbalah

2.2 God’s Two Intellects

Chapter 3

Other Considerations on the Consensus between Spinoza and the Kabbalah

3.1 The Doctrine of the Anima Mundi

3.2 The Nature of the God of Kabbalah and the Essence of Spinoza’s Substance

3.3 Spinoza and the Kabbalah, According to Basnage

Chapter 4

The Procession of the Many

4.1 Divine Freedom, in Gate of Heaven

4.2 Origins of the Ṣimṣum

4.3 Divine Necessities

Chapter 5

Inconsistencies of Creation in Time

5.1 A Doctrine of Emanation

5.2 Creation and Emanation in Herrera

5.3 The Fall

5.4 Spinoza: The Creation

Chapter 6

Modes of the Divinity

6. 1 The Doctrine of the Infinite Modes

6.2 The Parṣufim as Instruments of Restoration

Chapter 7

The Concept of Causa Sui in Spinoza and Its Prefiguration in Herrera

7.1 The Ismāʽīlī’s Conception of the Notion of Causa Sui

7.2 Maimonides’ Unknowable God

7.3 Plotinus and His Conception of the One as Causing Itself

Chapter 8

The Forging of the Attributes and the Secret of Immanent Causation

8.1 The Perception of the Attributes

8.2 The Unknowability of the Immanent Cause

Chapter 9

Amor Dei Intellectualis

9.1 Spinoza’s Panentheism

9.2 The Glory of God

9.3 Man’s Love Toward God

Chapter 10

Spinoza’s Acosmism

10. 1 The Nature of Divine Love

10. 2 The Modes as Appearances

Concluding Remarks

Bibliography

Index of Names

Index of Subject Matters