God and Pantheism

Spinoza's description of God in his Ethics is one that does not resemble the Abrahamic God many of us, including Spinoza, are familiar with. Through his philosophy, Spinoza developed and understanding of God that enriched his moral guidelines. This understanding is sometimes argued to be pantheistic in nature, though it is of a less crude format than our typical stereotype.

In his philosophy, Spinoza speaks of the One Substance, and stresses the idea that all known materials are based in this. This substance is God. Therefore, everything that exists is related to God. It is important to understand, however, that He did not CREATE nature, He IS nature. our understandings, and forms of thought are thus attributes of God.

From this, the question comes "Is Spinoza Pantheistic?" Our general stereotype of pantheism is the belief that God is the World. (This is a fairly crude understanding, and does not give proper respect to this form of belief. However, for the sake of argument we will discuss it in this sense.) Spinoza does not align himself with this belief. He believes that all of God's attributes are expressed IN the world, not that God is NOTHING MORE than the world. Thus, Spinoza does not fit into our over generalized understanding of pantheism.

However, a debate exists over whether or not Spinoza represents a subtle form of pantheism. His understanding of God being expressed throughout the world does lead to a positive affirmation. However, his belief that God is more than the world leads to a negative dissent. Though I still believe Spinoza represents a subtle form of pantheism, I would be interested to know what you believe.