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Oxford Studies in Early Modern Philosophy is an annual series, presenting a selection of the best current work in the history of early modern philosophy. It focuses on the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries — the extraordinary period of intellectual flourishing that begins, very roughly, with Descartes and his contemporaries and ends with Kant. It also publishes papers on thinkers or movements outside of that framework, provided they are important in illuminating early modern thought. Topics covered include Spinoza's political philosophy, Leibniz, monadic domination, Newton's ontology of omnipresence and infinate space, Hume, and Descarte.

This is a study of the reasons behind Spinoza's excommunication from the Portuguese–Jewish community of Amsterdam in 1656. The central question in the book is how and why did the issue of the immortality of the soul play a role in the decision to excommunicate Spinoza. The work begins with a discussion of the nature of cherem or banning within Judaism, and in the Amsterdam community, in particular, as well as of a number of possible explanations for Spinoza's ban. It then turns to the variety of traditions in Jewish religious and philosophical thought on the post‐mortem fate of the soul and the after life. This is followed by an examination of Spinoza's own views on the eternity of the mind in the Ethics and the role that the denial of personal immortality plays in his overall philosophical and political project. Part of the book's argument is that Spinoza's views were not only an outgrowth of his own metaphysical principles, but also a culmination of an intellectualist trend in medieval Jewish rationalism (especially Maimonides and Gersonides).

This volume has three aims. First, historians of philosophy have typically focused on the discussions of the moral relevance of emotions, and with the exception of scholars of ancient philosophy, neglected the place of emotions in cognitive life. This collection of articles refocuses the discussion of emotion in the medieval and early modern periods to their role in cognition. Second, though many have aimed to clarify relationship between the later thinkers and their predecessors with regard to issues in metaphysics and epistemology, there has been very little effort at tracing similar lines of thought about emotion. As a whole, the contributions to this volume serve to begin a discussion about the continuities between medieval and early modern thinking about the emotions. In this regard, there is also a discussion of the emotions of cognitive life of the Renaissance. Though we get only a snapshot of a period of philosophical work often passed over, even this snapshot invites questions about how to weave an intellectual history about accounts of our emotions in our cognitive lives. Finally, attention to the concerns that engage philosophers of the medieval, renaissance and early modern periods can inform the contemporary debate regarding the relationship between emotions, cognition, and reason. The thirteen contributions explore this from the point of view of four key themes: the situation of emotions within the human mind; the intentionality of emotions and their role in cognition; emotions and action; the role of emotion in self-understanding and the social situation of individuals.

Almost all philosophers agree that one cannot be properly trained in current philosophy without knowing something of the historical development of the discipline. Beyond acknowledging this requirement, however, there is very little agreement as to what kind of methodology to follow when approaching past philosophical texts and what relationship, exactly, the study of the history of philosophy should have to contemporary philosophy, to the history and philosophy of science, or to intellectual history. This volume takes a measure of the current range of views on this complicated issue. The contributors have been chosen among specialists working in the area of early modern philosophy. It is with the early modern philosophers that basic questions of how to approach them – as colleagues with whom you discuss philosophy in the hallway, or as historical aliens speaking a different philosophical tongue – come up with the greatest urgency. The volume will however be of interest to a wide variety of specialists, teachers, and reflective students of other periods as well. The collection reflects the rapid internationalization of research that has opened up the field to a wide range of approaches within the last decades. The contributors include both specialists in the history of philosophy, as well as philosophers who work primarily on current problems in systematic philosophy but who have a pronounced interest in history.

Oxford Studies in Early Modern Philosophy is an annual series, presenting a selection of the best current work in the history of early modern philosophy. It focuses on the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries—the extraordinary period of intellectual flourishing that begins, roughly, with Descartes and his contemporaries and ends with Kant. It also publishes work on thinkers or movements outside of that framework, provided they are important in illuminating early modern thought. The core of the subject matter is philosophy and its history. But the volume’s chapters reflect the fact that philosophy in the early modern period was much broader in its scope than it is currently taken to be and included a great deal of what now belongs to the natural sciences. Furthermore, philosophy in the period was closely connected with other disciplines, such as theology, and with larger questions of social, political, and religious history. Volume 8 includes chapters dedicated to a wide set of topics in the philosophies of Descartes, Hobbes, Spinoza, Locke, Leibniz, Wolff, and Kant.

Oxford Studies in Early Modern Philosophy is an annual series, presenting a selection of the best current work in the history of early modern philosophy. It focuses on the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries—the extraordinary period of intellectual flourishing that begins, roughly, with Descartes and his contemporaries and ends with Kant. It also publishes work on thinkers or movements outside of that framework, provided they are important in illuminating early modern thought. The core of the subject matter is philosophy and its history. But the volume’s chapters reflect the fact that philosophy in the early modern period was much broader in its scope than it is currently taken to be and included a great deal of what now belongs to the natural sciences. Furthermore, philosophy in the period was closely connected with other disciplines, such as theology, law, and medicine, and with larger questions of social, political, and religious history. Volume 9 includes chapters dedicated to a wide set of topics in the philosophies of Descartes, Malebranche, Locke, Leibniz, Hume, and Kant.

Oxford Studies in Early Modern Philosophy is an annual series, presenting a selection of the best current work in the history of early modern philosophy. It focuses on the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries—the extraordinary period of intellectual flourishing that begins, very roughly, with Descartes and his contemporaries and ends with Kant. It also publishes work on thinkers or movements outside of that framework, provided they are important in illuminating early modern thought. The core of the subject matter is philosophy and its history. But the volume’s chapters reflect the fact that philosophy in the early modern period was much broader in its scope than it is currently taken to be and included a great deal of what now belongs to the natural sciences. Furthermore, philosophy in the period was closely connected with other disciplines, such as theology, and with larger questions of social, political, and religious history. Volume VII includes chapters dedicated to a wide set of topics in the philosophies of Hobbes, Descartes, Spinoza, Malebranche, Locke, Wolff, and Kant.

Descartes’s Fictions traces common movements in early modern philosophy and literary method. This volume reassesses the significance of Descartes’s writing by bringing his philosophical output into contact with the literary treatises, exempla, and debates of his age. Arguing that humanist theorizing about the art of poetry represents a vital intellectual context for Descartes’s work, the volume offers readings of the controversies to which this poetic theory gives rise, with particular reference to the genre of tragicomedy, the question of verisimilitude, and the figures of Guez de Balzac and Pierre Corneille. Drawing on what Descartes says about, and to, his many contemporaries and correspondents embedded in the early modern republic of letters, this volume shows that poetics provides a repository of themes and images to which he returns repeatedly: fortune, method, error, providence, passion, and imagination, amongst others. Like the poets and theorists of the early modern period, Descartes is also drawn to the forms of attention that people may bring to his work. This interest finds expression in the mature Cartesian metaphysics of the Meditations, as well as, later, in the moral philosophy of his correspondence with Elisabeth of Bohemia or the Passions of the Soul. Some of the tropes of modern secondary criticism—a comparison of Descartes and Corneille, or the portrayal of Descartes as a ‘tragic’ figure—are also re-evaluated. This volume thus bridges the gap between Cartesian criticism and late-humanist literary culture in France.