S. Paul Kashap (1927 - 2015) Redigeerde een boek en schreef zelf een monografie en enige artikelen over Spinoza. “A recognized scholar of Spinoza’s philosophy”?

Aanleiding voor dit blog is het gebruik dat Kees Schuyt in de hoofdstukken 8 en 9 in zijn boek Spinoza en de vreugde van het inzicht maakt van S. Paul Kashap, Spinoza and Moral Freedom.

Op 10-03-2015 had ik het blog: “S. Paul Kashap redigeerde als eerste een verzamelbundel met artikelen over Spinoza”, waarin ik dit boek ook vermeldde. Maar een apart blog over Paul Kashap had ik nog niet. Het gebruik dat Kees Schuyt maakt van dit boek van Kashap, maakte mij opnieuw nieuwsgierig naar deze Paul Kashap en wordt nu aanleiding voor een apart blog over wat ik te weten kwam. In dit blog geef ik de informatie over zijn bio en over wat hij over Spinoza bracht. In een volgend blog zal ik mijn beoordeling van en commentaar op enige aspecten van zijn Spinoza-interpretatie geven.

Surajnayan Paul Gurdayal Kashap, born July 1, 1927 - died on Dec. 3, 2015

Hij werd geboren in Jalalpur, toen behorend tot India, nu tot Pakistan, groeide op in Pachmarhi in centraal India waar z’n vader legerarts was. Hij studeerde aan de Universiteit van Lahore tot 1947, en behaalde vervolgens zijn BA en MA aan de Universiteit van Bombay (Wilson College). Vervolgens behaalde hij een tweede MA aan de Universiteit van Edinburgh en daarna een bachelor in literatuur aan de universiteit van (St. John's College). Ook besteedde hij diverse zomers als fellow van het Indian Institute of Advanced Studies in Simla, India.

Hij trouwde op i november 1957 met Nancy Sherry Kashap, met wie hij drie kinderen kreeg: Ashwin Philip, Christopher Sanjiv, Andrew Deven.

Hij werd Assistant professor filosofie aan het Wheaton College, Norton, Massachusetts, 1961-1963, aan de Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island 1963-1969. En werd in 1969 professor philosophy aan de University California, Santa Cruz, wat hij tot zijn emeritaat bleef. Aan de UCSC gaf hij ook populaire seminars over het leven en denken van Mahatma Gandhi en gaf hij cursussen in Sanskrit-teksten, zoals de Bhagavad Gita.

In het obituary waaraan ik de meeste van deze gegevens ontleen, is verder te lezen:

“He was a recognized scholar of Spinoza's philosophy (principally his Ethics), and published two main works on this subject, Studies in Spinoza, and Spinoza & Moral Freedom,” waarmee we eigenlijk meteen de kern van dit blog hebben. [cf hier en hier, vandaar ook zijn foto; voorts ook gegevens van hier]

Zijn werk over Spinoza

• Het eerste dat ik van hem over Spinoza kan vinden is een review van zijn hand van Edwin M. Curley, Spinoza's Metaphysics: An Essay in Interpretation, in: Man and World 4 (1971), 100-113 [cf.]

• Vervolgens redigeerde hij de bundel Studies in Spinoza. Critical and Interpretive Essays.  [Berkeley [e.a.]: University of California Press, 1972; cf. dit blog waar en hoe het boek te raadplegen is]. Daaraan droeg hij, naast de Inleiding, nog het hoofdstuk bij:

• "Thought and action in Spinoza," pp. 332-350.

Uit het Review door H. S. Harris van Studies in Spinoza by S. Paul Kashap [in: Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Vol. 35, No. 2 (Dec., 1974), pp. 280-281] dit citaat:

This volume contains eighteen essays on the philosophy of Spinoza, of which only the last, contributed by Kashap himself, has never appeared before. The oldest is excerpted from S. Alexander's book on Spinoza and Time (1921). Next in seniority is an essay by A. Wolf on "Spinoza's Conception of the Attributes" which appeared in 1927. Of the rest, one is a chapter from G. H. R. Parkinson's book Spinoza's Theory of Knowledge (1954). The other fourteen appeared in various journals between 1937 and 1969. Kashap has supplied a brief descriptive introduction, and a selective bibliography of books and articles on Spinoza in English. The editor claims that "The final selection of the essays was made not so much from the point of view of their textual criticism but on the basis of their ability to advance one's philosophical appreciation of Spinoza's thought" (xiv).
Volgt enig commentaar op een verder “valuable book.”

• Paul Kashap, “Some recent works on Spinoza’s thought,” In: Journal of the History of Ideas 38, 3 (1977), 541-548, waarin hij vier werken besprak: Henry E. Allison, Benedict de Spinoza. An Introduction (1975); J.G. van der Bend (Ed.), Spinoza on knowing, being and freedom (1974); E. E. Harris, Salvation from despair: a reappraisal of Spinoza's philosophy (1973); Thomas Carson Mark, Spinoza's theory of thruth (1972).

• “Spinoza's Use of 'Idea'” [in: Southwestern Journal of Philosophy Vol. 8, No. 3, SPINOZA ISSUE (FALL, 1977) 57-70 – gebundeld in:

Robert W. Shahan & J. J. Biro (Eds.), New Perspectives. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1978, . Pp. 240, 57-70. 

This collection of essays, published to mark the tercentenary of Spinoza's death, includes papers by established Spinoza scholars as well as by some younger philosophers. There are leven papers, ranging over a wide variety of topics. Three of the authors deal with the cluster of issues involving ideas, truth and knowledge; two take up Spinoza's relation to Malebranche and LaPeyrère, respectively; two focus primarily on Spinoza's method; and the topics of the remain ing four are Spinoza's physics, his views on time and immortality, on part and whole, and his relation to some contemporary work in the philosophy of religion. The contributors are: Thomas Carson Mark, G. H. R. Parkinson, S. Paul Kashap, David R. Lachterman, Daisie Radner, C. L. Hardin, William Sacksteder, E. M. Curley, Richard H. Popkin, Efraim Shmueli and Douglas Lewis.
R.W.S. and J.I.B. In: The Monist, Vol. 63, No. 2, Crime and Punishment: Philosophical Issues (APRIL,1980), pp. 262-265

Daarin was, zoals gezegd, opgenomen het artikel van

• S. PAUL KASHAP, Spinoza's Use of "Idea" uit: The Southwestern Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 8, No. 3, SPINOZA ISSUE (FALL, 1977), pp. 57-70
Cf. blog van 14 mrt. 2017: Een Spinoza-special van 40 jaar geleden.

David Savan is in zijn review van Spinoza: New Perspectives by Robert W. Shahan and John I. Biro in: The Southwestern Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 10, No. 2 (SUMMER, 1979), pp. 217-221, behoorlijk kritisch over dit artikel van Kashap. Hij schrijft:

I do not understand why Paul Kashap, for example, begins with a fresh slate. His idealist interpretation of Spinoza's theory of ideas is opposed by Hallett and Gueroult, as well as by the authors of several papers in this volume. Kashap is well aware of this. He has published other good papers on Spinoza, and is the editor of an excellent and useful collection of critical essays, to which he appended a select bibliography. It would have been a courtesy to his predecessors and a help to readers if he had footnoted, at least, his differences with most of the Spinoza scholars.
Kashap's central thesis is that Spinoza uses the word "idea" in several different senses in the Ethics. In particular, ideas in the (human) mind are not the same as ideas as objects of knowledge ("thought-objects"). Paul's idea of Peter, for example, is an idea of a thought-object and not directly of a mode of extension. Yet Spinoza writes that "the human mind is the idea itself or the knowledge of the human body" (E II, P19, Dm; cf. Pi 3, P16, P22, and P25). Second, Kashap's view entails that the human mind cannot know the attribute of extension except through its idea (thought-object). Yet Spinoza writes that the actual intellect, whether finite or infinite, must comprehend the attributes of God (E I, P30). Third, ideas in the human mind cannot know God but only the idea (thought-object) of God. Yet Spinoza writes that the human mind knows Goďs essence (E II, P47) and, since God is substance, he must be conceived through himself (E I, D3).

En dan tenslotte zijn eigenlijke hoofdwerk, deze monografie over Spinoza

• S. Paul Kashap, Spinoza and Moral Freedom [State University of New York Press ofwel Suny Press,, 1987, xvi, 198 pp. - books.google]

Inhoudsopgave
Substance 1
Ideas 47
Action 93
Cause 127
Freedom 153
Selected Bibliography 185
Index 193

Over Spinoza and Moral Freedom

De blurb: Spinoza and Moral Freedom guides the reader through Spinoza's principal ideas and powerful lines of reasoning, clearing up obscurities along the way, while acknowledging the genuine difficulties and gaps. At the same time, it neither intrudes the author's own beliefs and personality upon the reader nor gives instructions on what the reader's own final judgment should be. What Kashap offers is pure Spinoza, rather than a Spinoza reformed in light of another person's wishes or preoccupations. In this respect, Kashap's approach is refreshingly new and unique. The style is graceful and lucid, and in no way obscured by philosophical jargon.” [cf.]

Review door Choice Review

One of the leading contemporary Spinoza scholars has written a work distinctive for its usefulness in interpreting Spinoza and in the contemporary significance of its concern: to determine whether the concept of freedom-in the context of a fully deterministic philosophy-meshes with our ordinary understanding of freedom as moral freedom. Accomplishing the task requires Kashap (University of California, Santa Cruz) to explicate the primary elements of Spinoza's metaphysics and epistemology. He does this with ingenuity and lucidity. This thorough and clear title will help undergraduates who for the first time grapple with Spinoza; it will also benefit graduate students and faculty that seek to deepen their understanding of Spinoza's work. It has a useful selected bibliography and index. The only unfortunate feature of the book is the many annoying typographical errors.-W.A. Wilkinson, Michigan State University [cf.]

J. A. Cover in zijn review van Spinoza and Moral Freedom by S. Paul Kashap [in: The Philosophical Review, Vol. 100, No. 1 (Jan., 1991), pp. 160-164 ] waardeert het feit dat Kashap een gat wil opvullen wat betreft de behandeling van Spinoza’s filosofie m.b.t. moraliteit, maar zegt al snel: “I found Spinoza and Moral Freedom frustratingly difficult to follow, due mostly to a lack of clarity on Kashap's part.” Hij waardeert dat Kashap de basisconcepten als ‘idee’, ‘actie’ en ‘oorzaak’ behandelt, “for while freedom is given its treatment in terms of actions as they relate to true ideas, "yet for Spinoza, there is a sense in which a human being's existence depends upon factors over which he or she has no control" (pp. ix-x). De reviewer vraagt zich af wat dat betekent en waarom het niet wordt toegelicht. Behalve dit soort onduidelijkheden, waarvan hij nog voorbeelden geeft, mist hij verder “a genuine effort to expound critically and argue for and with Spinoza's own claims.” Dan wordt gaandeweg duidelijk dat de reviewer grote moeite heeft met Spinoza zelf, b.v. diens claim dat er slechts één substantie bestaat die alle attributen heeft. Volgt een uiteenzetting over de modaliteiten contingentie vs. noodzakelijkheid en de stelling dat Spinoza niet in staat kan worden geacht zijn determinisme in overeenstemming te brengen met vrijheid in morele zin – want men had niet anders kunnen handelen. Kashap behandelt dat niet adequaat, zegt simpelweg:

If, however, despite his belief that every event and action must have an explanation in terms of causes or reasons, Spinoza does allow that human beings have the ability or 'power' to make conscious efforts to bring about certain effects related to adequate and true ideas in their minds . . ., then the crucial argument against him, namely that his determinism implies a denial of moral freedom, becomes quite ineffective (p. 148).

Kashap behandelt niets over compatibalisme. Dat hij ons “a special sort of agent-causation” toeschrijft is zeer opvallend en nogal onspinozistisch.

Tot slot Steven Frankel over Kashaps Spinoza and Moral Freedom
“Spinoza's argument is that when a man acts according to his wishes and desires, and hence does what he wants to do without any external compulsion, he acts necessarily in the sense that his conscious desires are his reasons or sufficient conditions for doing what he does.” (Spinoza and Moral Freedomp. 169)

Kashap,[..] argues that certain inadequate ideas are "natural": "This awareness [of freedom] is by no means an illusion, but an authentic idea of perception in the common order of nature" (Spinoza and Moral Freedom, 162). In other words, he argues that our belief in free will does reflect a natural prejudice, or a common way of imagining reality. This opens up a space for subjectivity and political life, which though not true, has an overwhelming reality for most people. Political freedom is an interpretation of the world whereby we use man's consciousness of his freedom of choice to hold him responsible for his actions. In this sense, freedom is a "natural" interpretation of the world by the imagination since it expresses our experience, however inadequate, of nature.” Aldus Steven Frankel in zijn "Determined to Be Free: The Meaning of Freedom in Spinoza's Theologico-Political Treatise." [In: The Review of Politics, Vol. 73, No. 1 (WINTER 2011), pp. 55-76 - cf. academia.edu].

Ja, zo is wel te begrijpen dat Kees Schuyt zo graag citeert uit dit boek van Kashap. Je kan zo als het ware menen onder het determinisme uit te komen.