Temporality and History in Spinoza

Spinoza’s philosophy is often characterized as a philosophysub specie aeternitatiswhere time and temporality are notions without an expressive role. Consequently, understanding human history by means of theEthics —using geometric demonstrations supported by metaphysical terms — and without the aid of the notion of time, can be considered as leading to an unsolvable problem. In this chapter, I draw upon Spinoza’s refusal of finalism to propose a renewed investigation about Spinozism and the issue of temporality, asking the question: could the absence of time in Spinoza’s work and his writings on efficient and immanent causality allow us to rethink a theory of history?