Is Spinoza’s View on Value Judgments Convincing?

A Theological Reflection

In the Appendix to Part I of The Ethics, Spinoza critiques the human tendency to assign value to things based on personal benefit rather than objective truth. He argues that people assume everything in nature exists for their sake and, as a result, construct judgments by labeling things as good, bad, beautiful, or ugly, not based on the inherent nature of those things, but on how they affect human experience. In Spinoza's view, this reveals a fundamental flaw in human reasoning: imagination replaces true understanding, leading to confusion and false beliefs about both the world and God.

Spinoza's critique of value judgments remains relevant today, particularly in how people often conflate personal preference with universal truth. He argues that humans instinctively label things as good or bad based on how they affect their own well-being, rather than on any objective reality. This observation highlights a common tendency: what brings pleasure is labeled as good, while what causes discomfort is deemed bad without questioning whether these judgments reflect deeper truths. We see this in moral debates, aesthetic preferences, and even religious views. For instance, in modern discourse, people frequently assert that beauty is "subjective" or that morality is "relative," as if value were nothing more than a projection of human feeling rather than something with independent existence. Spinoza's warning serves as a reminder that unchecked emotional reasoning can distort our perception of reality. His approach challenges us to separate our instincts from genuine understanding, urging us to adopt a more rational view of the world.

However, while Spinoza is correct in critiquing the human tendency to conflate personal feelings with truth, his conclusion is overly skeptical. From an Orthodox Christian perspective, value is not merely a psychological construct; it is rooted in something beyond human perception. Beauty, goodness, and truth do not exist merely because people recognize them; rather, they reflect the nature of God and possess objective reality. The problem is not the existence of value but our failure to perceive it clearly. Spinoza suggests that all meaning-making is imaginative, a human projection onto an indifferent universe, but this view overlooks a key distinction: not all human judgments are arbitrary. Some reflect a deeper order, one that transcends individual or cultural preference. Orthodox theology emphasizes discernment, recognizing that our passions and biases often obscure true perception. Unlike Spinoza's framework, which assumes all value judgments originate from subjective human needs, the Orthodox view holds that certain values exist independently of our feelings, they are discovered, not invented.

Spinoza's skepticism rests on the assumption that all human meaning-making is rooted in imagination, but this overlooks the distinction between subjective feeling and spiritual discernment. Religious traditions—including Orthodoxy—do not simply endorse emotional instinct; they train believers to seek wisdom, question their biases, and align their understanding with something beyond themselves. While superstition and irrational belief certainly exist, dismissing all value judgments as imaginative projections risks ignoring the possibility that values that are grounded in divine reality, are objectively true.

Thus, while Spinoza's critique encourages necessary caution in how we form judgments, it does not fully account for the possibility of transcendent truth. The task is not to abandon value judgments altogether but to refine them, ensuring they are rooted in discernment rather than impulse. Rather than assuming meaning is something we impose upon the world, we might instead ask: What if beauty, goodness, and truth exist outside human perception, calling us to discover rather than invent them?

If questioning perception reshapes how we see value, does it also shift our understanding of reality itself? And if our judgments are shaped by experience rather than truth, what remains when the illusion is stripped away?