NECESSITÀ E TEMPO NELLA METAFISICA DI SPINOZA
Alberto Giovanni Biuso
The question of time is much more subtle in Spinoza than it appears to a first analysis of a metaphysical system aimed at the eternity and perfection of matter, its indivisibility, the location of each limited, finite, transient entity, within the compactness of the All. If the spinozian substance is – as a causa sui – on the outside of time, nevertheless its structure is also a continuous process in the infinite forms of the attributes and in the infinite number of modes. This process is already completely contained in the tangle of Being that is always understood and perfect in the timeless sphere of substance, and yet its true life unfolds over time as the modes of attributes not only produce incessantly but, even more, in the ways they are. Spinoza’s thought is a philosophy of fullness from which time – the universal and profound substance of all things – is not excluded. In order to understand the presence and centrality of becoming in spinozian metaphysics it is crucial the distinction – very clear both in Korte Verhandeling and in Ethica – between time, duration and eternity.