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Deleuze: Teacher of Spinoza’s Philosophy
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Deleuze: Teacher of Spinoza’s Philosophy

A special issue of Philosophies (ISSN 2409-9287).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (1 January 2026) | Viewed by 8227

Special Issue Editor

Dr. Florian Vermeiren

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Institute of Philosophy, KU Leuven, 3000 Leuven, Belgium
Interests: metaphysics of Spinoza, Leibniz, Bergson, Whitehead and Deleuze

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Deleuze’s engagement with the history of philosophy forms a crucial dimension of his own philosophical project. Among the philosophers he studied, Spinoza stands out as uniquely influential; Deleuze dedicated two full-length books and several articles to Spinoza, and he famously celebrates him as “the prince of philosophy”. Beyond Deleuze’s historiographical works, Spinoza’s ideas permeate much of his own theory, underscoring their enduring resonance.

The recent publication of Deleuze’s lectures on Spinoza (Les Éditions de Minuit, 2024) offers new insights into this relationship. Delivered more than a decade after the initial publication of his Spinoza books, these lectures expand on and occasionally diverge from his earlier interpretations. These developments are also reflected in the additional content included in the 1980 edition of Spinoza, Practical Philosophy. Key themes from Deleuze’s early Spinoza writings—such as univocity, intensive magnitude, and the problem of evil—reappear in the lectures. At the same time, new topics emerge, including Spinoza's ‘geometrism’, his relationship to Kant, the political dimensions of his philosophy, and the interpretation his metaphysics in terms of differential calculus. These explorations reveal fresh connections between Spinoza’s philosophy and key Deleuzean concepts. The lectures also engage with Martial Gueroult’s important study of Spinoza which is contemporaneous with (the first editions of) Deleuze’s Spinoza books. This offers an insight into Deleuze’s position within the broader field of Spinoza scholarship.

The publication of these lectures serves as a timely opportunity to reflect on Deleuze’s role as a teacher of Spinoza. While the theme of this special issue centers on the newly released lectures, it also includes Deleuze’s broader influence within past and present Spinoza scholarship. Finally, the issue aims to examine how Deleuze’s work contributed to the resurgence of interest in Spinoza’s philosophy over the past decades.

Possible topics include (but are not limited to) the following:

  • Evolutions in Deleuze’s interpretation of Spinoza;
  • New topics in the lectures not found in the earlier works on Spinoza: Political meaning of Spinozism, Spinoza’s relation to Kant, differential calculus, etc.;
  • Influence of other key figures like Leibniz, Bergson, and Nietzsche in Deleuze’s reading of Spinoza;
  • The connection found in these lectures between Spinoza and topics from Deleuze’s other works;
  • The tension between Deleuze’s Spinozism and other aspects of Deleuze’s theory;
  • Deleuze’s criticism of Spinoza;
  • The role of Deleuze in the 21st-century Spinoza revival;
  • The place of Deleuze within past and/or present Spinoza scholarship.

Dr. Florian Vermeiren
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

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Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Philosophies is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • Deleuze
  • Spinoza
  • history of Spinozism
  • univocity
  • ethics
  • intensive magnitude

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Published Papers (8 papers)

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10 pages, 243 KB  
Article
Spinoza’s Climatology of Affects and the Diagram of Painting
by Sonja Lavaert
Philosophies 2026, 11(3), 78; https://doi.org/10.3390/philosophies11030078 - 13 May 2026
Viewed by 195
Abstract
In his lectures from November 1980 to March 1981, Deleuze describes the immanent and compositional nature of Spinoza’s philosophy expressed in the content, the method, and the form of his writings. Spinoza himself uses in the Ethics and the TP the images of [...] Read more.
In his lectures from November 1980 to March 1981, Deleuze describes the immanent and compositional nature of Spinoza’s philosophy expressed in the content, the method, and the form of his writings. Spinoza himself uses in the Ethics and the TP the images of the climatologist studying the weather and the geometric drawing of lines and surfaces for his technical, artisanal, and neutral approach to the affects and political life. His ontology is characterized by the absence of hierarchical order and by nature as the principle and source of diversity. This approach is reminiscent of art, which also orders the chaos of human existence and makes it productive in a free and immeasurable way. Deleuze conceives of Spinoza’s ontology as a practical philosophy, leading him to the examples and the analysis of paintings (and, vice versa, from the art of painting to Spinoza’s philosophy), to which he dedicates his subsequent lectures from March to June 1981. In this article I reflect on the link between Deleuze’s lectures on Spinoza and on painting, and therefore also between Spinoza’s compositional thought itself and painting. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Deleuze: Teacher of Spinoza’s Philosophy)
17 pages, 299 KB  
Article
Spinoza and Signs: Semiology and Empiricism in Deleuze’s Course on Spinoza
by Thomas Detcheverry
Philosophies 2026, 11(3), 70; https://doi.org/10.3390/philosophies11030070 - 29 Apr 2026
Viewed by 477
Abstract
This article addresses an apparent tension in Deleuze’s philosophy: while his own work consistently valorizes the encounter and the role of signs in the genesis of thought, his interpretation of Spinoza seems to offer a radical critique of signs as sources of imagination, [...] Read more.
This article addresses an apparent tension in Deleuze’s philosophy: while his own work consistently valorizes the encounter and the role of signs in the genesis of thought, his interpretation of Spinoza seems to offer a radical critique of signs as sources of imagination, superstition, and servitude. The article argues that this tension is only apparent provided that Deleuze’s reconstruction of a Spinozist empiricist semiology is carefully examined. By analyzing Spinoza’s definition of the sign, its classification into scalar and vectorial types, and its grounding in an ethology of the body and affects, the article shows that Deleuze sharply distinguishes between signs that constitute vague experience and certain privileged signs—joyful passions and the “good encounter”—that make the formation of reason possible. The critique of the sign thus targets a specific regime of imaginative thought, while the valorization of the encounter concerns the empirical conditions for engendering thinking. This reconstruction ultimately reveals an isomorphism between Spinoza’s rationalism and Deleuze’s project of transcendental empiricism. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Deleuze: Teacher of Spinoza’s Philosophy)
17 pages, 244 KB  
Article
Passed over in Silence: Deleuze, Spinoza, Wittgenstein, and an Ethics of Learning
by Jeffrey A. Bell
Philosophies 2026, 11(2), 59; https://doi.org/10.3390/philosophies11020059 - 9 Apr 2026
Viewed by 706
Abstract
This essay attempts to bring together the philosophies of Spinoza, Wittgenstein, and Deleuze by developing an ethics of learning that is implicit, and at times explicit, in each of their works. How this comes to be manifest in their works is that for [...] Read more.
This essay attempts to bring together the philosophies of Spinoza, Wittgenstein, and Deleuze by developing an ethics of learning that is implicit, and at times explicit, in each of their works. How this comes to be manifest in their works is that for Spinoza, Wittgenstein, and Deleuze, what is most important about this ethics of learning is that it is irreducible to rigid moral laws and to an understanding of reality that is reducible to forms of representational thinking. Most importantly, this essay shows that Spinoza’s understanding of absolutely infinite substance allows Spinoza to develop the ethical project of his Ethics—namely, his ethics of learning—and it is also what helps us to understand what Wittgenstein believed must be passed over in silence. Although the influence of Spinoza on Deleuze is well known, the focus placed here on learning will highlight, and in large part explain, why Spinoza remains a constant thread throughout Deleuze’s work while the importance of other philosophers, such as Nietzsche, slip to the background. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Deleuze: Teacher of Spinoza’s Philosophy)
10 pages, 225 KB  
Article
Deleuze on Spinoza’s Geometrism
by Florian Vermeiren
Philosophies 2026, 11(2), 50; https://doi.org/10.3390/philosophies11020050 - 26 Mar 2026
Viewed by 788
Abstract
In his seminars, Deleuze claims that Spinoza is ‘an absolute geometrist’. This article contextualizes, explains and substantiates this aspect of Deleuze’s interpretation of Spinoza. I position Deleuze’s reading within both the long-running scholarly debate on Spinoza’s relationship to mathematics and within the evolution [...] Read more.
In his seminars, Deleuze claims that Spinoza is ‘an absolute geometrist’. This article contextualizes, explains and substantiates this aspect of Deleuze’s interpretation of Spinoza. I position Deleuze’s reading within both the long-running scholarly debate on Spinoza’s relationship to mathematics and within the evolution of Deleuze’s own relation to Spinoza. Deleuze’s idea that Spinoza is a geometrist is shown to consist of three elements. First, according to Spinoza, geometry is more fundamental than arithmetic. Second, Spinoza frees geometry from the realm of fiction and abstract and develops, as Deleuze says, a ‘mathematics of the real’. Third, Spinoza finds in geometry a language of univocity, by which he can avoid the equivocity and hierarchy of the Aristotelian worldview. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Deleuze: Teacher of Spinoza’s Philosophy)
28 pages, 331 KB  
Article
Spinoza quatenus Deleuze: The Problem of Expression in Language
by Max Lowdin
Philosophies 2026, 11(2), 36; https://doi.org/10.3390/philosophies11020036 - 12 Mar 2026
Viewed by 780
Abstract
Spinoza’s theory of language seems to risk the paradox that no expression of true ideas is possible in linguistic terms. One particular term in the Ethics has stood out as addressing its potential contradictions: quatenus, ‘insofar as’ or ‘to the extent that,’ [...] Read more.
Spinoza’s theory of language seems to risk the paradox that no expression of true ideas is possible in linguistic terms. One particular term in the Ethics has stood out as addressing its potential contradictions: quatenus, ‘insofar as’ or ‘to the extent that,’ occurring hundreds of times in the text but still an element of mystery. This article offers an interpretation of this notion inspired by Deleuze’s reading and especially the theme in his seminars, that Spinoza’s project is a ‘general semiology.’ This suggests another way to affirm the coherence of the Ethics, by making a virtuous circle of its ontological and practical registers. Key to this is the notion of ‘sense’ in its genetic role and the overlooked distinction between infinite attributes and the two powers. The senses of words, propositions or demonstrations in the Ethics are not independent of a ‘noncausal correspondence’ between powers of thinking and acting from which they arise, and which quatenus consistently marks. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Deleuze: Teacher of Spinoza’s Philosophy)
22 pages, 315 KB  
Article
Spinoza’s “Bizarre” Christ: Between Signs and Expressions
by Sybrand Veeger
Philosophies 2026, 11(2), 33; https://doi.org/10.3390/philosophies11020033 - 10 Mar 2026
Viewed by 1105
Abstract
The distinction between signs and expressions is essential to unlock Deleuze’s interpretation of Spinoza. However, during a lecture delivered on 13 January 1981, Deleuze makes a passing remark that complicates this distinction. For Spinoza, Christ’s religion, like political society, is a systems of [...] Read more.
The distinction between signs and expressions is essential to unlock Deleuze’s interpretation of Spinoza. However, during a lecture delivered on 13 January 1981, Deleuze makes a passing remark that complicates this distinction. For Spinoza, Christ’s religion, like political society, is a systems of signs pertaining to the collective imagination that nevertheless is meant to facilitate the transition towards the domain of expressions, that is, to the domain of reason and philosophy. The aim of this paper is to shed light on this ambiguity between signs and expressions in Deleuze’s work on Spinoza. First, I discuss the scattered passages in Spinoza’s oeuvre dealing with the figure of Christ. I then go on to reconstruct Deleuze’s Spinozistic taxonomy of signs. Third, I reconstruct Deleuze’s comparison between Spinoza and Hobbes regarding the emergence of political society from the state of nature. I then propose a close reading of chapter 7 of the Theological-Political Treatise to argue that Christ’s religion, according to Spinoza, should be seen as fulfilling the function of political society in times of crisis. I end with an extensive analysis of Spinoza’s formula “the Spirit of Christ, that is, the idea of God” in light of Deleuze’s reading of the first half of Ethics V. To conclude, I suggest we look at Christ as the conceptual persona of Spinozism. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Deleuze: Teacher of Spinoza’s Philosophy)
24 pages, 337 KB  
Article
Deleuze’s Spinozist Gambler: Lessons on Games of Chance
by Ilgin Aksoy and Corry Shores
Philosophies 2026, 11(1), 22; https://doi.org/10.3390/philosophies11010022 - 20 Feb 2026
Viewed by 864
Abstract
At the end of Deleuze’s lectures on Spinoza of 1980–1981, he asks his students to “imagine a Spinozist gambler.” Yet he ends the course offering few clues about how to picture this figure. Here we provide an interpretation of the Spinozist gambler based [...] Read more.
At the end of Deleuze’s lectures on Spinoza of 1980–1981, he asks his students to “imagine a Spinozist gambler.” Yet he ends the course offering few clues about how to picture this figure. Here we provide an interpretation of the Spinozist gambler based on both its Spinozist conceptual context and its place in Deleuze’s broader philosophy of gambling play. Accordingly, we examine Spinozist gambling in terms of Deleuze’s account of Spinoza’s three types of knowledge, and we compare the Spinozist gambler to Deleuze’s more prominent figure of the Nietzschean dice-thrower. We thereby offer a tripartite characterization of the Spinozist gambler following its place in Spinoza’s epistemology, which we further refine by examining Deleuze’s comments on indeterminism in Spinoza and Nietzsche. We argue that, according to Deleuze, the Spinozist gambler controls chance through rational organization, whereas the Nietzschean gambler affirms and embraces chance itself. And by means of this analysis, we advance our knowledge of both Deleuze’s Spinozism and his philosophy of play. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Deleuze: Teacher of Spinoza’s Philosophy)
10 pages, 206 KB  
Article
The Quest of the Absolute: Spinoza and Sartre
by Roland Breeur
Philosophies 2026, 11(1), 21; https://doi.org/10.3390/philosophies11010021 - 19 Feb 2026
Viewed by 760
Abstract
In 1948 Sartre wrote an essay about the absolute space in Alberto Giacometti’s sculptures. This notion of absolute space is also used by Gilles Deleuze, inspired by the art critic and philosopher Henri Maldiney, in his approach of the notion of essence in [...] Read more.
In 1948 Sartre wrote an essay about the absolute space in Alberto Giacometti’s sculptures. This notion of absolute space is also used by Gilles Deleuze, inspired by the art critic and philosopher Henri Maldiney, in his approach of the notion of essence in Spinoza. In the first part of this article, I explain what this absolute space is about, and how it helps us to better understand Spinoza’s theory of the relation between essences and existence of modi in their relationship with—and dependency of—the substance. In a second part, I explain Sartre’s notion of absolute space in order to illustrate his inversion of the relation of essence and existence, and what this inversion means on a metaphysical level. I conclude with the suggestion that Sartre’s early philosophy and his notion of absolute consciousness and freedom can be interpreted as a kind of Spinozism, stripped of its essences. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Deleuze: Teacher of Spinoza’s Philosophy)
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