בנוגע די חילוק צווישן ״אינטעלעקטשואלע״ און ״פראקטישע״ וויסענשאפט/קלוגשאפט איז דאס וואס דר. סטיִווען נעדלער
שרייבט בנוגע שפינאזע. שפינאזע האט זיך געדינגען מיט׳ן רמב״ם און געהאלטן אז נבואה איז פשוט געקומען פון
נאר א שטארקייט אינעם כח המדמה, ווי איידער אז דער נביא איז אויך געווען שטארק און בשלימות אין זיין כח השכלי ווי דער רמב״ם האט געהאלטן. ער האט אבער דאך געהאלטן אז נבואה האט דאך א מעלה איבער׳ן פילאזאף המושלם בשכלו:
Spinoza also shares Maimonides’ view that the prophet’s imaginative abilities give him something of an advantage over the philosopher. “Since the prophets perceived the revelations of God [Nature] with the aid of the imaginative faculty, they may doubtless have perceived much that is beyond the limits of the intellect.” In the Ethics, Spinoza generally denigrates the epistemological value of the imagination in favor of the intellect. The ideas of the imagination, like those of the senses, are not a source of adequate knowledge, and serve mainly to foster the passions. Nothing Spinoza says in the Treatise challenges this position. But he does grant that the strength of the prophet’s imagination confers on him remarkable, if short-lived, perspicuity. The prophet has a certain quickness of insight, an intuitive ability to envision the ramifications of things that is not available to the person guided solely by the rational intellect and limited to only logical tools. “Many more ideas can be constructed from words and images than merely from the principles and axioms on which our entire natural knowledge is based.” The prophet, because of the strength of his imagination, is a very perceptive person. He may not have the learning and deep metaphysical understanding of the philosophical sage, and he may never be able to achieve the condition of rational virtue and true eudaimonia of the intellectually perfected individual, but sometimes he can see things - practical things - that the latter cannot. Spinoza does not elaborate on this particular gift of the prophet, but what he appears to have in mind is the fact that sometimes people who work with images and concrete ideas have a quickness of mind and depth of insight into ethical situations that the more abstract thinker lacks. Perhaps the prophet, with his practical judgment enhanced by the imagination, is better able than an intellectual to size up a concrete situation, or to see how a general principle is to be applied in a particular case.
