SPINOZA BARUCH Error by BARUCH SPINOZA or BENEDICTUS SPINOZA or ESPINOSA . He has never had one in his name because Spinoza was a Dutch-born Sephardic Jew, but of Spanish-Portuguese origin (which is why his surname is sometimes spelled with z and others with s) and that of denunciation nobility and owner or successor of landowners, which was not allowed to Jews in Europe. However, upon his death, his adherents published a posthumous work as Benedictus De Spinoza, perhaps to extol his much-vilified name, since in life he went through great ups and downs. He was an acerbic critic of religious orthodoxy and one of the 3 great rationalist philosophers of the S. XVII, together with the French Descartes and the German Liebnitz, becoming advisor to the kings of Spain. His literature, which remained underground for a long time, was claimed by the great German philosophers of the S. XIX, and today he considers himself the father of modern philosophy.