The modern era in Jewish thought was established by the alarmingly radical figure of seventeenth century philosopher, Baruch Spinoza (1632-1677), who influenced Enlightenment thought throughout Europe as part of an international ideological movement. While only the most radical thinkers accepted his ideas, even the more conservative, who rejected Spinoza's atheism and materialism, could not avoid having to answer him. Spinoza highlighted the tensions of enlightenment. In 1673, the Elector of Palatine, Karl Ludwig, offered Spinoza the professorship of philosophy at Heidelberg University in Germany, with the condition that he remain reasonably orthodox. Spinoza declined to accept it because he preferred to assert his independence of thought. The majority of his works were not written under his own name because of the strong charge made concerning his supposed atheism. He was expelled from the Sephardi community of Amsterdam in 1656 for his unorthodox views, yet, despite this, he had an influence on subsequent, more orthodox Jewish philosophers such as Moses Mendelssohn who was born 52 years after Spinoza's death.
Some believe it is as though Spinoza had been granted a glimpse of the future, which he conveyed to the world. He is often thought to have been a man who was not of his own era. Samuel Shirley was inspired to translate Spinoza's works by the belief that Spinoza had, "a vision of truth beyond what is normally granted to human beings."" There have been numerous bursts of curiosity in Spinoza over the centuries, Germany experienced an explosion of interest in Spinoza during the 1780s, immediately prior to the French Revolution. He quickly went from being condemned as the worst of atheists and blasphemers to being universally admired by all the leading intellectuals of the day, who found in Spinoza's works a revolutionary spirit that matched their own rising sense of rebellion against the orthodoxies of church and state.