Wikipedia's article on Spinoza quotes Clare Clarisle's book Spinoza's Religion (Princeton University Press, 2021) as saying "When seventeenth-century readers ac

Wikipedia's article on Spinoza quotes Clare Clarisle's book Spinoza's Religion (Princeton University Press, 2021) as saying "When seventeenth-century readers accused Spinoza of atheism, they usually meant that he challenged doctrinal orthodoxy, particularly on moral issues, and not that he denied God’s existence." Which is the thing, language changes. The word "atheist" doesn't mean the same thing it meant 350 years ago. (Even today, it doesn't have a single meaning, but that's a whole other topic.)