In 1665, the village of Voorburg, just outside The Hague, was in the grip of a rancorous civil dispute over who would be the next pastor of the local church. In a petition composed by one party to the dispute written for the municipal government of Delft, within whose bailiwick Voorburg lay, mention is made of a Daniel Tydeman, in whose house lodged “a certain A[msterdammer?] Spinosa, born of Jewish parents, who is now (so it is said) an atheist, that is, a man who mocks all religions and is thus a pernicious element in this republic.” The petitioners added that a number of learned individuals and preachers could attest to these facts.

Tydeman was a master painter as well as a once and future soldier. He lived with his wife, Margarita Karels, in a house on the Kerkstraat (Church Street), probably near the center of town. They were members of the Reformed Church, but Tydeman seems to have had Collegiant proclivities. These appear, in fact, to have been responsible for his being on the losing side of the 1665 dispute. When Spinoza moved from Rijnsburg to Voorburg in the spring of 1663, it may have been at the recommendation of his own Collegiant friends that he chose to rent a room in Tydeman's house.