The writ of 27 July 1656 is one of the harshest the Amsterdam community ever issued: it curses Spinoza by day and by night, forbids anyone to speak or write to him, to do him any favour, to be under the same roof, or to read anything he composed. He was twenty-three, and the specific charges are not recorded — the text refers only to abominable heresies and monstrous deeds. He never sought readmission, adopted the Latin name Benedictus, and moved out of the Jewish quarter. Requests to lift the ban have been made in the modern period and have not succeeded, which the community's defenders point out is consistent: Spinoza never asked for it to be lifted either.