Seems to me that man has often sought after a "god" he could measure, fully comprehend or even depict or construct.
Most of the time the imaging or imagining (as in the case at hand) is an anthropomorphism of God - like Michaelangelo's Creation of Adam, beautiful but an anthropomorphism nonetheless. God is not an old gray-haired man on a cloud.
But it can also be a case of man wanting to be like God or even superior to Him - which is perilous.
For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north: I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High. Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit. - Isaiah 14:12-14
I find it illuminating that Aaron thought he could feast to the Lord before the golden calf and somehow that would be acceptable.
And when Aaron saw [it], he built an altar before it; and Aaron made proclamation, and said, To morrow [is] a feast to the LORD.
And they rose up early on the morrow, and offered burnt offerings, and brought peace offerings; and the people sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play. - Exodus 32:4-6
Indeed, dearest sister in Christ!
But if a man does that, what he winds up with is not God, but merely an idol in glorification to himself. (Which seems to have been Spinoza's main takeaway from his efforts along these lines ... but further explication of this point will have to wait for another time.) Therein lies perdition. In such a decision, man freely chooses his fate, constructs his own eternal Hell while still living....
Somehow I imagine that Isaac Newton, although a heretic by Christian standards, managed to escape this fate of self-constructed eternal Hell. (Heaven already knows I sincerely hope and pray so.) Newton was a monotheist, and espoused the concept of God Pantocrator. That is, of God not only as Creator, but as absolute ruler of the universe in every moment of time in space, Who has to constantly intercede to make necessary "course corrections" occasioned by the very operation of the mechanical laws.... Which Newton felt could only accrete increasing disorder over time, unless God were to step in as needed to restore and correct His created order.
It seems a strange way to think about God. But evidently, this was Newton's basic view.
And yet this "God-addled" person articulated the most sublime account of the mechanics of material bodies on any and every scale, from subatomic particles to the cosmos itself — which still stands as the best description we have of the behavior of massive bodies (of whatever size) within the perspective of four-dimensional physics.
The only problem with Newtonian mechanics nowadays is that it does not seem terribly helpful when the scientific problem is biological, not merely physical. The expectation of the past 400 years is that Newtonian mechanics is absolutely universal. Yet the fact seems to be that it is only universal with respect to material bodies, not living organisms (which are "material bodies" PLUS the "something else" which makes them living). With respect to living organisms, Newtonian mechanics has no real purchase at all.
Whatever. In any case, it's soooooooooo good to be back again! I really missed you guys!
Thank you ever so much, dearest sister in Christ, for your outstanding essay/post!