Thank you, Brad, for that explanation.
While I do not read Spinoza directly himself (I absorb his words via others describing what he wrote down), I admire the guy for reaching that position in which God can be declared real, when indeed viewed as an abstraction. Instead of describing God via other means, he pins God in the only structurally appropriate spot while letting God stand.
While I do not hear this directly, I assume that Spinoza meant how God is intrinsic in everything, and not something next to everything. As such, we can do away with the word God altogether if it weren't for a specific communal reality we can understand to be true for all that exist.
As such, I am reminded of Gödel who showed us with his Incompleteness Theorem that no locally correct truth can be used to explain the big-picture level with that same truth then found for all at that level. The simple example is starting out with a male person and then declaring the truth about all people based on this person or group of similar people. Not possible, of course. The top level needs to be viewed differently. It must hang in the air.
And that brings me to the pyramid, which word has been translated as 'one (1) that comes forth from height'. As such, any idea that tries to unify separate parts will be hanging in the air, reaching out to ground level but bifurcating into four distinct corner positions. The top is united, while it’s a lot of work at ground level to reach that single position.
Einstein mentioned this, too, in a different manner. He said that in order to overcome (scientific) problems, we have to look one level up for the solution.
The human mind has learned that uniting is highly beneficial. We excel because we use artificial realities around which we united ourselves: money, language, religion. While they are not real onto themselves, we benefit nevertheless. They help us organize ourselves in beneficial manners (except for when these man-made entities start competing and get into each other's way, sometimes leading to war even). Money, for instance, it the most powerful essence on this planet, and you can truly not eat it or drink it — though some I’ve been told swim in it.
That's why I admire Spinoza. He is the first (in modern times) to correctly declare the highest level as an abstraction and yet capable of changing reality as we perceive it.
In ancient times, this was likely common understanding, though it is hard to see in how far the ancients worked with abstract notions.
The Greek word for God, Theo, declares in plain English a word that 'hangs in the air' yet that is tied to the ground nevertheless. We can see this back in the word theory in which a hypothesis (the balloon) is found among facts (the solid ground). The word theory contains both positions at the same time. The facts must be presented (or the balloon just floats away in the air) together with the proposed overarching idea considered to exist among these facts.
Even the English word God can be tied to our reality, and 'gut' is then the word to explain this. We feel something moving through the gut, but we do not see it. In Dutch, also God, the word is tied to 'giet' which is like 'pour' or 'downpour'. While not drowning, when it 'giets' one gets wet completely nevertheless, just the same as if one jumped into the water.
Akhenaten and Nefertiti, to close this reply with, provide an example that tells us how the ancients dealt with the abstract level. Well, they didn't deal well with it. While Akhenaten and Nefertiti were tolerated with their one-god belief, as soon as they had died all their artifacts were destroyed. This shows that the abstract idea was recognized (as told by the translation of the word pyramid), but that one can point but never reach the heavens. Bad moves therefore by Akhenaten and Nefertiti.
Spinoza, brought up in a fully one-god culture, formulated this in a rather good, and abstract, manner. Had he been born in ancient Egypt, no one would have thought he was a genius. But he was of course; clearly so.
Thank you, Brad, for your reply.
