Perhaps
most significantly, Henry also had a dualistic view of God. He knew from Joseph
Smith’s testimony that man is created in the image of God the Father and His
Son, Jesus Christ, and that they have bodies of flesh and bone. However, he
also believed that their influence is as expansive as the universe; he has as
evidence of that both the inspired writings of Joseph Smith and also his own
scientific observations, which showed divine order everywhere. Like Joseph
Smith, Henry had no difficulty with the paradox of an individual, personal God
who also exerts limitless influence. (Henry J. Eyring, Mormon
Scientist: The Life and Faith of Henry Eyring [Salt Lake City: Deseret
Book, 2007], 166)
In the endnote to the above
paragraph, we read that:
Henry
had a historical analogy for the duality of God’s nature: “If we read the story
of Robert E. Lee, the great military tactician, we find that even at Gettysburg
his army was maneuvered as though Lee himself was storming Cemetery Ridge
alongside Pickett, as well as being everywhere else on the battlefield. Lee’s
success as a general depended to a very great extent on the gathering of
information about the strength, position and intentions of his adversary before
and after the battle started. The result is that any story of Lee as a general
would tell about his influence permeating the whole sphere of his activities
and very little about Lee the man. In this sense Lee is two people, the man
like anyone else, and for far-flung intelligence system which governed the
mention of himself and his army much as the wave is spread out in space and
governs the motion of a photon or a material particle.
“In
an analogous manner, we may think of God as the all-wise arbiter of the
Universe, with His infinite wisdom having an influence which permeates the most
remote recesses of space, and yet being Himself an exalted being with
personality and deep concern for struggling humanity. One of the many things
the Restored Gospel has done is to emphasize, as the scriptures have always
done, the deep personal concern of God for His children.” (Eyring, Faith of
a Scientist, 84-85). (Ibid., 312 n. 5)
