A Glossary
and Synopsis
of The Urantia Book
(Urantia is the cosmic name of our planet the Earth)
Sixty
anonymous Master Minds present:
The complete Covenant of Science and religion.
[ Note: This is believed to be a translation of the Jacques Weiss Glossary. The original has Urantia Foundation's name and address at the bottom of the cover page as Urantia Foundation, 533 Diversey Parkway, Chicago 14, Illinois. Given our first indication of Weiss' intention to produce a Glossary in correspondence of 1961, and considering the postal code in the address, this Glossary would likely be dated prior to the use of zip codes which places its origin between 1961 and 1965.]
The Urantia Book is divided into four major parts:
SOURCE
This cosmogony has been revealed by forty-eight personalities and a committee of twelve members, most of them wishing to remain anonymous. It has been written from the transcendent to the knowledgeable. We advise the readers first to study the Glossary, and then to read the Four Parts in the reverse order, Part IV, Part III, Part II, Part I, so as to go from the knowledgeable to the transcendent. Thus they will easily assimilate the new wording, which had necessarily to be used for the description of people and phenomena hitherto unknown on earth.
GLOSSARY
This glossary has been established in order to familiarize the readers with the special terms and names most frequently used in The Urantia Book for the description of notions, ideas, phenomena, things, beings, and personalities, the existence of which can only be revealed with a new terminology. We have classified these terms and name in the following subdivisions:
Section 1 – The Astronomical Universe
Section 2 - The Physical and Psycho-Material Standards
Section 3 – The Administration of the Universe
Section 4 – The Paradise Ascent
Section 5 – The Human Races
Section 6 – Some Remarkable Personalities
Section 7 – Religion
Urantia is the name given by the universe directors to our planet, the Earth. The Urantians are the normal mortals of the various earthly races, the Terrestrians of the past, of the present, and of the future.
Urantia was a commonplace planet of the local universe of NEBADON, which contains about ten million similar ones, of which 3,840,101 were inhabited in the year 1934 A.D. For the reasons outlined in this book, Urantia was nevertheless chosen by Christ Michael, Creator and Sovereign of the universe of Nebadon, for His bestowal in the likeness of mortal flesh under the personality of Jesus of Nazareth. The Urantian humanity was torn by the consequences of the Lucifer Rebellion. By showing the way to salvation, Christ Michael gave to the Earth and to the other planets of the universe an example of conformity to the will of God. Thereafter, Urantia was no longer a commonplace planet.
SECTION I, THE ASTRONOMICAL UNIVERSE
The Master Universe, or Universe of Universes includes the total astronomical space. It is composed on the one hand by the Grand Universe (inhabited or habitable), and on the other hand by the Outer Space, with its annular zones of unpervaded space alterning with other annular zones of pervaded space, in which huge but yet inhabitable universes are materializing.
The Grand Universe (inhabited or habitable) is divided into administrative departments according to the decimal system, with a septenary exception at the summit. It consists of a Central Universe called Havona, encircling the Eternal Isle of Paradise, and of seven Superuniverses whirling around Havona on an immensely long and relatively flattened elliptical orbit.
The Eternal Isle of Paradise is the only fixed point of the universe of universes. Its huge size challenges imagination. It has the form of an oval flattened disk with its two faces, the Upper Paradise and the Nether Paradise. The directions determined by its major and minor axis are the absolute North, South, East, and West, enabling al the universes to be geographically oriented. The Isle and the billion great architectural spheres gravitating around it constitute the eternal universe of Havona. Among these spheres are the huge Dark Gravity Bodies controlling universal gravitation, and the seven divine spheres centralizing certain activities of the Three Persons of the Trinity, the Universal Father, the Eternal Son, and the Infinite Spirit. The names of these seven spheres symbolically recall their functions:
Divinington, - the bosom of the Father
Sonarington, - the bosom of the Son
Spiritington, - the bosom of the Spirit
Vicegerington, - the bosom of the Father and the Son
Solitarington, - the bosom of the Father and the Spirit
Seraphington, - the bosom of the Son and the Spirit
Ascendington, - the bosom of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit
These seven combinations are the only ones possible between three persons, and this is why number seven and the septenary are so often found in the manifestations of the spirit world. The physical worlds are somewhat organized according to the decimal system.
Each one of the seven superuniverses gravitating around the central universe of Havona is administratively divided into:
10 Major Sectors, each comprising…
100 Minor Sectors, each comprising…
100 Local Universes, created or to be created, each comprising…
100 Constellations, created or to be created, each comprising…
100 Systems, created or to be created, each comprising…
1000 Planets or Worlds, Inhabited or habitable.
Thus each superuniverse contains (see page 167):
10 Major Sectors
100 Minor Sectors
100,000 Local Universes
10 million Constellations
1 billion Systems, and about…
1,000 billion inhabited or habitable planets.
To find our planet Urantia in this immensity, you just need to know the administrative divisions to which it belongs. Each of these divisions has a Capital, housing the Headquarters of its administration. These capitals are Architectural Worlds, created and built according to specific standards pre-established by the Master Architects of the Universe. They are provided with all the devices allowing to live nicely there in beauty and to secure their functional part as capitals, with irrigation, heating, light, vegetation, animal world, natural resources, appropriate buildings, arrival and departure stations for intersideral transportation, and universal broadcasting systems of all kinds. On the contrary, planets like our have been detached from melting solar masses and have slowly solidified with meteoric accretions according to the laws of nature.
Urantia, our Earth, is located in the seventh superuniverse, Orvonton, whose central nucleus is the Milky Way, and whose capital is Uversa. Our major sector bears the name of Splandon, capital Umajor and Fifth. And our minor sector is Ensa, capital Uminor the Third. Among the hundred local universes on Ensa, we belong to the one of Nebadon, whose capital is Salvington, the permanent abode of the Supreme Sovereign of Nebadon, a Creator Son of the Michael order, Christ Michael, the one who incarnated on Urantia nineteen hundred years ago as the person of Jesus of Nazareth. You can already see that the local universes are administrative divisions having a paramount importance in the superuniverses. Nebadon naturally has its 100 constellations, among which is ours, that of Norlatiadek, with Edentia as capital. This constellation of Norlatiadek comprises one hundred systems of which ours, number 24, is Satania, with Jerusem as headquarters. Satania is not a solar system, but a system of suns comprising 1,000 habitable planets of which 610 are inhabited, among which our, Urantia, bears the systemic number 606.
In the universe records, our planet Urantia is thus simply designated as follows: the 606 of Satania in the Norlatiadek constellation, local universe of Nebadon, minor sector Ensa, major sector Splandon, superuniverse of Orvonton. This is enough for a heavenly messenger to find anybody on earth.
Urantia is a Decimal planet. On one out of ten planets, the Creator of the local universe lets life and human society develop with a minimum interference of His part in their evolution. On the nine other planets, humanity is more solidly officered by celestial personalities, and more tightly guided towards its destiny. On decimal planets like ours, where a large number of liberties are allowed, life produces variegated and original combinations which the Creators observe and which they let other worlds profit by, but the risks of anarchy and rebellion are much greater on such planets than on others.
SECTION 2, THE PHYSICAL AND PSYCHO-MATERIAL STANDARDS
A – THE DAYS AND THE YEARS
As it is well known, the Urantia years comprise 365 ¼ days, and every day represents the needed time for a planet to revolve once around itself and present anew its meridian to the sun. In the larger sectors of the universe, the years comprise most generally 100 days, but such local days are very different from the Urantia days. For example:
Systemic Time – One day of Satania = 3 days of Urantia less 1 hour 4 minutes 16 seconds. Five years of 100 days of Satania = four years of Urantia (P. 619).
Local Universe Time – One day of Nebadon = 18 days 6 hours 2 ½ minutes of Urantia. One year of 100 days = about five years of Urantia (P. 372).Superuniverse Time – One day of Orvonton = nearly one month of Urantia. One year of 100 days or Orvonton = 3,000 days of Urantia minus 22 minutes, or about 8 1/5 years of Urantia (P. 174).
Central Universe Time – One day of Havona = 1,000 leap years of Urantia minus 7 minutes 3 1/8 seconds (P. 543 & 544). This is why Apostle Peter said: “But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day”, (Peter III-8). Thus if such a difficult and complex case as the Lucifer rebellion is submitted to the courts of the central universe of Havona, and if the judges accept to sit urgently in judgment within three days, mortals must not be impatient to wait for the sentence during 3,000 years, for that is very quick indeed.
Time of a Dispensation – A dispensation is the time interval between the arrival of a Teacher on a planet, and the arrival of the next one. Thus the arrival of Jesus on Urantia ended the dispensation of Adam.
B – TIME – SPACE
Space and Time are essential features of the material universe. Space is conceived by synthesis and time by analysis. Space is measured by time, and not time by space. Material creatures are dependent on space and time, and Jesus as Son of Man incarnated among us shared this subjection. But as Son of God, He was independent of time before incarnating on Urantia, and he regained this independence after His Ascension, but He is dependent upon space. Stated otherwise, He can only be at one place at a given moment, but He can go instantly from one place to another. The reverse is true for the Mother Spirit of the local universe: She is independent from space, but dependent on time; stated otherwise She is constantly present everywhere in Her universe, but She cannot live simultaneously at two epochs. God is independent from both Time and Space. Between Him and man who depend wholly on both, there is a whole gamut of beings able to move at speeds higher than light, and who are thus more or less independent from time according to their speed. Let us for example quote the Supernaphim who can transport dematerialized men at twice the speed of light, the Solitary Messengers who can travel at nearly five million times the speed of light (and who nevertheless need thousands of years to reach the ends of the universe), and the Thought Adjusters who can go anywhere almost instantly, as it happened for the Adjuster of Jesus, who went to and returned from Divinington on the day of Jesus’ baptism in the Jordan River; even a Solitary Messenger would have taken years for such a round trip.
The journeys of planets and energies follow circuits, which are pre-established by the Master Architects of the Universe. There are spiritual circuits, gravitation circuits, mental circuits, physical energy circuits, etc…All these circuits start from and return to Paradise. The matter of Paradise is specific and eternal. Paradise is everlasting and independent from time. There, action attends decision, and results are instantaneous.
C – THE VARIOUS LEVELS OF ENERGY AND INTELLIGENCE
Universe activities take place on many levels falling into five main categories:
1 – The material or physical level.
2 – The mental or intellectual level.
3 – The soul or morontia level.
4 – The spirit or spiritual level.
5 – The absolute level.
I) – Physical Energy is divided into three sorts:
a) – Cosmic Force, the energies coming forth from the Unqualified Absolute and not responding yet to Paradise gravity.
b) – Emergent Energy, responding to Paradise gravity but not to linear or local gravity. This corresponds to the pre-electronic level of matter-energy.
c) – Universal Power, or Universe Force, responding directly to Paradise gravity and to linear or local gravity; it corresponds to the electronic level of matter-energy. It is manipulated in the universes by the Universe Power Directors and the Power Centers, etc.
The transition between on-material energy and material energy appears in the Ultimatons which are very small energy grains rotating at almost unconceivable speeds. This speed is so stupendous that it endows the ultimatons with antigravity powers. An electron, an already very small unit but known by science, is formed by a group of one hundred ultimatons.
2) – Mind. It connotes the presence of a living ministry added to various energy systems. Upon all levels, we have used the word Mind, but it is obvious that the nature of thought is different at various levels; so much different that the cosmic entities often use special words to qualify certain aspects of Material Mind, of Soul Mind, or of Spiritual Mind. For example:
Mana – It is the primitive belief in the spirits of nature.
Mota – It is the psychic or Morontia intelligence, a kind of intelligence transcending mortal mind.
Monota – It is spiritual intelligence, Paradise or cosmic mind, transcending our imagination.
The term Will Creature is used to designate beings endowed with personality and Free Will. Free will is essentially the ability to do or not to do the will of God insofar as we are conscious of it. When a human or seraphic creature has finally and deliberately decided to oppose the will of God, such creature is a Rebel and risks the second Death, the destruction of soul and personality. Only the Ancients of Days have the power to inflict such a penalty and thus to rid the universe of rebellious elements. They resort to this sanction only after having exhausted all the resources of mercy.
3) – The Morontia Level. This term has no equivalent in current language. The word “etheric” (etherical plane, etheric body) is sometimes used in an analogous sense. The word Morontia is used so many times in the Book that it is essential to comprehend it as well as possible in order to understand the evolution of men and their relations to the worlds that they cannot see. Morontia, still practically unknown on earth, is the psychic matter the substance of the soul. The warp of the morontia fabric is spiritual, its weft is material.
The substance of the soul is neither spiritual nor material in the same way that a child is neither its father nor its mother, or that water is neither hydrogen nor oxygen. The Morontia substance of the soul results from a partial fusion between the Thought Adjuster (the divine spark indwelling man) and the material mind of the thus indwelt mortal. If the soul is judged worthy to survive physical death, the human personality deceased and sleeping, is resuscitated by a suitable technique on the morontia or Mansion Worlds. The raised human becomes an Ascender, a creature endowed with eternal life who undertakes the long ascent of Paradise.
In certain circumstances, with or without the help of entities of the spiritual hierarchy, the morontia forms can become perfectly visible to men. The Holy Scriptures contain many examples among which we quote the following:
a) – The episode of Balaam riding his donkey and stopped by the Angel of the Lord in a narrow path (Numbers XXII – 22 and following verses). The donkey saw the morontia form of the Angel and Balaam did not. Then the Angel took a little denser morontia form, and Balaam in his turn was able to see him.
b) – The appearance of Gabriel to the mothers of John the Baptist and Jesus, to announce that both would bear a son.
c) – The nineteen appearances of Jesus under a morontia form after His resurrection and before His ascension.
4) – Definition of certain words of the Spirit Level:
Ethics and Morals – These two words are nearly synonymous. Morals are rather related to the individual behavior of man, and Ethics to his collective behavior. The word Ethics has also been used in the sense of Philosophy of Morals.
Existential and Experiential – These words will be encountered very often. The adjective Existential qualifies all things or beings that exist in the absolute, independently from time-space, since past eternity until future eternity. For example, the Isle of Paradise, the Three Persons of the Trinity, the Thought Adjusters, truth, beauty, goodness, love, and harmony, are existential. The adjective Experiential qualifies things and beings that exist in the relative, in time-space, in relation to existential values. For example, the Sun, the planets, morals, politics, religions, evolving human mores, men, their soul, animals, nature, and personal feelings are experiential. Between the Existential and experiential ones are intermediary ones such as the morontia level, already discussed and rather experiential, and the Absonite levels (more than finite buy less than absolute) without beginning nor end, transcending time and space, and closely bordering the existential levels. (See P. 2, paragraphs 5 and 7, and Paper 10 chapter 5). For example: The nature of the Master Architects of the Universes is absonite. The notion of Light extends also from the physical to the hyperphysical, from the light visible to incarnated eyes, through intellectual insight, to spiritual luminosity, the presence manifestation of a spiritual being. (See P. 9, last paragraph, and P. 10, first paragraph.)
Truth concerns the spiritual results and the eternal values. Truth cannot always be established by a combination of apparent facts.
Quarantine. In its normal condition, a planet is in constant communication with the remainder of the universe thorough the broadcasting systems, hierarchically organized. But in case of rebellion, the first move of the heavenly hierarchy is to put it in quarantine, which means cutting the communications immediately up-stream of the planet, in order to prevent the rebellion from expanding. This is what happened to our planet Urantia at the time of the Lucifer rebellion. We must wait for the final judgment of Lucifer to see the end of the situation. In the meantime, Urantia remains in quarantine, but the present revelations foresee that this quarantine may end in a relatively short time (perhaps one or two centuries).
5) – The absolute level is inaccessible to the human intellect. During the discussion of certain absolute aspects in the First Part, the reader will often meet the word Unqualified. The authors have used it as adjective associated with substantives such as Deity, will, personality, etc. In the French translation, the equivalent of Unconditioned seems to convey at best its signification. It must be interpreted in the sense of unlimited, unconditional, without reserve, total, absolute, general, not eventuated, without form, etc…
SECTION 3, ADMINISTRATION OF THE UNIVERSE
The universe of universes is meticulously directed by a hierarchy of beings. The myriads of stars of a nebular system, such as the Milky Way, whirl according to coordinated laws and wills. The races that live on inhabited planets are, of course, subject to this administration that demands a certain conformism to the will and general plan of God, while respecting as much as possible the free will of man. It is by love that order and unity are secured in the universe. All creatures that love God (and all those who know Him eventually love Him) work in the same Spirit towards doing His will.
At the summit of the hierarchy, you find God, the cause without cause, the Absolute, which the creatures have worshipped under thousands of names. As soon as God wishes to manifest Himself, He does it under the aspect of the Absolute Trinity made up of three Persons always acting unanimously, but with their specialized parts maintaining the essential Unity of the whole.
1) – The Universal Father – First Source and Center, who has willingly stripped Himself, in favor of the two other Persons of the Trinity, of all His attributes except Absolute Will and Absolute Fatherhood. Thus the Father alone wields the final will and endows with Personality the beings to whom He desires to give it. By reading the Book and by meditation, the reader will succeed in realizing this mysterious notion of personality. There are many classes of non-personalized intelligent beings, of expecting personality beings, and of pre-personal beings. For a man, the loss of personality is equivalent to cosmic death or second death.
2) – The Second Person of the Trinity is the Eternal Son, or Second Source and Center. He is the expression of the Personality of the Universal Father, and His part consists in revealing the Father to the universes. He makes this revelation through the Creator Sons also called the Michaels, the Sovereign Creators of local universes such as Nebadon, the Christs like the one who came to bestow Himself upon Urantia under the aspect of Jesus of Nazareth. The multiple Creator Sons are thus the sons of the unique Eternal Son and must not be confused with Him.
3) – The Third Person of the Trinity is the Infinite Spirit, or Conjoint Actor, or Third Source and Center. The Infinite Spirit represents the passage into action, the intelligent manifestation of the joint wills of the Universal Father and the Eternal Son. He acts by stupendous variety of means and works with infinite obligingness.
Each of the Three Persons of the Trinity manifests Itself through a Spirit. The Universal Father has the ability to split Himself into divine pre-personal sparks called Thought Adjusters or Mystery Monitors. The proof of the existence of the Adjusters is given on Page 24. As soon as a man has taken his first moral decision, the Father sends an Adjuster to indwell his thoughts; this enables the mortal to know the will of God by communicating through his conscience with this inner Adjuster. The mortal remains free to do or not to do the will of God expressed by the Adjuster. If he does not hear the Adjuster, the mortal is in Ignorance or Error. If he hears the Adjuster and does not listen to Him, he commits Sin. If he deliberately practices sin, he is a Rebel indulging in Iniquity; he is doomed to final annihilation if he does not repent before the hour when the vast provision of heavenly mercy is exhausted concerning him.
The spirit of the Eternal Son, or Second Source and Center is the Spirit of Truth, which which Jesus sent to humanity at the Pentecost after His ascension. This spirit consists essentially in recognizing the Fatherhood of God, and consequently the immediate brotherhood of men. The basic message of the Gospel is the unconditional salvation of men, their sure survival, when they recognize their faith-sonship with God.
The spirit of the Infinite Spirit, or Conjoint Actor, or Third Source and Center, is the Holy Spirit. The spirit of infinite mercy and infinite obligingness. Mercy is an individual spirit and emotion, while justice is a group business.
The organization of the living universe follows quite naturally with the next degree of the Hierarchy, the eventuation of the Seven Master Spirits or Eternals of Days representing the seven possible aspects of the activities of the three Persons of the Trinity acting together or separately: Father, Son, Spirit, Father-Son, Father-Spirit, Son-Spirit, and Father-Son-Spirit.
Each of the Seven Master Spirits has his residence on one of the seven Spirit Spheres gravitating around the Central Isle of Paradise, each of these spheres bearing the name of the dependent superuniverse. (Our planet belongs to the seventh superuniverse (Father-Son-Spirit) and the name of the superuniverse is Orvonton. As already known, its capital is Uversa. The central universe sphere where the seventh Master Spirit has his headquarters is also called Orvonton.
The Heirarchy of the “Days” has its summit with the Eternals of Days, the Master Spirits of the central universe. The next stage comes with the Ancients of Days. Three Ancients of Days dwell on the headquarters sphere of each superuniverse. They rule it and are attended by a host of celestial beings such as Divine Counselors, Universe Censors, Wisdom Perfectors, Mighty Messengers, etc., whose functions and qualities are described in the Book. A group of personalities of these orders has sponsored the study of the central universe and of the superuniverses, which form the First Part of the present Cosmogony. If there are rebels hopelessly addicted to iniquity and perhaps deserving second death, or cosmic annihilation, only the Ancients of Days may decree and realize this operation. Thus Christ Michael cannot decide the cosmic death of Lucifer, the arch rebel created in his own local universe of Nebadon. Therefore Christ submitted the case of Lucifer and his followers to the rung of jurisdiction above the courts of His local universe, and He awaits the decision of the Ancients of Days. Judgments of that kind are passed according to cosmic and superuniversal motives beyond the authority of the Sovereign Creator of a local universe, and with all the more reason above human understanding. The punishment may have to be awaited for thousands of Urantia years.
The descending Hierarchy of the order of “Days” follows in the major sectors, which are directed by three Perfections of Days, and next in the minor sectors, which are directed by three Recents of Days. Then we reach the local universes, each attended by a Creative Daughter of the order of the Mother Spirits. Each Creator Son is blessed in His mission by a Union of Days who dwells in His headquarters and secures certain superuniverse relationships. On Salvington, capital of Nebadon, the Union of Days bears the name of Immanuel (in Hebrew Immanu El, God is with us). It is Him whom Jesus called His Elder Brother and who gave the extraordinary counsels immediately preceding the incarnation of Jesus on earth and related in Paper 120, chapters 1, 2 and 3.
The Michael who rules a local universe is naturally helped in turn by the countless hosts of celestial beings among whom we can quote Gabriel, the Bright and Morning Star, the chief executive of the local universe, the one who uttered the Annunciation to the mothers of John the Baptist and of Jesus. Let us also mention the Melchizedeks, the Life Carriers, the Adjutant Mind-Spirits, the Brilliant Evening Stars, the Archangel, the Solitary Messengers, the Seraphim, and scores of orders and personalities too numerous to be mentioned. The Melchizedeks are marvelous teachers and directors. The Life Carriers bring life on the planets and modulate it by creating new forms and new surroundings for development. The Adjutant Mind Spirits bestow their mental and emotional qualities on the mortal beings. The Solitary Messengers carry their messages with velocities nearing five million times the speed of light. Certain seraphim are Guardian Angels; others take care of the dematerialization and the interstellar transportation of persons, etc.
Pursuing the descent of the hierarchical scale, we reach the Constellations; they are ruled by three Sons of the Vorondadek order, assisted by an observer of the order of “Days”, a Faithful of Days. The Vorondadeks are also known as Most Highs or Constellation Fathers. The writers of the holy scriptures of the Bible have often confused the Most Highs with God. Let us recall that Urantia belongs to the Constellation of Norlatiadek.
We arrive now to the smallest administrative unit before the individual planets, the Systems of about 1,000 inhabited or habitable planets, ruled by a System Sovereign, a Son of the Lanonandek order. We belong to the System of Satania whose Sovereign, called Lanaforge, has been appointed a few scores of millennia ago, to replace the rebel Lucifer.
The last administrative unit of astronomic nature is the individual planet itself, ruled by a Planetary Prince who can acquire the title of Planetary Sovereign. On Urantia, this ruler was Caligastia, who joined the Lucifer rebellion and was deposed. Adam would have become Planetary Sovereign if he had not failed in his mission.
Let us finally point out that on earth there are some immortal and permanent citizens who have witnessed everything that happened on the planet since 300,000 years, who remember it perfectly, and who are able to communicate with men under certain conditions. These are the Midwayers (primary and secondary). The Midwayers possess morontia forms (see this word in Section 2, subdivision C of the present Glossary), which are normally invisible to men. One midwayer out of four is nearly visible to men and can make himself visible if he wants to. Even under their invisible morontia form the midwayers can act on physical matter, as did the Angel who opened for the Apostles the doors of their prison (Acts V-19). Paul and Silas were liberated in the same way (Acts XVI-26).
SECTION 4, THE PARADISE ASCENT
In the preceding Section 3, the reader has realized the existence of a descending hierarchy of spiritual personalities, starting with the three Persons of the Trinity indwelling the Central Isle of Paradise, and ending with the celestial personalities who indwell planets similar to ours. This living hierarchy forms the stream of Descending Pilgrims from Eternity. Such beings are Perfect in Potential, but need to acquire the experience of the material levels of existence in order to become perfect in Manifestation. A wonderful illustration is given by Christ Michael, Creator of the local universe of Nebadon, who came down into incarnation in order to gain the full experience of a Son of Man and assume thereafter the part and name of Son of God, Supreme Sovereign of His self-created universe of which He was only Vice Gerent before having physically passed through the same experiences of the men of His creation. Certain commentators of His legendary life have considered Michael only as a man, and others only as a God. The Truth is that He was and remains both man and God, and that during His passage on earth He has fused both natures into one. Henceforth He is the undisputed Supreme Sovereign of Nebadon, on the one hand because He has been confirmed in this function by God Himself, and on the other hand because all the Nebadon creatures worthy of survival obey Him and serve Him voluntarily out of Love for Him, by reason of His wonderful and inspiring way of passing the hardest tests experiencable by an incarnated being. Other descending pilgrims from eternity, such as Adam and Eve, have mingled with humanity and left offspring; alas, insufficiently numerous, on Urantia.
In contrast with this flow of Descending Pilgrims from Eternity, we find an ebb of Ascending Pilgrims of Time, who are essentially men and certain angels. We have not even been able to include in this necessarily abbreviated Glossary the twentieth part of the new terminology unavoidably used to designate people and things yet unknown on earth, we shall mainly consider the human current of ascending pilgrims of time.
Contrary to the descending pilgrims from eternity, the ascending pilgrims of time are created Imperfect in potential, but they gain an experience in manifestation during their life on their native planet. If after this single life in physical incarnation they are found worthy of survival, they enter the Ascending Paradise Career. They are raised form the dead at every millennium or at every end of a Dispensation. A dispensation is the period of time elapsing on a planet between the successive Bestowals on this Planet of two successive Teachers of a heavenly order. You will see more in detail in Section 7, the meaning of the word “bestowal”.
So, at the time of his death, a man goes asleep into nothingness; his Thought Adjuster leaves him, and his Guardian Angel concerns himself with other works. Man ceases to possess a personality. If he is destined to survival, he will be resurrected on semi-physical worlds, the morontia or Mansion Worlds. He then receives a morontia body. His Adjuster comes back to indwell his mind, and the proper heavenly personalities supervise his spiritual progression. His morontia body is refined; it is many times replaced by bodies of a more and more spiritualized substance, up to the end of the morontia experience. Such successive changes have been revealed on earth by great celestial Teachers. Material mind has erroneously considered these bodies as constituting reincarnations on the physical plane. Reincarnation is a morontia phenomenon. Men are born anew neither on their native planet, nor with a physical body.
After the morontia or soul experience, the long spiritual experience begins. Subtle body, soul, and spirits fuse more and more, and the ascending pilgrim of time is fully launched in the Paradise ascent career, a glittering series of experiences where vaster aspects of the universe constantly open before his eyes, which marvel at new revelations. He is carried from world to world by seraphic transporters according to a technique, which is fully described in the Book.
The number of worlds visited before reaching the central universe is stupendous; and in the central universe itself there are a billion spheres which must be known before qualifying for the long, long interstellar flight, which will bring you on the shores of the Eternal Isle. The ordinary notions of time are quite out of proportion with the millions of years of the career of the ascending pilgrims of time, and even the duration of such a career is short in relation to eternity.
Whatever it may be, countless human beings follow it. The first one who traversed it entirely, the first Finaliter was Granfanda whose story will be found in the Book.
Naturally, this career has a goal, which is to transform men into Perfected Beings, or Finaliters, similar under many aspects to the naturally Perfect beings who normally indwell the Paradise sphere, but who lack the experience of time.
Having passed through the stupendous experience just outlined, the Finaliters are mustered in the Corps of the Finality, the destiny of which is not yet revealed. We leave to the reader’s imagination the possibility of establishing a link between the myriads of men and angels who constantly swell the numbers of Finaliters, and the later peopling of the huge, but yet uninhabited universes which are taking shape in the Outer Space Levels, millions of light-years afar from the seven inhabited superuniverses.
The human racers are the offspring of human individuals who appeared on earth by Mutation. The first really human couple was the pair of Andon and Fonta, two twins born by mutation from primate pre-human parents about a million years ago. Andon and Fonta always walked upright, while their parents often walked like four-footed animals. Their brain was much more developed. They were the first to ignite fire. They had nineteen children, who married among themselves and formed the human race. We all descend from them. (See Paper 63).
Before them, the pre-human Primates were born from Lemurs, a kind of very intelligent animals. The offspring of the Primates evolved by two mutations, a progressive one which gave birth to Andon and Fonta, and a regressive one which gave birth to the monkeys. Thus man does not descend from the monkey but man and monkey both descend fro the Primates by mutation.
On all inhabited planets there exist or have existed six indigenous color races (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and indigo) and one colored race imported from another world (the violet race, the one of Adam and Eve). The ancestors of a colored race are usually born by mutation in separate families. On Urantia, the first colored individuals were all successively born, about 500,000 years ago, from the same father and mother, two remarkably intelligent personalities of a tribe of Northwest India. (See Paper 64). These parents had nineteen children, of whom five were red, two orange, four yellow, two green four blue, and two indigo. This was the Sangik family, out of which al colored races have sprung.
The extraordinary mixtures of races, which took place on Urantia following migrations and wars, have produced a situation, which can no longer be clearly defined. Let us simply state that the orange and green races have been racially exterminated; that the red race, driven out of Asia by the yellow race, had emigrated into America by the land bridge of Bering; that the present races of Negroid type are rather born from indigo blood, and the white race rather from blue blood, with interferences of which we give below a brief account.
Towards the time when the Sangik family was giving birth to the ancestors of the colored races, about 500,000 years ago, there arrived on earth, coming from the Constellation of Norlatiadek, a Planetary Prince named Caligastia, a follower of Lucifer (see Section 6 below). He was attended by a corporeal staff of 50 members, among which was a future reel, Nod, the ancestor of the Nodites. Many races of Urantia have been named according to their unique ancestor. The same happened about 35,000 years ago, after the arrival on earth of Adam and Eve, the parents of the violet race, sent from Jerusem, the system headquarters, in order to establish a numerous offspring of pure violet race upon the Earth. This race was intended to mingle later with the six colored races in order to elevate them. The reader will see in the Book the extraordinary way in which this plan mostly failed.
Here are the names of some races frequently mentioned in this Cosmogony.
Andonites…the offspring of Andon and Fonta with a minimum of admixture.
Sangiks…the direct offspring of the Sangik family already mentioned.
Nodites…a warlike race descending from Nod, a member of the staff of Caligastia.
Adamites…a peaceful race of pure offspring from Adam.
Adamsonites…offspring of Adamson the eldest son of Adam and Eve, who married Ratta, a girl of pure Nodite blood.
Andites…a complex race, able and aggressive, resulting mainly fro the mixture of the Adamites with the Nodites, with an admixture from the evolutionary races. The constant overpopulation of the Andites in Mesopotamia and the neighborhood caused massive migrations directed on the one had toward the North of the Caspian Sea, and thence toward Western Europe through Russia and Poland, and on the other hand towards Turkestan and India. The present white race contains much Andite blood.
We can only mention rapidly some evocation names such as the Neanderthal Man and the Cro-Magnoid Man. The reader will find in the Book many details about these races and numerous other secondary races.
SECTION 6, SOME PARTICULARLY REMARKABLE PERSONALITIES
Granfanda…(already mentioned), the first ascender who succeeded to reach Paradise.
Andon and Fonta…(already mentioned), the first truly human beings who appeared on Urantia.
Lucifer…(see Paper 53) was a “pilgrim” descending from eternity, an angel of light of the class of the primary Lanonandeks. He was the Sovereign of our system of Satania, which includes one thousand inhabited, or habitable planets. 200,000 years ago, Lucifer started a rebellion in the system of Norlatiadek by pride and thirst for personal power, denying allegiance to the universal heavenly hierarchy. He drew into rebellion a certain number of planets, but never appeared on Urantia under visible form. The rebel planets were put in quarantine by the Constellation Fathers. Replaced by Lanaforge, a System Sovereign of matchless loyalty, Lucifer has been dismissed and deposed, but he is not yet judged, because in these matters the adjudication belongs to the Ancients of Days, rulers of the superuniverse.
Satan was the first lieutenant of Lucifer, who delegated him on Urantia to foster the rebellion. He also was a Primary Lanonandek.
Beelzebub was the chief of the unfaithful midwayers who joined to forces of the Planetary Prince of Urantia at the time of the rebellion.
Van and Amadon were two members of the corporeal staff of Caligastia who refused to obey the orders of the treacherous rebel. They resisted him during 150,000 years on the physical plane, thanks to the “Tree of Life”. This is one of the most inspiring episodes of the Book. Van had established his headquarters in Turkey, on the shore of the Lake of Van, which still bears his name.
Caligastia had been Planetary Prince of Urantia during 300,000 years at the time of the rebellion. By joining the Lucifer party, he drew our world into chaos. Technically, he is the “devil”. He has been dismissed and deposed.
The Twenty-Four Ancients. Since his resurrection after his death on the cross, it is Michael of Nebadon (Jesus of Nazareth) who now holds the official title of Planetary Prince of Urantia. But practically he delegates his powers to a board of 24 members having their headquarters on Edentia, the capital sphere of our constellation of Norlatiadek. These twenty-four Ancients mentioned in the Bible (Revelation IV-6 and 10) include today among them a set of remarkable personalities who have played a conspicuous spiritual part on Urantia. Here are the names of some of them:
1) – Onagar, the greatest thinker of the age preceding the arrival of the Planetary Prince. He oriented his contemporaries towards the worship of the “Breath Giver”.
2) – Onamonalonton, a chief of the red race in very olden times. He taught his race to abstain from worshipping multiple Gods and to venerate the “Great Spirit”.
3) – Singlangton, the first of the yellow race who led his people into the worship of the “One Truth” instead of multiple truths.
4) – Adam, the discredited but rehabilitated planetary father of Urantia.
5) – Eve, the mother of the violet race; she was rehabilitated with Adam and affected to serve with a group of surviving mortals.
6) – Enoch, the first Urantia mortal who fused with his Thought Adjuster during his incarnated life.
7) – Machiventa Melchizedek, the only one of this order of celestial beings who took a human form on Urantia. He appeared suddenly at Salem about 4,000 years ago as a full-grown adult; he lived 94 years on earth in order to revive the religion of One God, and disappeared one day without leaving any trace. He was the one who oriented the destiny of Abraham “according to the Melchizedek order”, as mentioned in the Bible.
8), 9), and 10) – Three personalities well known by readers of the Bible: Moses, Elijah, and John the Baptist.
For want to space, we can mention here neither the fourteen other Ancients nor hundreds of other most interesting personalities. We shall terminate this section by giving a spiritual insight of the character of each of the twelve Apostles of Jesus. After His resurrection, Jesus appeared to ten of them on the shore of the Sea of Galilee and took them successively by pairs to ask them certain questions. When they had answered satisfactorily, Jesus gave them His last admonishments before disappearing for His Ascension.
The eleventh apostle, Simon the Zealot. Had not yet rejoined the group of the ten first ones. He was a fiery patriot, desperate to see that the Kingdom of God was not of this world.
As to Judas Iscariot, the twelfth apostle, he had not betrayed for money, but by pride and resentment because he was not in the limelight; he hoped to be overwhelmed with honors for having delivered Jesus to the Sanhedrin. He was the only Judean among the twelve. The others were all Galileans.
Whilst Christ Michael, Creator of the local universe of Nebadon, was gaining the experience allowing Him to touch deliberately the heart of men by Compassion, He also brought them good news, a Gospel forming the basic foundations of the future religion of the world. This Gospel is simply the following: All men who seek to know God and to do His will are Faith-Sons of God. God deals with them like a Father, watching over them, guiding them, and forgiving their mistakes with a Fatherly love, much deeper and vaster than Brotherly love. Brotherly love is the love than men manifest to each other when they recognize themselves as brethren because they are the sons of the same Father. To recognize the Fatherhood of God, and consequently Human Brotherhood is the Gospel of Jesus. You will see under what circumstances Christianity, mainly founded by the Apostles Peter and Paul, is compromise religion about Jesus, somewhat neglecting the fact that it is impossible to establish the brotherhood of men without a previous and living recognition of the Fatherhood of God.
By incarnating on Urantia to reveal God not only to the Urantians, but to all worlds of His universe, Michael did more than temporarily tarrying on the earth. His earthly life has been a Bestowal, a contribution marking the planet with an indelible imprint. Michael has given Himself to men, He has Bestowed Himself on humanity, and at Pentecost, after His resurrection, He has bestowed upon them the Spirit of Truth.
The reader will find in the Book many other examples of bestowals, but of course, none of them reaches the sublime greatness of the one of Michael, personal Creator of our local universe. Let us mention among others, the bestowal of Adam and Eve about 35,000 years ago, and the one of Machiventa Melchizedek about 4,000 years ago, at the time of Abraham. In a more restricted sense, and on the human scale, it could be said that Moses bestowed himself on the Hebrew people at the Exodus.
In the cosmic sense, religion is a lived personal experience, which for every man is similar in principle and different in realization. True religion should be acquired at the family home by the teaching of the parents and the living example given by them to their children. Organized or Institutional religion is temporary compromise with materialism; it keeps a certain usefulness until such time when men are sufficiently evolved to practice Personal religion and know that God is a Person; then they will seek to know Him, to do His will, and to become alike to him.