Meredith Sprunger's Synopsis of The Urantia Book
Synopsis of Paper 66
THE PLANETARY PRINCE OF Urantia
1. About five hundred thousand years ago and concurrent with the appearance of the six colored or Sangik races, Caligastia, the Planetary Prince, arrived on Urantia. There were almost one‑half billion primitive human beings on earth at the time of the Prince's arrival, and they were well scattered over Europe, Asia, and .Africa. The Prince's headquarters, established in Mesopotamia, was at about the center of world population.
2. Caligastia went forth from Jerusem to his trust of world dominion with an enviable record of loyalty and devotion to the welfare of the universe of his origin and. sojourn ...I was present on Jerusem when the brilliant Caligastia departed from the system capital. No prince of the planets ever embarked upon a career of world rulership with a richer preparatory experience or with better prospects than did Caligastia on that eventful day one‑half million years ego... I did not then comprehend that Caligastia was insidiously falling in love with himself; I did not then so fully understand the subtleties of personality pride.
3. The Planetary Prince of Urantia was not sent out on his mission alone but was accompanied by the usual corps of assistants and administrative helpers. At the head of this group was Daligastia, the associate‑assistant of the Planetary Prince ...But from your standpoint the most interesting group of all were the corporeal members of the Prince's staff ...These one hundred rematerialized members of the Prince's staff were chosen by Caligastia from over 785,000 ascendant citizens of Jerusem who volunteered for embarkation on the Urantia adventure. Each one of the chosen one hundred was from a different planet, and none of them were from Urantia.
4. One hundred human subjects were given into the hands of the highly skilled volunteer commission from Avalon, who directed the material extraction of a portion of the life plasm of these Andon descendants. This living material was then transferred to the material bodies constructed for the use of the one hundred Jerusemite members of the Prince's staff.
5. The headquarters of the Planetary Prince was situated in the Persian Gulf region of those days, in the district corresponding to later Mesopotamia ...The nucleus of the Prince's settlement was a very simple but beautiful city, enclosed within a wall forty feet high. This world center of culture was named Dalamatia in honor of Daligastia.
6. The arrival of the Prince's staff created a profound impression...And much of your subsequent mythology grew out of the garbled legends of these early days when these members of the Prince's staff were repersonalized on Urantia as supermen. The serious obstacle to the good influence of such extraplanetary teachers is the tendency of mortals to regard them as gods.
7. The re‑created bodies of this group were fully satisfied by a nonflesh diet. This was one of the considerations which determined their residence in a warm region abounding in fruits and. nuts. The practice of subsisting on a nonflesh diet dates from the times of the Caligastia one hundred.
8. This group, while enjoying provisional citizenship on Jerusem, were as yet unfused with their Thought Adjusters; and when they volunteered and were accepted for p1anetary service in liaison with the descending orders of sonship, their Adjusters were detached. But these Jerusemites were superhuman beings—they possessed souls of ascendant growth.
9. In conformity to their instructions the staff did not engage in sexual reproduction... during the thirty‑third year...number two and number seven of the Danite group accidentally discovered a phenomenon attendant upon the liaison of their morontia. selves (supposedly nonsexual]. and nonmaterial); and the result of this adventure proved to be the first of the primary midway creatures...Thus did the Prince's staff eventually bring into being the original corps of 50,000 primary midwayers.
10. The Caligastia one hundred were personally immortal, or undying. There circulated through their material forms the antidotal complements of the life currents of the system ...These antidotal complements of the Satania life currents were derived from the fruit of the tree of life, a shrub of Edentia which was sent to Urantia by the Most Highs of Norlatiadek at the time of Caligastia's arrival.
11. At the time the one hundred Andonites contributed their human germ plasm to the members of the Prince's staff, the Life Carriers introduced into their mortal bodies the complement of the system circuits; and thus were they enabled to live on concurrently with the staff, century after century, in defiance of physical death.
12. The one hundred were organized for service in ten autonomous councils of ten members each...These ten groups were constituted as follows:
1. The council on food. and material welfare...
2. The board of animal domestication and utilization ...The members of this corps first taught men to use the wheel for the facilitation of traction...
3. The. advisers regarding the conquest of predatory animals...
4. The faculty on dissemination and. conservation of knowledge...Fad formulated the first alphabet and introduced a writing system...
5. The commission on industry and trade...It was among these enlightened groups educated in the Dalamatia schools that the first commercial credit was practiced...
6. The college of revealed religion...The head of this council was Harp.
None of the Prince's staff would present revelation to complicate evolution; they presented revelation only as the climax of their exhaustion of the forces of evolution...
7. The guardians of health and life... It required thousands of years to persuade them to burn refuse ...Lut...induced the religious teachers to include cleansing with water as a part of the purification ceremonies to be practiced in connection with the noontime devotions, once a week, in the worship of the Father of all.
These guardians of health also sought to introduce handshaking in substitution for saliva exchange or blood drinking as a seal of personal friendship...
8. The planetary council on art and science ...These primitive men would not consent to experiment with steam power ...They were, however, finally persuaded to work with metals and fire...
9. The governors of advanced tribal relations...
10. The supreme court of tribal co‑ordination and racial co‑operation. This supreme council was directed by Van and was the court of appeals for all of the other nine special commissions charged with the supervision of human affairs.
13. The whole world was caught in the stalemate of tradition‑bound mores when the Caligastia one hundred arrived and began the proclamation of the new gospel of individual initiative within the social groups of that day. But this beneficent rule was so soon interrupted that the races never have been wholly liberated from the slavery of custom; fashion still unduly dominates Urantia.
14. Each of the ten planetary commissions set about slowly and naturally to advance the interests intrusted to them. Their plan consisted in attracting the best minds of the surrounding tribes and, after training them, sending them back to their people as emissaries of social uplift.
15. The one hundred would not attempt to impose the habits and mores of even a superior race upon another tribe. Always they patiently worked to uplift and advance the time‑tried mores of each race...Their motive was progression by evolution and not revolution by revelation.
16. The Prince's headquarters, though exquisitely beautiful and designed to awe the primitive men of that age, was altogether modest ...The land provision within the city walls was sufficient to provide for pasturage and gardening for the support of a population of shout twenty thousand.
17. The definite order of family life and the living of one family together in one residence of comparatively settled location date from these times of Dalamatia and were chiefly due to the example and teachings of the one hundred and their pupils.
18. The Prince's staff lived together as fathers and mothers…the fifty pattern homes of Dalamatia never sheltered less than five hundred adopted little ones assembled from the superior families of the Andonic and Sangik races.
19. Hap presented the early races with a moral law...
1. You shall not fear nor serve any God but the Father of all.
2. You shall not disobey the Father's Son, the world's ruler, nor show disrespect to his superhuman associates.
3. You shall not speak a lie when called before the judges of the people.
4. You shall not kill men, women, or children.
5. You shall not steal your neighbor’s goods or cattle.
6. You shall not touch your friend's wife.
7. You shall not show disrespect to your parents or to the elders of the tribe.
20. It became the custom to hold one of these commands in mind for each day of the week, using it for salutations and mealtime thanksgiving. The time measurement of these days was the lunar month, this period being reckoned as twenty‑eight days ...The seven‑day week was introduced by the Dalamatia teachers and grew out of the fact that seven was one fourth of twenty‑eight ...But there is no natural origin for the weekly period.
21. The cultivation of the soil is inherent in the establishment of an advancing civilization on the evolutionary worlds, and this injunction was the center of all teaching of the Planetary Prince and his staff ...Work with the soil is not a curse; rather is it the highest blessing to all who are thus permitted to enjoy the most human of all human activities.
22. In looking back over the long career of Caligastia, we find only one outstanding feature of his conduct that might have challenged attention; he was ultraindividualistic...It should be noted that both Lucifer and Caligastia had been patiently instructed and lovingly warned respecting their critical tendencies and the subtle development of their pride of self and its associated exaggeration of the feeling of self‑importance ...They judged their unselfish advisers by their own evolving selfishness.
23. The power of the fallen Prince to disturb human affairs was enormously curtailed by the mortal incarnation of Machiventa Melchizedek in the days of Abraham; and subsequently, during the life of Michael in the flesh, this traitorous Prince was finally shorn of all authority on Urantia.
24. Even before Michael's bestowal on Urantia, neither Caligastia nor Daligastia was ever able to oppress mortals or to coerce any normal individual into doing anything against the human will. The free will of man is supreme in moral affairs; even the indwelling Thought Adjuster refuses to compel man to think a single thought or to perform a single act against the choosing of man's own will.
Discussion Questions
1. What significance does Caligastia’s excellent preparation and high prospects have for his failure as a Planetary Prince?
2. How and by whom was the city of Dalamatia built?
3. What are the implications of the fact that the primary midwayers were discovered “accidentally” and “supposedly nonsexual and nonmaterial” activities?
4. How does one explain that apparently the one hundred Andonites were originally unaware of their contributed germ plasm and infusion of the complement of the system circuits?
5. Do you think tradition and fashion are too dominant in our world?
6. Is the Fifth Epochal Revelation a threat of overenlightenment in our society?
7. How does one prevent pride and individualism which help people to be creative from becoming an evil, undermining tendency?
A Service of
The Urantia Book Fellowship