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The 5th Epochal Revelation
-The Urantia Papers
PAPER 21
THE PARADISE CREATOR SONS
21:0.1
THE Creator Sons are the makers and rulers of the local
universes of time and space. These universe creators and
sovereigns are of dual origin, embodying the
characteristics of God the Father and God the Son. But
each Creator Son is different from every other; each is
unique in nature as well as in personality; each is the
"only-begotten Son" of the perfect deity ideal of his
origin.
21:0.2
In the vast work of organizing, evolving, and perfecting
a local universe, these high Sons always enjoy the
sustaining approval of the Universal Father. The
relationship of the Creator Sons with their Paradise
Father is touching and superlative. No doubt the
profound affection of the Deity parents for their divine
progeny is the wellspring of that beautiful and
well-nigh divine love which even mortal parents bear
their children.
21:0.3
These primary Paradise Sons are personalized as
Michaels. As they go forth from Paradise to found their
universes, they are known as Creator Michaels. When
settled in supreme authority, they are called Master
Michaels. Sometimes we refer to the sovereign of your
universe of Nebadon as Christ Michael. Always and
forever do they reign after the "order of Michael," that
being the designation of the first Son of their order
and nature.
21:0.4
The original or first-born Michael has never experienced
incarnation as a material being, but seven times he
passed through the experience of spiritual creature
ascent on the seven circuits of Havona, advancing from
the outer spheres to the innermost circuit of the
central creation. The order of Michael knows the grand
universe from one end to the other; there is no
essential experience of any of the children of time and
space in which the Michaels have not personally
participated; they are in fact partakers not only of the
divine nature but also of your nature, meaning all
natures, from the highest to the lowest.
21:0.5
The original Michael is the presiding head of the
primary Paradise Sons when they assemble for conference
at the center of all things. Not long since on Uversa we
recorded a universal broadcast of a conclave
extraordinary on the eternal Isle of one hundred fifty
thousand Creator Sons assembled in the parental presence
and engaged in deliberations having to do with the
progress of the unification and stabilization of the
universe of universes. This was a selected group of
Sovereign Michaels, sevenfold bestowal Sons.
1. ORIGIN AND NATURE OF CREATOR SONS
21:1.1
When the fullness of absolute spiritual ideation in the
Eternal Son encounters the fullness of absolute
personality concept in the Universal Father, when such a
creative union is finally and fully attained, when such
absolute identity of spirit and such infinite oneness of
personality concept occur, then, right then and there,
without the loss of anything of personality or
prerogative by either of the infinite Deities, there
flashes into full-fledged being a new and original
Creator Son, the only-begotten Son of the perfect ideal
and the powerful idea whose union produces this new
creator personality of power and perfection.
21:1.2
Each Creator Son is the only-begotten and
only-begettable offspring of the perfect union of the
original concepts of the two infinite and eternal and
perfect minds of the ever-existent Creators of the
universe of universes. There never can be another such
Son because each Creator Son is the unqualified,
finished, and final expression and embodiment of all of
every phase of every feature of every possibility of
every divine reality that could, throughout all
eternity, ever be found in, expressed by, or evolved
from, those divine creative potentials which united to
bring this Michael Son into existence. Each Creator Son
is the absolute of the united deity concepts which
constitute his divine origin.
21:1.3
The divine natures of these Creator Sons are, in
principle, derived equally from the attributes of both
Paradise parents. All partake of the fullness of the
divine nature of the Universal Father and of the
creative prerogatives of the Eternal Son, but as we
observe the practical outworking of the Michael
functions in the universes, we discern apparent
differences. Some Creator Sons appear to be more like
God the Father; others more like God the Son. For
example: The trend of administration in the universe of
Nebadon suggests that its Creator and ruling Son is one
whose nature and character more resemble that of the
Eternal Mother Son. It should be further stated that
some universes are presided over by Paradise Michaels
who appear equally to resemble God the Father and God
the Son. And these observations are in no sense implied
criticisms; they are simply a recording of fact.
21:1.4
I do not know the exact number of Creator Sons in
existence, but I have good reasons for believing that
there are more than seven hundred thousand. Now, we know
that there are exactly seven hundred thousand Unions of
Days and no more are being created. We also observe that
the ordained plans of the present universe age seem to
indicate that one Union of Days is to be stationed in
each local universe as the counseling ambassador of the
Trinity. We note further that the constantly increasing
number of Creator Sons already exceeds the stationary
number of the Unions of Days. But concerning the destiny
of the Michaels beyond seven hundred thousand, we have
never been informed.
2. THE CREATORS OF LOCAL UNIVERSES
21:2.1
The Paradise Sons of the primary order are the
designers, creators, builders, and administrators of
their respective domains, the local universes of time
and space, the basic creative units of the seven
evolutionary superuniverses. A Creator Son is permitted
to choose the space site of his future cosmic activity,
but before he may begin even the physical organization
of his universe, he must spend a long period of
observation devoted to the study of the efforts of his
older brothers in various creations located in the
superuniverse of his projected action. And prior to all
this, the Michael Son will have completed his long and
unique experience of Paradise observation and Havona
training.
21:2.2
When a Creator Son departs from Paradise to embark upon
the adventure of universe making, to become the head --
virtually the God -- of the local universe of his own
organization, then, for the first time, he finds himself
in intimate contact with, and in many respects dependent
upon, the Third Source and Center. The Infinite Spirit,
though abiding with the Father and the Son at the center
of all things, is destined to function as the actual and
effective helper of each Creator Son. Therefore is each
Creator Son accompanied by a Creative Daughter of the
Infinite Spirit, that being who is destined to become
the Divine Minister, the Mother Spirit of the new local
universe.
21:2.3
The departure of a Michael Son on this occasion forever
liberates his creator prerogatives from the Paradise
Sources and Centers, subject only to certain limitations
inherent in the pre-existence of these Sources and
Centers and to certain other antecedent powers and
presences. Among these limitations to the otherwise
all-powerful creator prerogatives of a local universe
Father are the following:
21:2.4
1. Energy-matter
is dominated by the Infinite Spirit. Before any new
forms of things, great or small, may be created, before
any new transformations of energy-matter may be
attempted, a Creator Son must secure the consent and
working co-operation of the Infinite Spirit.
21:2.5
2. Creature
designs and types are controlled by the Eternal Son.
Before a Creator Son may engage in the creation of any
new type of being, any new design of creature, he must
secure the consent of the Eternal and Original Mother
Son.
21:2.6
3. Personality
is designed and bestowed by the Universal Father.
21:2.7
The types and patterns of
mind are
determined by the precreature factors of being. After
these have been associated to constitute a creature
(personal or otherwise), mind is the endowment of the
Third Source and Center, the universal source of mind
ministry to all beings below the level of Paradise
Creators.
21:2.8
The control of
spirit designs and types depends on the level of
their manifestation. In the last analysis, spiritual
design is controlled by the Trinity or by the
pre-Trinity spirit endowments of the Trinity
personalities -- Father, Son, and Spirit.
21:2.9
When such a perfect and divine Son has taken possession
of the space site of his chosen universe; when the
initial problems of universe materialization and of
gross equilibrium have been resolved; when he has formed
an effective and co-operative working union with the
complemental Daughter of the Infinite Spirit -- then do
this Universe Son and this Universe Spirit initiate that
liaison which is designed to give origin to the
innumerable hosts of their local universe children. In
connection with this event the Creative Spirit
focalization of the Paradise Infinite Spirit becomes
changed in nature, taking on the personal qualities of
the Mother Spirit of a local universe.
21:2.10
Notwithstanding that all Creator Sons are divinely like
their Paradise parents, none exactly resembles another;
each is unique, diverse, exclusive, and original in
nature as
well as in personality. And since they are the
architects and makers of the life plans of their
respective realms, this very diversity insures that
their domains will also be diverse in every form and
phase of Michael-derived living existence which may be
created or subsequently evolved therein. Hence the
orders of creatures native to the local universes are
quite varied. No two are administered or inhabited by
dual-origin native beings who are in all respects
identical. Within any superuniverse, one half of their
inherent attributes are quite alike, being derived from
the uniform Creative Spirits; the other half vary, being
derived from the diversified Creator Sons. But such
diversity does not characterize those creatures of sole
origin in the Creative Spirit nor those imported beings
who are native to the central or superuniverses.
21:2.11
When a Michael Son is absent from his universe, its
government is directed by the first-born native being,
the Bright and Morning Star, the local universe chief
executive. The advice and counsel of the Union of Days
is invaluable at such times. During these absences a
Creator Son is able to invest the associated Mother
Spirit with the overcontrol of his spiritual presence on
the inhabited worlds and in the hearts of his mortal
children. And the Mother Spirit of a local universe
remains always at its headquarters, extending her
fostering care and spiritual ministry to the uttermost
parts of such an evolutionary domain.
21:2.12
The personal presence of a Creator Son in his local
universe is not necessary to the smooth running of an
established material creation. Such Sons may journey to
Paradise, and still their universes swing on through
space. They may lay down their lines of power to
incarnate as the children of time; still their realms
whirl on about their respective centers. No material
organization is independent of the absolute-gravity
grasp of Paradise or of the cosmic overcontrol inherent
in the space presence of the Unqualified Absolute.
3. LOCAL UNIVERSE SOVEREIGNTY
21:3.1
A Creator Son is given the range of a universe by the
consent of the Paradise Trinity and with the
confirmation of the supervising Master Spirit of the
superuniverse concerned. Such action constitutes title
of physical possession, a cosmic leasehold. But the
elevation of a Michael Son from this initial and
self-limited stage of rulership to the experiential
supremacy of self-earned sovereignty comes as a result
of his own personal experiences in the work of universe
creation and incarnated bestowal. Until the achievement
of bestowal-earned sovereignty, he rules as vicegerent
of the Universal Father.
21:3.2
A Creator Son could assert full sovereignty over his
personal creation at any time, but he wisely chooses not
to. If, prior to passing through the creature bestowals,
he assumed an unearned supreme sovereignty, the Paradise
personalities resident in his local universe would
withdraw. But this has never happened throughout all the
creations of time and space.
21:3.3
The fact of creatorship implies the fullness of
sovereignty, but the Michaels choose to experientially
earn it,
thereby retaining the full co-operation of all Paradise
personalities attached to the local universe
administration. We know of no Michael who ever did
otherwise; but they all could, they are truly freewill
Sons.
21:3.4
The sovereignty of a Creator Son in a local universe
passes through six, perhaps seven, stages of
experiential manifestation. These appear in the
following order:
21:3.5
1. Initial vicegerent sovereignty -- the solitary
provisional authority exercised by a Creator Son before
the acquirement of personal qualities by the associated
Creative Spirit.
21:3.6
2. Conjoint vicegerent sovereignty -- the joint rule of
the Paradise pair subsequent to the personality
achievement of the Universe Mother Spirit.
21:3.7
3. Augmenting vicegerent sovereignty -- the advancing
authority of a Creator Son during the period of his
seven creature bestowals.
21:3.8
4. Supreme sovereignty -- the settled authority
following the completion of the seventh bestowal. In
Nebadon, supreme sovereignty dates from the completion
of Michael's bestowal on Urantia. It has existed just
slightly over nineteen hundred years of your planetary
time.
21:3.9
5. Augmenting supreme sovereignty -- the advanced
relationship growing out of the settling of a majority
of the creature domains in light and life. This stage
pertains to the unachieved future of your local
universe.
21:3.10
6. Trinitarian sovereignty -- exercised subsequent to
the settling of the entire local universe in light and
life.
21:3.11
7. Unrevealed sovereignty -- the unknown relationships
of a future universe age.
21:3.12
In accepting the initial vicegerent sovereignty of a
projected local universe, a Creator Michael takes an
oath to the Trinity not to assume supreme sovereignty
until the seven creature bestowals have been completed
and certified by the superuniverse rulers. But if a
Michael Son could not, at will, assert such unearned
sovereignty, there would be no meaning in taking an oath
not to do so.
21:3.13
Even in the prebestowal ages a Creator Son rules his
domain well-nigh supremely when there is no dissent in
any of its parts. Limited rulership would hardly be
manifest if sovereignty were never challenged. The
sovereignty exercised by a prebestowal Creator Son in a
universe without rebellion is no greater than in a
universe with rebellion; but in the first instance
sovereignty limitations are not apparent; in the second,
they are.
21:3.14
If ever the authority or administration of a Creator Son
is challenged, attacked, or jeopardized, he is eternally
pledged to uphold, protect, defend, and if necessary
retrieve his personal creation. Such Sons can be
troubled or harassed only by the creatures of their own
making or by higher beings of their own choosing. It
might be inferred that "higher beings," those of origin
on levels above a local universe, would be unlikely to
trouble a Creator Son, and this is true. But they could
if they chose to. Virtue is volitional with personality;
righteousness is not automatic in freewill creatures.
21:3.15
Before the completion of the bestowal career a Creator
Son rules with certain self-imposed limitations of
sovereignty, but subsequent to his finished bestowal
service he rules by virtue of his actual experience in
the form and likeness of his manifold creatures. When a
Creator has seven times sojourned among his creatures,
when the bestowal career is finished, then is he
supremely settled in universe authority; he has become a
Master Son, a sovereign and supreme ruler.
21:3.16
The technique of obtaining supreme sovereignty over a
local universe involves the following seven experiential
steps:
21:3.17
1. Experientially to penetrate seven creature levels of
being through the technique of incarnated bestowal in
the very likeness of the creatures on the level
concerned.
21:3.18
2. To make an experiential consecration to each phase of
the sevenfold will of Paradise Deity as it is
personified in the Seven Master Spirits.
21:3.19
3. To traverse each of the seven experiences on the
creature levels simultaneously with the execution of one
of the seven consecrations to the will of Paradise
Deity.
21:3.20
4. On each creature level, experientially to portray the
acme of creature life to Paradise Deity and to all
universe intelligences.
21:3.21
5. On each creature level, experientially to reveal one
phase of the sevenfold will of Deity to the bestowal
level and to all the universe.
21:3.22
6. Experientially to unify the sevenfold creature
experience with the sevenfold experience of consecration
to the revelation of the nature and will of Deity.
21:3.23
7. To achieve new and higher relationship with the
Supreme Being. The repercussion of the totality of this
Creator-creature experience augments the superuniverse
reality of God the Supreme and the time-space
sovereignty of the Almighty Supreme and factualizes the
supreme local universe sovereignty of a Paradise
Michael.
21:3.24
In settling the question of sovereignty in a local
universe, the Creator Son is not only demonstrating his
own fitness to rule but is also revealing the nature and
portraying the sevenfold attitude of the Paradise
Deities. The finite understanding and creature
appreciation of the Father's primacy is concerned in the
adventure of a Creator Son when he condescends to take
upon himself the form and experiences of his creatures.
These primary Paradise Sons are the real revealers of
the Father's loving nature and beneficent authority, the
same Father who, in association with the Son and the
Spirit, is the universal head of all power, personality,
and government throughout all the universal realms.
4. THE MICHAEL BESTOWALS
21:4.1
There are seven groups of bestowal Creator Sons, and
they are so classified in accordance with the number of
times they have bestowed themselves upon the creatures
of their realms. They range from the initial experience
up through five additional spheres of progressive
bestowal until they attain the seventh and final episode
of creature-Creator experience.
21:4.2
Avonal bestowals are always in the likeness of mortal
flesh, but the seven bestowals of a Creator Son involve
his appearing on seven creature levels of being and
pertain to the revelation of the seven primary
expressions of the will and nature of Deity. Without
exception, all Creator Sons pass through this seven
times giving of themselves to their created children
before they assume settled and supreme jurisdiction over
the universes of their own creation.
21:4.3
Though these seven bestowals vary in the different
sectors and universes, they always embrace the
mortal-bestowal adventure. In the final bestowal a
Creator Son appears as a member of one of the higher
mortal races on some inhabited world, usually as a
member of that racial group which contains the largest
hereditary legacy of the Adamic stock which has
previously been imported to upstep the physical status
of the animal-origin peoples. Only once in his sevenfold
career as a bestowal Son is a Paradise Michael born of
woman as you have the record of the babe of Bethlehem.
Only once does he live and die as a member of the lowest
order of evolutionary will creatures.
21:4.4
After each of his bestowals a Creator Son proceeds to
the "right hand of the Father," there to gain the
Father's acceptance of the bestowal and to receive
instruction preparatory to the next episode of universe
service. Following the seventh and final bestowal a
Creator Son receives from the Universal Father supreme
authority and jurisdiction over his universe.
21:4.5
It is of record that the divine Son of last appearance
on your planet was a Paradise Creator Son who had
completed six phases of his bestowal career;
consequently, when he gave up the conscious grasp of the
incarnated life on Urantia, he could, and did, truly
say, "It is finished" -- it was literally finished. His
death on Urantia completed his bestowal career; it was
the last step in fulfilling the sacred oath of a
Paradise Creator Son. And when this experience has been
acquired, such Sons are supreme universe sovereigns; no
longer do they rule as vicegerents of the Father but in
their own right and name as "King of Kings and Lord of
Lords." With certain stated exceptions these sevenfold
bestowal Sons are unqualifiedly supreme in the universes
of their abode. Concerning his local universe, "all
power in heaven and on earth" was relegated to this
triumphant and enthroned Master Son.
21:4.6
Creator Sons, subsequent to the completion of their
bestowal careers, are reckoned as a separate order,
sevenfold Master Sons. In person the Master Sons are
identical with the Creator Sons, but they have undergone
such a unique bestowal experience that they are commonly
regarded as a different order. When a Creator deigns to
effect a bestowal, a real and permanent change is
destined to take place. True, the bestowal Son is still
and none the less a Creator, but he has added to his
nature the experience of a creature, which forever
removes him from the divine level of a Creator Son and
elevates him to the experiential plane of a Master Son,
one who has fully earned the right to rule a universe
and administer its worlds. Such beings embody all that
can be secured from divine parentage and embrace
everything to be derived from perfected-creature
experience. Why should man bemoan his lowly origin and
enforced evolutionary career when the very Gods must
pass through an equivalent experience before they are
accounted experientially worthy and competent finally
and fully to rule over their universe domains!
5. RELATION OF MASTER SONS TO THE UNIVERSE
21:5.1
The power of a Master Michael is unlimited because
derived from experienced association with the Paradise
Trinity, is unquestioned because derived from actual
experience as the very creatures subject to such
authority. The nature of the sovereignty of a sevenfold
Creator Son is supreme because it:
1. Embraces the sevenfold viewpoint of Paradise Deity.
2. Embodies a sevenfold attitude of time-space
creatures.
3. Perfectly synthesizes Paradise attitude and creature
viewpoint.
21:5.2
This experiential sovereignty is thus all-inclusive of
the divinity of God the Sevenfold culminating in the
Supreme Being. And the personal sovereignty of a
sevenfold Son is like the future sovereignty of the
sometime-to-be-completed Supreme Being, embracing as it
does the fullest possible content of the power and
authority of the Paradise Trinity manifestable within
the time-space limits concerned.
21:5.3
With the achievement of supreme local universe
sovereignty, there passes from a Michael Son the power
and opportunity to create entirely new types of creature
beings during the present universe age. But a Master
Son's loss of power to originate entirely new orders of
beings in no way interferes with the work of life
elaboration already established and in process of
unfoldment; this vast program of universe evolution goes
on without interruption or curtailment. The acquirement
of supreme sovereignty by a Master Son implies the
responsibility of personal devotion to the fostering and
the administering of that which has already been
designed and created, and of that which will
subsequently be produced by those who have been thus
designed and created. In time there may develop an
almost endless evolution of diverse beings, but no
entirely new pattern or type of intelligent creature
will henceforth take direct origin from a Master Son.
This is the first step, the beginning, of a settled
administration in any local universe.
21:5.4
The elevation of a sevenfold bestowal Son to the
unquestioned sovereignty of his universe means the
beginning of the end of agelong uncertainty and relative
confusion. Subsequent to this event, that which cannot
be sometime spiritualized will eventually be
disorganized; that which cannot be sometime co-ordinated
with cosmic reality will eventually be destroyed. When
the provisions of endless mercy and nameless patience
have been exhausted in an effort to win the loyalty and
devotion of the will creatures of the realms, justice
and righteousness will prevail. That which mercy cannot
rehabilitate justice will eventually annihilate.
21:5.5
The Master Michaels are supreme in their own local
universes when once they have been installed as
sovereign rulers. The few limitations upon their rule
are those inherent in the cosmic pre-existence of
certain forces and personalities. Otherwise these Master
Sons are supreme in authority, responsibility, and
administrative power in their respective universes; they
are as Creators and Gods, supreme in virtually all
things. There is no penetration beyond their wisdom
regarding the functioning of a given universe.
21:5.6
After his elevation to settled sovereignty in a local
universe a Paradise Michael is in full control of all
other Sons of God functioning in his domain, and he may
freely rule in accordance with his concept of the needs
of his realms. A Master Son may at will vary the order
of the spiritual adjudication and evolutionary
adjustment of the inhabited planets. And such Sons do
make and carry out the plans of their own choosing in
all matters of special planetary needs, in particular
regarding the worlds of their creature sojourn and still
more concerning the realm of terminal bestowal, the
planet of incarnation in the likeness of mortal flesh.
21:5.7
The Master Sons seem to be in perfect communication with
their bestowal worlds, not only the worlds of their
personal sojourn but all worlds whereon a Magisterial
Son has bestowed himself. This contact is maintained by
their own spiritual presence, the Spirit of Truth, which
they are able to "pour out upon all flesh." These Master
Sons also maintain an unbroken connection with the
Eternal Mother Son at the center of all things. They
possess a sympathetic reach which extends from the
Universal Father on high to the lowly races of planetary
life in the realms of time.
6. DESTINY OF THE MASTER MICHAELS
21:6.1
No one may with finality of authority presume to discuss
either the natures or the destinies of the sevenfold
Master Sovereigns of the local universes; nevertheless,
we all speculate much regarding these matters. We are
taught, and we believe, that each Paradise Michael is
the absolute
of the dual deity concepts of his origin; thus he
embodies actual phases of the infinity of the Universal
Father and the Eternal Son. The Michaels must be partial
in relation to total infinity, but they are probably
absolute in relation to that part of infinity concerned
in their origin. But as we observe their work in the
present universe age, we detect no action that is more
than finite; any conjectured superfinite capacities must
be self-contained and as yet unrevealed.
21:6.2
The completion of the creature-bestowal careers and the
elevation to supreme universe sovereignty must signify
the completed liberation of a Michael's finite-action
capacities accompanied by the appearance of capacity for
more-than-finite service. For in this connection we note
that such Master Sons are then restricted in the
production of new types of creature beings, a
restriction undoubtedly made necessary by the liberation
of their superfinite potentialities.
21:6.3
It is highly probable that these undisclosed creator
powers will remain self-contained throughout the present
universe age. But sometime in the far-distant future, in
the now mobilizing universes of outer space, we believe
that the liaison between a sevenfold Master Son and a
seventh-stage Creative Spirit may attain to absonite
levels of service attended by the appearance of new
things, meanings, and values on transcendental levels of
ultimate universe significance.
21:6.4
Just as the Deity of the Supreme is actualizing by
virtue of experiential service, so are the Creator Sons
achieving the personal realization of the
Paradise-divinity potentials bound up in their
unfathomable natures. When on Urantia, Christ Michael
once said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life." And
we believe that in eternity the Michaels are literally
destined to be "the way, the truth, and the life," ever
blazing the path for all universe personalities as it
leads from supreme divinity through ultimate absonity to
eternal deity finality.
21:6.5
Presented by a Perfector of Wisdom from Uversa.
*
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