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The 5th Epochal Revelation
-The Urantia Papers
PAPER 48
THE MORONTIA LIFE
48:0.1
THE Gods cannot -- at least they do not -- transform a
creature of gross animal nature into a perfected spirit
by some mysterious act of creative magic. When the
Creators desire to produce perfect beings, they do so by
direct and original creation, but they never undertake
to convert animal-origin and material creatures into
beings of perfection in a single step.
48:0.2
The morontia life, extending as it does over the various
stages of the local universe career, is the only
possible approach whereby material mortals could attain
the threshold of the spirit world. What magic could
death, the natural dissolution of the material body,
hold that such a simple step should instantly transform
the mortal and material mind into an immortal and
perfected spirit? Such beliefs are but ignorant
superstitions and pleasing fables.
48:0.3
Always this morontia transition intervenes between the
mortal estate and the subsequent spirit status of
surviving human beings. This intermediate state of
universe progress differs markedly in the various local
creations, but in intent and purpose they are all quite
similar. The arrangement of the mansion and higher
morontia worlds in Nebadon is fairly typical of the
morontia transition regimes in this part of Orvonton.
1. MORONTIA MATERIALS
48:1.1
The morontia realms are the local universe liaison
spheres between the material and spiritual levels of
creature existence. This morontia life has been known on
Urantia since the early days of the Planetary Prince.
From time to time this transition state has been taught
to mortals, and the concept, in distorted form, has
found a place in present-day religions.
48:1.2
The morontia spheres are the transition phases of mortal
ascension through the progression worlds of the local
universe. Only the seven worlds surrounding the
finaliters' sphere of the local systems are called
mansion worlds, but all fifty-six of the system
transition abodes, in common with the higher spheres
around the constellations and the universe headquarters,
are called morontia worlds. These creations partake of
the physical beauty and the morontia grandeur of the
local universe headquarters spheres.
48:1.3
All of these worlds are architectural spheres, and they
have just double the number of elements of the evolved
planets. Such made-to-order worlds not only abound in
the heavy metals and crystals, having one hundred
physical elements, but likewise have exactly one hundred
forms of a unique energy organization called
morontia material.
The Master Physical Controllers and the Morontia Power
Supervisors are able so to modify the revolutions of the
primary units of matter and at the same time so to
transform these associations of energy as to create this
new substance.
48:1.4
The early morontia life in the local systems is very
much like that of your present material world, becoming
less physical and more truly morontial on the
constellation study worlds. And as you advance to the
Salvington spheres, you increasingly attain spiritual
levels.
48:1.5
The Morontia Power Supervisors are able to effect a
union of material and of spiritual energies, thereby
organizing a morontia form of materialization which is
receptive to the superimposition of a controlling
spirit. When you traverse the morontia life of Nebadon,
these same patient and skillful Morontia Power
Supervisors will successively provide you with 570
morontia bodies, each one a phase of your progressive
transformation. From the time of leaving the material
worlds until you are constituted a first-stage spirit on
Salvington, you will undergo just 570 separate and
ascending morontia changes. Eight of these occur in the
system, seventy-one in the constellation, and 491 during
the sojourn on the spheres of Salvington.
48:1.6
In the days of the mortal flesh the divine spirit
indwells you, almost as a thing apart -- in reality an
invasion of man by the bestowed spirit of the Universal
Father. But in the morontia life the spirit will become
a real part of your personality, and as you successively
pass through the 570 progressive transformations, you
ascend from the material to the spiritual estate of
creature life.
48:1.7
Paul learned of the existence of the morontia worlds and
of the reality of morontia materials, for he wrote,
"They have in heaven a better and more enduring
substance." And these morontia materials are real,
literal, even as in "the city which has foundations,
whose builder and maker is God." And each of these
marvelous spheres is "a better country, that is, a
heavenly one."
2. MORONTIA POWER SUPERVISORS
48:2.1
These unique beings are exclusively concerned with the
supervision of those activities which represent a
working combination of spiritual and physical or
semimaterial energies. They are exclusively devoted to
the ministry of morontia progression. Not that they so
much minister to mortals during the transition
experience, but they rather make possible the transition
environment for the progressing morontia creatures. They
are the channels of morontia power which sustain and
energize the morontia phases of the transition worlds.
48:2.2
Morontia Power Supervisors are the offspring of a local
universe Mother Spirit. They are fairly standard in
design though differing slightly in nature in the
various local creations. They are created for their
specific function and require no training before
entering upon their responsibilities.
48:2.3
The creation of the first Morontia Power Supervisors is
simultaneous with the arrival of the first mortal
survivor on the shores of some one of the first mansion
worlds in a local universe. They are created in groups
of one thousand, classified as follows:
1. Circuit Regulators . . . 400
2. System Co-ordinators . . 200
3. Planetary Custodians . . 100
4. Combined Controllers . . 100
5. Liaison Stabilizers. . . 100
6. Selective Assorters. . . .50
7. Associate Registrars . . .50
48:2.4
The power supervisors always serve in their native
universe. They are directed exclusively by the joint
spirit activity of the Universe Son and the Universe
Spirit but are otherwise a wholly self-governing group.
They maintain headquarters on each of the first mansion
worlds of the local systems, where they work in close
association with both the physical controllers and the
seraphim but function in a world of their own as regards
energy manifestation and spirit application.
48:2.5
They also sometimes work in connection with
supermaterial phenomena on the evolutionary worlds as
ministers of temporary assignment. But they rarely serve
on the inhabited planets; neither do they work on the
higher training worlds of the superuniverse, being
chiefly devoted to the transition regime of morontia
progression in a local universe.
48:2.6
1. Circuit
Regulators. These are the unique beings who
co-ordinate physical and spiritual energy and regulate
its flow into the segregated channels of the morontia
spheres, and these circuits are exclusively planetary,
limited to a single world. The morontia circuits are
distinct from, and supplementary to, both physical and
spiritual circuits on the transition worlds, and it
requires millions of these regulators to energize even a
system of mansion worlds like that of Satania.
48:2.7
Circuit regulators initiate those changes in material
energies which render them subject to the control and
regulation of their associates. These beings are
morontia power generators as well as circuit regulators.
Much as a dynamo apparently generates electricity out of
the atmosphere, so do these living morontia dynamos seem
to transform the everywhere energies of space into those
materials which the morontia supervisors weave into the
bodies and life activities of the ascending mortals.
48:2.8
2. System
Co-ordinators. Since each morontia world has a
separate order of morontia energy, it is exceedingly
difficult for humans to visualize these spheres. But on
each successive transition sphere, mortals will find the
plant life and everything else pertaining to the
morontia existence progressively modified to correspond
with the advancing spiritization of the ascending
survivor. And since the energy system of each world is
thus individualized, these co-ordinators operate to
harmonize and blend such differing power systems into a
working unit for the associated spheres of any
particular group.
48:2.9
Ascending mortals gradually progress from the physical
to the spiritual as they advance from one morontia world
to another; hence the necessity for providing an
ascending scale of morontia spheres and an ascending
scale of morontia forms.
48:2.10
When mansion world ascenders pass from one sphere to
another, they are delivered by the transport seraphim to
the receivers of the system co-ordinators on the
advanced world. Here in those unique temples at the
center of the seventy radiating wings wherein are the
chambers of transition similar to the resurrection halls
on the initial world of reception for earth-origin
mortals, the necessary changes in creature form are
skillfully effected by the system co-ordinators. These
early morontia-form changes require about seven days of
standard time for their accomplishment.
48:2.11
3. Planetary
Custodians. Each morontia world, from the mansion
spheres up to the universe headquarters, is in the
custody -- as regards morontia affairs -- of seventy
guardians. They constitute the local planetary council
of supreme morontia authority. This council grants
material for morontia forms to all ascending creatures
who land on the spheres and authorizes those changes in
creature form which make it possible for an ascender to
proceed to the succeeding sphere. After the mansion
worlds have been traversed, you will translate from one
phase of morontia life to another without having to
surrender consciousness. Unconsciousness attends only
the earlier metamorphoses and the later transitions from
one universe to another and from Havona to Paradise.
48:2.12
4. Combined
Controllers. One of these highly mechanical beings
is always stationed at the center of each administrative
unit of a morontia world. A combined controller is
sensitive to, and functional with, physical, spiritual,
and morontial energies; and with this being there are
always associated two system co-ordinators, four circuit
regulators, one planetary custodian, one liaison
stabilizer, and either an associate registrar or a
selective assorter.
48:2.13
5. Liaison
Stabilizers. These are the regulators of the
morontia energy in association with the physical and
spirit forces of the realm. They make possible the
conversion of morontia energy into morontia material.
The whole morontia organization of existence is
dependent on the stabilizers. They slow down the energy
revolutions to that point where physicalization can
occur. But I have no terms with which I can compare or
illustrate the ministry of such beings. It is quite
beyond human imagination.
48:2.14
6. Selective
Assorters. As you progress from one class or phase
of a morontia world to another, you must be re-keyed or
advance-tuned, and it is the task of the selective
assorters to keep you in progressive synchrony with the
morontia life.
48:2.15
While the basic morontia forms of life and matter are
identical from the first mansion world to the last
universe transition sphere, there is a functional
progression which gradually extends from the material to
the spiritual. Your adaptation to this basically uniform
but successively advancing and spiritizing creation is
effected by this selective re-keying. Such an adjustment
in the mechanism of personality is tantamount to a new
creation, notwithstanding that you retain the same
morontia form.
48:2.16
You may repeatedly subject yourself to the test of these
examiners, and as soon as you register adequate
spiritual achievement, they will gladly certify you for
advanced standing. These progressive changes result in
altered reactions to the morontia environment, such as
modifications in food requirements and numerous other
personal practices.
48:2.17
The selective assorters are also of great service in the
grouping of morontia personalities for purposes of
study, teaching, and other projects. They naturally
indicate those who will best function in temporary
association.
48:2.18
7. Associate
Registrars. The morontia world has its own
recorders, who serve in association with the spirit
recorders in the supervision and custody of the records
and other data indigenous to the morontia creations. The
morontia records are available to all orders of
personalities.
48:2.19
All morontia transition realms are accessible alike to
material and spirit beings. As morontia progressors you
will remain in full contact with the material world and
with material personalities, while you will increasingly
discern and fraternize with spirit beings; and by the
time of departure from the morontia regime, you will
have seen all orders of spirits with the exception of a
few of the higher types, such as Solitary Messengers.
3. MORONTIA COMPANIONS
48:3.1
These hosts of the mansion and morontia worlds are the
offspring of a local universe Mother Spirit. They are
created from age to age in groups of one hundred
thousand, and in Nebadon there are at present over
seventy billion of these unique beings.
48:3.2
Morontia Companions are trained for service by the
Melchizedeks on a special planet near Salvington; they
do not pass through the central Melchizedek schools. In
service they range from the lowest mansion worlds of the
systems to the highest study spheres of Salvington, but
they are seldom encountered on the inhabited worlds.
They serve under the general supervision of the Sons of
God and under the immediate direction of the
Melchizedeks.
48:3.3
The Morontia Companions maintain ten thousand
headquarters in a local universe -- on each of the first
mansion worlds of the local systems. They are almost
wholly a self-governing order and are, in general, an
intelligent and loyal group of beings; but every now and
then, in connection with certain unfortunate celestial
upheavals, they have been known to go astray. Thousands
of these useful creatures were lost during the times of
the Lucifer rebellion in Satania. Your local system now
has its full quota of these beings, the loss of the
Lucifer rebellion having only recently been made up.
48:3.4
There are two distinct types of Morontia Companions; one
type is aggressive, the other retiring, but otherwise
they are equal in status. They are not sex creatures,
but they manifest a touchingly beautiful affection for
one another. And while they are hardly companionate in
the material (human) sense, they are very close of kin
to the human races in the order of creature existence.
The midway creatures of the worlds are your nearest of
kin; then come the morontia cherubim, and after them the
Morontia Companions.
48:3.5
These companions are touchingly affectionate and
charmingly social beings. They possess distinct
personalities, and when you meet them on the mansion
worlds, after learning to recognize them as a class, you
will soon discern their individuality. Mortals all
resemble one another; at the same time each of you
possesses a distinct and recognizable personality.
48:3.6
Something of an idea of the nature of the work of these
Morontia Companions may be derived from the following
classification of their activities in a local system:
48:3.7
1. Pilgrim
Guardians are not assigned to specific duties in
their association with the morontia progressors. These
companions are responsible for the whole of the morontia
career and are therefore the co-ordinators of the work
of all other morontia and transition ministers.
48:3.8
2. Pilgrim
Receivers and Free Associators. These are the social
companions of the new arrivals on the mansion worlds.
One of them will certainly be on hand to welcome you
when you awaken on the initial mansion world from the
first transit sleep of time, when you experience the
resurrection from the death of the flesh into the
morontia life. And from the time you are thus formally
welcomed on awakening to that day when you leave the
local universe as a first-stage spirit, these Morontia
Companions are ever with you.
48:3.9
Companions are not assigned permanently to individuals.
An ascending mortal on one of the mansion or higher
worlds might have a different companion on each of
several successive occasions and again might go for long
periods without one. It would all depend on the
requirements and also on the supply of companions
available.
48:3.10
3. Hosts to
Celestial Visitors. These gracious creatures are
dedicated to the entertainment of the superhuman groups
of student visitors and other celestials who may chance
to sojourn on the transition worlds. You will have ample
opportunity to visit within any realm you have
experientially attained. Student visitors are allowed on
all inhabited planets, even those in isolation.
48:3.11
4. Co-ordinators
and Liaison Directors. These companions are
dedicated to the facilitation of morontia intercourse
and to the prevention of confusion. They are the
instructors of social conduct and morontia progress,
sponsoring classes and other group activities among the
ascending mortals. They maintain extensive areas wherein
they assemble their pupils and from time to time make
requisition on the celestial artisans and the reversion
directors for the embellishment of their programs. As
you progress, you will come in intimate contact with
these companions, and you will grow exceedingly fond of
both groups. It is a matter of chance as to whether you
will be associated with an aggressive or a retiring type
of companion.
48:3.12
5. Interpreters
and Translators. During the early mansonia career
you will have frequent recourse to the interpreters and
the translators. They know and speak all the tongues of
a local universe; they are the linguists of the realms.
48:3.13
You will not acquire new languages automatically; you
will learn a language over there much as you do down
here, and these brilliant beings will be your language
teachers. The first study on the mansion worlds will be
the tongue of Satania and then the language of Nebadon.
And while you are mastering these new tongues, the
Morontia Companions will be your efficient interpreters
and patient translators. You will never encounter a
visitor on any of these worlds but that some one of the
Morontia Companions will be able to officiate as
interpreter.
48:3.14
6. Excursion and
Reversion Supervisors. These companions will
accompany you on the longer trips to the headquarters
sphere and to the surrounding worlds of transition
culture. They plan, conduct, and supervise all such
individual and group tours about the system worlds of
training and culture.
48:3.15
7. Area and
Building Custodians. Even the material and morontia
structures increase in perfection and grandeur as you
advance in the mansonia career. As individuals and as
groups you are permitted to make certain changes in the
abodes assigned as headquarters for your sojourn on the
different mansion worlds. Many of the activities of
these spheres take place in the open enclosures of the
variously designated circles, squares, and triangles.
The majority of the mansion world structures are
roofless, being enclosures of magnificent construction
and exquisite embellishment. The climatic and other
physical conditions prevailing on the architectural
worlds make roofs wholly unnecessary.
48:3.16
These custodians of the transition phases of ascendant
life are supreme in the management of morontia affairs.
They were created for this work, and pending the
factualization of the Supreme Being, always will they
remain Morontia Companions; never do they perform other
duties.
48:3.17
As systems and universes are settled in light and life,
the mansion worlds increasingly cease to function as
transition spheres of morontia training. More and more
the finaliters institute their new training regime,
which appears to be designed to translate the cosmic
consciousness from the present level of the grand
universe to that of the future outer universes. The
Morontia Companions are destined to function
increasingly in association with the finaliters and in
numerous other realms not at present revealed on
Urantia.
48:3.18
You can forecast that these beings are probably going to
contribute much to your enjoyment of the mansion worlds,
whether your sojourn is to be long or short. And you
will continue to enjoy them all the way up to
Salvington. They are not, technically, essential to any
part of your survival experience. You could reach
Salvington without them, but you would greatly miss
them. They are the personality luxury of your ascending
career in the local universe.
4. THE REVERSION DIRECTORS
48:4.1
Joyful mirth and the smile-equivalent are as universal
as music. There is a morontial and a spiritual
equivalent of mirth and laughter. The ascendant life is
about equally divided between work and play -- freedom
from assignment.
48:4.2
Celestial relaxation and superhuman humor are quite
different from their human analogues, but we all
actually indulge in a form of both; and they really
accomplish for us, in our state, just about what ideal
humor is able to do for you on Urantia. The Morontia
Companions are skillful play sponsors, and they are most
ably supported by the reversion directors.
48:4.3
You would probably best understand the work of the
reversion directors if they were likened to the higher
types of humorists on Urantia, though that would be an
exceedingly crude and somewhat unfortunate way in which
to try to convey an idea of the function of these
directors of change and relaxation, these ministers of
the exalted humor of the morontia and spirit realms.
48:4.4
In discussing spirit humor, first let me tell you what
it is not. Spirit jest is never tinged with the
accentuation of the misfortunes of the weak and erring.
Neither is it ever blasphemous of the righteousness and
glory of divinity. Our humor embraces three general
levels of appreciation:
48:4.5
1. Reminiscent
jests. Quips growing out of the memories of past
episodes in one's experience of combat, struggle, and
sometimes fearfulness, and ofttimes foolish and childish
anxiety. To us, this phase of humor derives from the
deep-seated and abiding ability to draw upon the past
for memory material with which pleasantly to flavor and
otherwise lighten the heavy loads of the present.
48:4.6
2. Current humor.
The senselessness of much that so often causes us
serious concern, the joy at discovering the unimportance
of much of our serious personal anxiety. We are most
appreciative of this phase of humor when we are best
able to discount the anxieties of the present in favor
of the certainties of the future.
48:4.7
3. Prophetic joy.
It will perhaps be difficult for mortals to envisage
this phase of humor, but we do get a peculiar
satisfaction out of the assurance "that all things work
together for good" -- for spirits and morontians as well
as for mortals. This aspect of celestial humor grows out
of our faith in the loving overcare of our superiors and
in the divine stability of our Supreme Directors.
48:4.8
But the reversion directors of the realms are not
concerned exclusively with depicting the high humor of
the various orders of intelligent beings; they are also
occupied with the leadership of diversion, spiritual
recreation and morontia entertainment. And in this
connection they have the hearty co-operation of the
celestial artisans.
48:4.9
The reversion directors themselves are not a created
group; they are a recruited corps embracing beings
ranging from the Havona natives down through the
messenger hosts of space and the ministering spirits of
time to the morontia progressors from the evolutionary
worlds. All are volunteers, giving themselves to the
work of assisting their fellows in the achievement of
thought change and mind rest, for such attitudes are
most helpful in recuperating depleted energies.
48:4.10
When partially exhausted by the efforts of attainment,
and while awaiting the reception of new energy charges,
there is agreeable pleasure in living over again the
enactments of other days and ages.
The early
experiences of the race or the order are restful to
reminisce. And that is exactly why these artists are
called reversion directors -- they assist in reverting
the memory to a former state of development or to a less
experienced status of being.
48:4.11
All beings enjoy this sort of reversion except those who
are inherent Creators, hence automatic
self-rejuvenators, and certain highly specialized types
of creatures, such as the power centers and the physical
controllers, who are always and eternally thoroughly
businesslike in all their reactions. These periodic
releases from the tension of functional duty are a
regular part of life on all worlds throughout the
universe of universes but not on the Isle of Paradise.
Beings indigenous to the central abode are incapable of
depletion and are not, therefore, subject to
re-energizing. And with such beings of eternal Paradise
perfection there can be no such reversion to
evolutionary experiences.
48:4.12
Most of us have come up through lower stages of
existence or through progressive levels of our orders,
and it is refreshing and in a measure amusing to look
back upon certain episodes of our early experience.
There is a restfulness in the contemplation of that
which is old to one's order, and which lingers as a
memory possession of the mind. The future signifies
struggle and advancement; it bespeaks work, effort, and
achievement; but the past savors of things already
mastered and achieved; contemplation of the past permits
of relaxation and such a carefree review as to provoke
spirit mirth and a morontia state of mind verging on
merriment.
48:4.13
Even mortal humor becomes most hearty when it depicts
episodes affecting those just a little beneath one's
present developmental state, or when it portrays one's
supposed superiors falling victim to the experiences
which are commonly associated with supposed inferiors.
You of Urantia have allowed much that is at once vulgar
and unkind to become confused with your humor, but on
the whole, you are to be congratulated on a
comparatively keen sense of humor. Some of your races
have a rich vein of it and are greatly helped in their
earthly careers thereby. Apparently you received much in
the way of humor from your Adamic inheritance, much more
than was secured of either music or art.
48:4.14
All Satania, during times of play, those times when its
inhabitants refreshingly resurrect the memories of a
lower stage of existence, is edified by the pleasant
humor of a corps of reversion directors from Urantia.
The sense of celestial humor we have with us always,
even when engaged in the most difficult of assignments.
It helps to avoid an overdevelopment of the notion of
one's self-importance. But we do not give rein to it
freely, as you might say, "have fun," except when we are
in recess from the serious assignments of our respective
orders.
48:4.15
When we are tempted to magnify our self-importance, if
we stop to contemplate the infinity of the greatness and
grandeur of our Makers, our own self-glorification
becomes sublimely ridiculous, even verging on the
humorous. One of the functions of humor is to help all
of us take ourselves less seriously.
Humor is the
divine antidote for exaltation of ego.
48:4.16
The need for the relaxation and diversion of humor is
greatest in those orders of ascendant beings who are
subjected to sustained stress in their upward struggles.
The two extremes of life have little need for humorous
diversions. Primitive men have no capacity therefor, and
beings of Paradise perfection have no need thereof. The
hosts of Havona are naturally a joyous and exhilarating
assemblage of supremely happy personalities. On Paradise
the quality of worship obviates the necessity for
reversion activities. But among those who start their
careers far below the goal of Paradise perfection, there
is a large place for the ministry of the reversion
directors.
48:4.17
The higher the mortal species, the greater the stress
and the greater the capacity for humor as well as the
necessity for it. In the spirit world the opposite is
true: The higher we ascend, the less the need for the
diversions of reversion experiences. But proceeding down
the scale of spirit life from Paradise to the seraphic
hosts, there is an increasing need for the mission of
mirth and the ministry of merriment. Those beings who
most need the refreshment of periodic reversion to the
intellectual status of previous experiences are the
higher types of the human species, the morontians,
angels, and the Material Sons, together with all similar
types of personality.
48:4.18
Humor should function as an automatic safety valve to
prevent the building up of excessive pressures due to
the monotony of sustained and serious self-contemplation
in association with the intense struggle for
developmental progress and noble achievement. Humor also
functions to lessen the shock of the unexpected impact
of fact or of truth, rigid unyielding fact and flexible
ever-living truth. The mortal personality, never sure as
to which will next be encountered, through humor swiftly
grasps -- sees the point and achieves insight -- the
unexpected nature of the situation be it fact or be it
truth.
48:4.19
While the humor of Urantia is exceedingly crude and most
inartistic, it does serve a valuable purpose both as a
health insurance and as a liberator of emotional
pressure, thus preventing injurious nervous tension and
overserious self-contemplation. Humor and play --
relaxation -- are never reactions of progressive
exertion; always are they the echoes of a backward
glance, a reminiscence of the past. Even on Urantia and
as you now are, you always find it rejuvenating when for
a short time you can suspend the exertions of the newer
and higher intellectual efforts and revert to the more
simple engagements of your ancestors.
48:4.20
The principles of Urantian play life are philosophically
sound and continue to apply on up through your ascending
life, through the circuits of Havona to the eternal
shores of Paradise. As ascendant beings you are in
possession of personal memories of all former and lower
existences, and without such identity memories of the
past there would be no basis for the humor of the
present, either mortal laughter or morontia mirth. It is
this recalling of past experiences that provides the
basis for present diversion and amusement. And so you
will enjoy the celestial equivalents of your earthly
humor all the way up through your long morontia, and
then increasingly spiritual, careers. And that part of
God (the Adjuster) which becomes an eternal part of the
personality of an ascendant mortal contributes the
overtones of divinity to the joyous expressions, even
spiritual laughter, of the ascending creatures of time
and space.
5. THE MANSION WORLD TEACHERS
48:5.1
The Mansion World Teachers are a corps of deserted but
glorified cherubim and sanobim. When a pilgrim of time
advances from a trial world of space to the mansion and
associated worlds of morontia training, he is
accompanied by his personal or group seraphim, the
guardian of destiny. In the worlds of mortal existence
the seraphim is ably assisted by cherubim and sanobim;
but when her mortal ward is delivered from the bonds of
the flesh and starts out on the ascendant career, when
the postmaterial or morontia life begins, the attending
seraphim has no further need of the ministrations of her
former lieutenants, the cherubim and sanobim.
48:5.2
These deserted assistants of the ministering seraphim
are often summoned to universe headquarters, where they
pass into the intimate embrace of the Universe Mother
Spirit and then go forth to the system training spheres
as Mansion World Teachers. These teachers often visit
the material worlds and function from the lowest mansion
worlds on up to the highest of the educational spheres
connected with the universe headquarters. Upon their own
motion they may return to their former associative work
with the ministering seraphim.
48:5.3
There are billions upon billions of these teachers in
Satania, and their numbers constantly increase because,
in the majority of instances, when a seraphim proceeds
inward with an Adjuster-fused mortal, both a cherubim
and a sanobim are left behind.
48:5.4
Mansion World Teachers, like most of the other
instructors, are commissioned by the Melchizedeks. They
are generally supervised by the Morontia Companions, but
as individuals and as teachers they are supervised by
the acting heads of the schools or spheres wherein they
may be functioning as instructors.
48:5.5
These advanced cherubim usually work in pairs as they
did when attached to the seraphim. They are by nature
very near the morontia type of existence, and they are
inherently sympathetic teachers of the ascending mortals
and most efficiently conduct the program of the mansion
world and morontia educational system.
48:5.6
In the schools of the morontia life these teachers
engage in individual, group, class, and mass teaching.
On the mansion worlds such schools are organized in
three general groups of one hundred divisions each: the
schools of thinking, the schools of feeling, and the
schools of doing. When you reach the constellation,
there are added the schools of ethics, the schools of
administration, and the schools of social adjustment. On
the universe headquarters worlds you will enter the
schools of philosophy, divinity, and pure spirituality.
48:5.7
Those things which you might have learned on earth, but
which you failed to learn, must be acquired under the
tutelage of these faithful and patient teachers. There
are no royal roads, short cuts, or easy paths to
Paradise. Irrespective of the individual variations of
the route, you master the lessons of one sphere before
you proceed to another; at least this is true after you
once leave the world of your nativity.
48:5.8
One of the purposes of the morontia career is to effect
the permanent eradication from the mortal survivors of
such animal vestigial traits as procrastination,
equivocation, insincerity, problem avoidance,
unfairness, and ease seeking. The mansonia life early
teaches the young morontia pupils that postponement is
in no sense avoidance. After the life in the flesh, time
is no longer available as a technique of dodging
situations or of circumventing disagreeable obligations.
48:5.9
Beginning service on the lowest of the tarrying spheres,
the Mansion World Teachers advance, with experience,
through the educational spheres of the system and the
constellation to the training worlds of Salvington. They
are subjected to no special discipline either before or
after their embrace by the Universe Mother Spirit. They
have already been trained for their work while serving
as seraphic associates on the worlds native to their
pupils of mansion world sojourn. They have had actual
experience with these advancing mortals on the inhabited
worlds. They are practical and sympathetic teachers,
wise and understanding instructors, able and efficient
guides. They are entirely familiar with the ascendant
plans and thoroughly experienced in the initial phases
of the progression career.
48:5.10
Many of the older of these teachers, those who have long
served on the worlds of the Salvington circuit, are
re-embraced by the Universe Mother Spirit, and from this
second embrace these cherubim and sanobim emerge with
the status of seraphim.
6. MORONTIA WORLD SERAPHIM -- TRANSITION MINISTERS
48:6.1
While all orders of angels, from the planetary helpers
to the supreme seraphim, minister on the morontia
worlds, the transition ministers are more exclusively
assigned to these activities. These angels are of the
sixth order of seraphic servers, and their ministry is
devoted to facilitating the transit of material and
mortal creatures from the temporal life in the flesh on
into the early stages of morontia existence on the seven
mansion worlds.
48:6.2
You should understand that the morontia life of an
ascending mortal is really initiated on the inhabited
worlds at the conception of the soul, at that moment
when the creature mind of moral status is indwelt by the
spirit Adjuster. And from that moment on, the mortal
soul has potential capacity for supermortal function,
even for recognition on the higher levels of the
morontia spheres of the local universe.
48:6.3
You will not, however, be conscious of the ministry of
the transition seraphim until you attain the mansion
worlds, where they labor untiringly for the advancement
of their mortal pupils, being assigned for service in
the following seven divisions:
48:6.4
1. Seraphic
Evangels. The moment you consciousize on the mansion
worlds, you are classified as evolving spirits in the
records of the system. True, you are not yet spirits in
reality, but you are no longer mortal or material
beings; you have embarked upon the prespirit career and
have been duly admitted to the morontia life.
48:6.5
On the mansion worlds the seraphic evangels will help
you to choose wisely among the optional routes to
Edentia, Salvington, Uversa, and Havona. If there are a
number of equally advisable routes, these will be put
before you, and you will be permitted to select the one
that most appeals to you. These seraphim then make
recommendations to the four and twenty advisers on
Jerusem concerning that course which would be most
advantageous for each ascending soul.
48:6.6
You are not given unrestricted choice as to your future
course; but you may choose within the limits of that
which the transition ministers and their superiors
wisely determine to be most suitable for your future
spirit attainment. The spirit world is governed on the
principle of respecting your freewill choice provided
the course you may choose is not detrimental to you or
injurious to your fellows.
48:6.7
These seraphic evangels are dedicated to the
proclamation of the gospel of eternal progression, the
triumph of perfection attainment. On the mansion worlds
they proclaim the great law of the conservation and
dominance of goodness: No act of good is ever wholly
lost; it may be long thwarted but never wholly annulled,
and it is eternally potent in proportion to the divinity
of its motivation.
48:6.8
Even on Urantia they counsel the human teachers of truth
and righteousness to adhere to the preaching of "the
goodness of God, which leads to repentance," to proclaim
"the love of God, which casts out all fear." Even so
have these truths been declared on your world:
The Gods are my caretakers; I shall not stray;
Side by side they lead me in the beautiful paths and
glorious refreshing of life everlasting.
I shall not, in this Divine Presence, want for food nor
thirst for water.
Though I go down into the valley of uncertainty or
ascend up into the worlds of doubt
Though I move in loneliness or with the fellows of my
kind,
Though I triumph in the choirs of light or falter in the
solitary places of the spheres,
Your good spirit shall minister to me, and your glorious
angel will comfort me.
Though I descend into the depths of darkness and death
itself,
I shall not doubt you nor fear you,
For I know that in the fullness of time and the glory of
your name
You will raise me up to sit with you on the battlements
on high.
48:6.9
That is the story whispered in the night season to the
shepherd boy. He could not retain it word for word, but
to the best of his memory he gave it much as it is
recorded today.
48:6.10
These seraphim are also the evangels of the gospel of
perfection attainment for the whole system as well as
for the individual ascender. Even now in the young
system of Satania their teachings and plans encompass
provisions for the future ages when the mansion worlds
will no longer serve the mortal ascenders as
steppingstones to the spheres on high.
48:6.11
2. Racial
Interpreters. All races of mortal beings are not
alike. True, there is a planetary pattern running
through the physical, mental, and spiritual natures and
tendencies of the various races of a given world; but
there are also distinct racial types, and very definite
social tendencies characterize the offspring of these
different basic types of human beings. On the worlds of
time the seraphic racial interpreters further the
efforts of the race commissioners to harmonize the
varied viewpoints of the races, and they continue to
function on the mansion worlds, where these same
differences tend to persist in a measure. On a confused
planet, such as Urantia, these brilliant beings have
hardly had a fair opportunity to function, but they are
the skillful sociologists and the wise ethnic advisers
of the first heaven.
48:6.12
You should consider the statement about "heaven" and the
"heaven of heavens." The heaven conceived by most of
your prophets was the first of the mansion worlds of the
local system. When the apostle spoke of being "caught up
to the third heaven," he referred to that experience in
which his Adjuster was detached during sleep and in this
unusual state made a projection to the third of the
seven mansion worlds. Some of your wise men saw the
vision of the greater heaven, "the heaven of heavens,"
of which the sevenfold mansion world experience was but
the first; the second being Jerusem; the third, Edentia
and its satellites; the fourth, Salvington and the
surrounding educational spheres; the fifth, Uversa; the
sixth, Havona; and the seventh, Paradise.
48:6.13
3. Mind Planners.
These seraphim are devoted to the effective grouping of
morontia beings and to organizing their teamwork on the
mansion worlds. They are the psychologists of the first
heaven. The majority of this particular division of
seraphic ministers have had previous experience as
guardian angels to the children of time, but their
wards, for some reason, failed to personalize on the
mansion worlds or else survived by the technique of
Spirit fusion.
48:6.14
It is the task of the mind planners to study the nature,
experience, and status of the Adjuster souls in transit
through the mansion worlds and to facilitate their
grouping for assignment and advancement. But these mind
planners do not scheme, manipulate, or otherwise take
advantage of the ignorance or other limitations of
mansion world students. They are wholly fair and
eminently just. They respect your newborn morontia will;
they regard you as independent volitional beings, and
they seek to encourage your speedy development and
advancement. Here you are face to face with true friends
and understanding counselors, angels who are really able
to help you "to see yourself as others see you" and "to
know yourself as angels know you."
48:6.15
Even on Urantia, these seraphim teach the everlasting
truth: If your own mind does not serve you well, you can
exchange it for the mind of Jesus of Nazareth, who
always serves you well.
48:6.16
4. Morontia
Counselors. These ministers receive their name
because they are assigned to teach, direct, and counsel
the surviving mortals from the worlds of human origin,
souls in transit to the higher schools of the system
headquarters. They are the teachers of those who seek
insight into the experiential unity of divergent life
levels, those who are attempting the integration of
meanings and the unification of values. This is the
function of philosophy in mortal life, of mota on the
morontia spheres.
48:6.17
Mota is more than a superior philosophy; it is to
philosophy as two eyes are to one; it has a stereoscopic
effect on meanings and values. Material man sees the
universe, as it were, with but one eye -- flat. Mansion
world students achieve cosmic perspective -- depth -- by
superimposing the perceptions of the morontia life upon
the perceptions of the physical life. And they are
enabled to bring these material and morontial viewpoints
into true focus largely through the untiring ministry of
their seraphic counselors, who so patiently teach the
mansion world students and the morontia progressors.
Many of the teaching counselors of the supreme order of
seraphim began their careers as advisers of the newly
liberated souls of the mortals of time.
48:6.18
5. Technicians.
These are the seraphim who help new ascenders adjust
themselves to the new and comparatively strange
environment of the morontia spheres. Life on the
transition worlds entails real contact with the energies
and materials of both the physical and morontia levels
and to a certain extent with spiritual realities.
Ascenders must acclimatize to every new morontia level,
and in all of this they are greatly helped by the
seraphic technicians. These seraphim act as liaisons
with the Morontia Power Supervisors and with the Master
Physical Controllers and function extensively as
instructors of the ascending pilgrims concerning the
nature of those energies which are utilized on the
transition spheres. They serve as emergency space
traversers and perform numerous other regular and
special duties.
48:6.19
6.
Recorder-Teachers. These seraphim are the recorders
of the borderland transactions of the spiritual and the
physical, of the relationships of men and angels, of the
morontia transactions of the lower universe realms. They
also serve as instructors regarding the efficient and
effective techniques of fact recording. There is an
artistry in the intelligent assembly and co-ordination
of related data, and this art is heightened in
collaboration with the celestial artisans, and even the
ascending mortals become thus affiliated with the
recording seraphim.
48:6.20
The recorders of all the seraphic orders devote a
certain amount of time to the education and training of
the morontia progressors. These angelic custodians of
the facts of time are the ideal instructors of all fact
seekers. Before leaving Jerusem, you will become quite
familiar with the history of Satania and its 619
inhabited worlds, and much of this story will be
imparted by the seraphic recorders.
48:6.21
These angels are all in the chain of recorders extending
from the lowest to the highest custodians of the facts
of time and the truths of eternity. Some day they will
teach you to seek truth as well as fact, to expand your
soul as well as your mind. Even now you should learn to
water the garden of your heart as well as to seek for
the dry sands of knowledge. Forms are valueless when
lessons are learned. No chick may be had without the
shell, and no shell is of any worth after the chick is
hatched. But sometimes error is so great that its
rectification by revelation would be fatal to those
slowly emerging truths which are essential to its
experiential overthrow. When children have their ideals,
do not dislodge them; let them grow. And while you are
learning to think as men, you should also be learning to
pray as children.
48:6.22
Law is life itself and not the rules of its conduct.
Evil is a transgression of law, not a violation of the
rules of conduct pertaining to life, which
is the law.
Falsehood is not a matter of narration technique but
something premeditated as a perversion of truth. The
creation of new pictures out of old facts, the
restatement of parental life in the lives of offspring
-- these are the artistic triumphs of truth. The shadow
of a hair's turning, premeditated for an untrue purpose,
the slightest twisting or perversion of that which is
principle -- these constitute falseness. But the fetish
of factualized truth, fossilized truth, the iron band of
so-called unchanging truth, holds one blindly in a
closed circle of cold fact. One can be technically right
as to fact and everlastingly wrong in the truth.
48:6.23
7. Ministering
Reserves. A large corps of all orders of the
transition seraphim is held on the first mansion world.
Next to the destiny guardians, these transition
ministers draw the nearest to humans of all orders of
seraphim, and many of your leisure moments will be spent
with them. Angels take delight in service and, when
unassigned, often minister as volunteers. The soul of
many an ascending mortal has for the first time been
kindled by the divine fire of the will-to-service
through personal friendship with the volunteer servers
of the seraphic reserves.
48:6.24
From them you will learn to let pressure develop
stability and certainty; to be faithful and earnest and,
withal, cheerful; to accept challenges without complaint
and to face difficulties and uncertainties without fear.
They will ask: If you fail, will you rise indomitably to
try anew? If you succeed, will you maintain a
well-balanced poise -- a stabilized and spiritualized
attitude -- throughout every effort in the long struggle
to break the fetters of material inertia, to attain the
freedom of spirit existence?
48:6.25
Even as mortals, so have these angels been father to
many disappointments, and they will point out that
sometimes your most disappointing disappointments have
become your greatest blessings. Sometimes the planting
of a seed necessitates its death, the death of your
fondest hopes, before it can be reborn to bear the
fruits of new life and new opportunity. And from them
you will learn to suffer less through sorrow and
disappointment, first, by making fewer personal plans
concerning other personalities, and then, by accepting
your lot when you have faithfully performed your duty.
48:6.26
You will learn that you increase your burdens and
decrease the likelihood of success by taking yourself
too seriously. Nothing can take precedence over the work
of your status sphere -- this world or the next. Very
important is the work of preparation for the next higher
sphere, but nothing equals the importance of the work of
the world in which you are actually living. But though
the work is important, the
self is not.
When you feel important, you lose energy to the wear and
tear of ego dignity so that there is little energy left
to do the work. Self-importance, not work-importance,
exhausts immature creatures; it is the self element that
exhausts, not the effort to achieve. You can do
important work if you do not become self-important; you
can do several things as easily as one if you leave
yourself out. Variety is restful; monotony is what wears
and exhausts. Day after day is alike -- just life or the
alternative of death.
7. MORONTIA MOTA
48:7.1
The lower planes of morontia mota join directly with the
higher levels of human philosophy. On the first mansion
world it is the practice to teach the less advanced
students by the parallel technique; that is, in one
column are presented the more simple concepts of mota
meanings, and in the opposite column citation is made of
analogous statements of mortal philosophy.
48:7.2
Not long since, while executing an assignment on the
first mansion world of Satania, I had occasion to
observe this method of teaching; and though I may not
undertake to present the mota content of the lesson, I
am permitted to record the twenty-eight statements of
human philosophy which this morontia instructor was
utilizing as illustrative material designed to assist
these new mansion world sojourners in their early
efforts to grasp the significance and meaning of mota.
These illustrations of human philosophy were:
48:7.3
1. A display of specialized skill does not signify
possession of spiritual capacity. Cleverness is not a
substitute for true character.
48:7.4
2. Few persons live up to the faith which they really
have. Unreasoned fear is a master intellectual fraud
practiced upon the evolving mortal soul.
48:7.5
3. Inherent capacities cannot be exceeded; a pint can
never hold a quart. The spirit concept cannot be
mechanically forced into the material memory mold.
48:7.6
4. Few mortals ever dare to draw anything like the sum
of personality credits established by the combined
ministries of nature and grace. The majority of
impoverished souls are truly rich, but they refuse to
believe it.
48:7.7
5. Difficulties may challenge mediocrity and defeat the
fearful, but they only stimulate the true children of
the Most Highs.
48:7.8
6. To enjoy privilege without abuse, to have liberty
without license, to possess power and steadfastly refuse
to use it for self-aggrandizement -- these are the marks
of high civilization.
48:7.9
7. Blind and unforeseen accidents do not occur in the
cosmos. Neither do the celestial beings assist the lower
being who refuses to act upon his light of truth.
48:7.10
8. Effort does not always produce joy, but there is no
happiness without intelligent effort.
48:7.11
9. Action achieves strength; moderation eventuates in
charm.
48:7.12
10. Righteousness strikes the harmony chords of truth,
and the melody vibrates throughout the cosmos, even to
the recognition of the Infinite.
48:7.13
11. The weak indulge in resolutions, but the strong act.
Life is but a day's work -- do it well. The act is ours;
the consequences God's.
48:7.14
12. The greatest affliction of the cosmos is never to
have been afflicted. Mortals only learn wisdom by
experiencing tribulation.
48:7.15
13. Stars are best discerned from the lonely isolation
of experiential depths, not from the illuminated and
ecstatic mountain tops.
48:7.16
14. Whet the appetites of your associates for truth;
give advice only when it is asked for.
48:7.17
15. Affectation is the ridiculous effort of the ignorant
to appear wise, the attempt of the barren soul to appear
rich.
48:7.18
16. You cannot perceive spiritual truth until you
feelingly experience it, and many truths are not really
felt except in adversity.
48:7.19
17. Ambition is dangerous until it is fully socialized.
You have not truly acquired any virtue until your acts
make you worthy of it.
48:7.20
18. Impatience is a spirit poison; anger is like a stone
hurled into a hornet's nest.
48:7.21
19. Anxiety must be abandoned. The disappointments
hardest to bear are those which never come.
48:7.22
20. Only a poet can discern poetry in the commonplace
prose of routine existence.
48:7.23
21. The high mission of any art is, by its illusions, to
foreshadow a higher universe reality, to crystallize the
emotions of time into the thought of eternity.
48:7.24
22. The evolving soul is not made divine by what it
does, but by what it strives to do.
48:7.25
23. Death added nothing to the intellectual possession
or to the spiritual endowment, but it did add to the
experiential status the consciousness of survival.
48:7.26
24. The destiny of eternity is determined moment by
moment by the achievements of the day by day living. The
acts of today are the destiny of tomorrow.
48:7.27
25. Greatness lies not so much in possessing strength as
in making a wise and divine use of such strength.
48:7.28
26. Knowledge is possessed only by sharing; it is
safeguarded by wisdom and socialized by love.
48:7.29
27. Progress demands development of individuality;
mediocrity seeks perpetuation in standardization.
48:7.30
28. The argumentative defense of any proposition is
inversely proportional to the truth contained.
48:7.31
Such is the work of the beginners on the first mansion
world while the more advanced pupils on the later worlds
are mastering the higher levels of cosmic insight and
morontia mota.
8. THE MORONTIA PROGRESSORS
48:8.1
From the time of graduation from the mansion worlds to
the attainment of spirit status in the superuniverse
career, ascending mortals are denominated morontia
progressors. Your passage through this wonderful
borderland life will be an unforgettable experience, a
charming memory. It is the evolutionary portal to spirit
life and the eventual attainment of creature perfection
by which ascenders achieve the goal of time -- the
finding of God on Paradise.
48:8.2
There is a definite and divine purpose in all this
morontia and subsequent spirit scheme of mortal
progression, this elaborate universe training school for
ascending creatures. It is the design of the Creators to
afford the creatures of time a graduated opportunity to
master the details of the operation and administration
of the grand universe, and this long course of training
is best carried forward by having the surviving mortal
climb up gradually and by actual participation in every
step of the ascent.
48:8.3
The mortal-survival plan has a practical and serviceable
objective; you are not the recipients of all this divine
labor and painstaking training only that you may survive
just to enjoy endless bliss and eternal ease. There is a
goal of transcendent service concealed beyond the
horizon of the present universe age. If the Gods
designed merely to take you on one long and eternal joy
excursion, they certainly would not so largely turn the
whole universe into one vast and intricate practical
training school, requisition a substantial part of the
celestial creation as teachers and instructors, and then
spend ages upon ages piloting you, one by one, through
this gigantic universe school of experiential training.
The furtherance of the scheme of mortal progression
seems to be one of the chief businesses of the present
organized universe, and the majority of innumerable
orders of created intelligences are either directly or
indirectly engaged in advancing some phase of this
progressive perfection plan.
48:8.4
In traversing the ascending scale of living existence
from mortal man to the Deity embrace, you actually live
the very life of every possible phase and stage of
perfected creature existence within the limits of the
present universe age. From mortal man to Paradise
finaliter embraces all that now can be -- encompasses
everything presently possible to the living orders of
intelligent, perfected finite creature beings. If the
future destiny of the Paradise finaliters is service in
new universes now in the making, it is assured that in
this new and future creation there will be no created
orders of experiential beings whose lives will be wholly
different from those which mortal finaliters have lived
on some world as a part of their ascending training, as
one of the stages of their agelong progress from animal
to angel and from angel to spirit and from spirit to
God.
48:8.5
Presented by an Archangel of Nebadon.
*
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