-
Posts
-
So, aren’t emotions/feelings also sourced in mind and by the gift/loan of mind?
TUB’s definition of mind:
0:5.8 2. Mind. The thinking, perceiving, and feeling mechanism of the human organism. The total conscious and unconscious experience. The intelligence associated with the emotional life reaching upward through worship and wisdom to the spirit level.
Mind is associated with the emotional life but note the reference to intelligence, specifically intelligence reaching up. Emotions exist on all levels. The ones we strive for are the ones on the spirit level. They are the ones we learn from the Father’s nature. The only place to learn that is the soul, which you get to by reaching up through the adjutants of worship and wisdom (gateway).
I don’t think there is a feeling/emotion ‘circuit’ but they are certainly normal…both the good and bad – fear and pride are also emotions/feelings, no? So I assume the mind is the source of both cognition and feelings. Is feeling a form of thinking? There are negative emotions and there certainly is stinkin’ thinkin’! How are they similar and different? (Help!)We certainly can change our auto reactions and control our lower/lesser/negative emotions by mind and we can change what we think about and what we think about what we think about….how is all this related?
There are quotes for that:
140:4.8 An effective philosophy of living is formed by a combination of cosmic insight and the total of one’s emotional reactions to the social and economic environment. Remember: While inherited urges cannot be fundamentally modified, emotional responses to such urges can be changed; therefore the moral nature can be modified, character can be improved. In the strong character emotional responses are integrated and co-ordinated, and thus is produced a unified personality. Deficient unification weakens the moral nature and engenders unhappiness.
108:6.4 The Adjuster is the wellspring of spiritual attainment and the hope of divine character within you. He is the power, privilege, and the possibility of survival, which so fully and forever distinguishes you from mere animal creatures. He is the higher and truly internal spiritual stimulus of thought in contrast with the external and physical stimulus, which reaches the mind over the nerve-energy mechanism of the material body. (1786.1) 161:2.6 5. He seems to know the thoughts of men’s minds and to understand the longings of their hearts. And he is always sympathetic with our troubled spirits. He seems to possess all our human emotions, but they are magnificently glorified. He strongly loves goodness and equally hates sin. He possesses a superhuman consciousness of the presence of Deity. He prays like a man but performs like a God. He seems to foreknow things; he even now dares to speak about his death, some mystic reference to his future glorification. While he is kind, he is also brave and courageous. He never falters in doing his duty.
34:7.1 The flesh, the inherent nature derived from the animal-origin races, does not naturally bear the fruits of the divine Spirit. When the mortal nature has been upstepped by the addition of the nature of the Material Sons of God, as the Urantia races were in a measure advanced by the bestowal of Adam, then is the way better prepared for the Spirit of Truth to co-operate with the indwelling Adjuster to bring forth the beautiful harvest of the character fruits of the spirit. If you do not reject this spirit, even though eternity may be required to fulfill the commission, “he will guide you into all truth.” 100:7.1 Although the average mortal of Urantia cannot hope to attain the high perfection of character which Jesus of Nazareth acquired while sojourning in the flesh, it is altogether possible for every mortal believer to develop a strong and unified personality along the perfected lines of the Jesus personality. The unique feature of the Master’s personality was not so much its perfection as its symmetry, its exquisite and balanced unification. The most effective presentation of Jesus consists in following the example of the one who said, as he gestured toward the Master standing before his accusers, “Behold the man!” 194:3.1 When man yields the “fruits of the spirit” in his life, he is simply showing forth the traits which the Master manifested in his own earthly life. When Jesus was on earth, he lived his life as one personality—Jesus of Nazareth. As the indwelling spirit of the “new teacher,” the Master has, since Pentecost, been able to live his life anew in the experience of every truth-taught believer.
And incidentally, all those quotes above are also about the evolution of dominance – transfer of identity. When we discover, recognize, interpret and choose the higher, divine emotions we are creating a divine character, like Jesus’ character, which then becomes the soul. It’s our evolving divine character that awakens on mansonia, and that character is created by habitually choosing to become more like Jesus, become more Godlike, aka, divinity attainment. The only way I know how to do that is through prayer/worship/meditation/reflective thinking, or whatever you want to call it. The four faith attitudes encourage the mind to develop this habit of thinking which promotes the evolution of dominance toward a divine character.
Rodan explained it well:
(1777.2) 160:3.1 The effort toward maturity necessitates work, and work requires energy. Whence the power to accomplish all this? The physical things can be taken for granted, but the Master has well said, “Man cannot live by bread alone.” Granted the possession of a normal body and reasonably good health, we must next look for those lures which will act as a stimulus to call forth man’s slumbering spiritual forces. Jesus has taught us that God lives in man; then how can we induce man to release these soul-bound powers of divinity and infinity? How shall we induce men to let go of God that he may spring forth to the refreshment of our own souls while in transit outward and then to serve the purpose of enlightening, uplifting, and blessing countless other souls? How best can I awaken these latent powers for good which lie dormant in your souls? One thing I am sure of: Emotional excitement is not the ideal spiritual stimulus. Excitement does not augment energy; it rather exhausts the powers of both mind and body. Whence then comes the energy to do these great things? Look to your Master. Even now he is out in the hills taking in power while we are here giving out energy. The secret of all this problem is wrapped up in spiritual communion, in worship. From the human standpoint it is a question of combined meditation and relaxation. Meditation makes the contact of mind with spirit; relaxation determines the capacity for spiritual receptivity. And this interchange of strength for weakness, courage for fear, the will of God for the mind of self, constitutes worship. At least, that is the way the philosopher views it.
(1777.3) 160:3.2 When these experiences are frequently repeated, they crystallize into habits, strength-giving and worshipful habits, and such habits eventually formulate themselves into a spiritual character, and such a character is finally recognized by one’s fellows as a mature personality. These practices are difficult and time-consuming at first, but when they become habitual, they are at once restful and timesaving. The more complex society becomes, and the more the lures of civilization multiply, the more urgent will become the necessity for God-knowing individuals to form such protective habitual practices designed to conserve and augment their spiritual energies.
Thanks for all the great commentary and quotes Bonita!! Appreciate the text by Rodan and the higher emotions and their source.
Yes…The Real Nature of Religion and Religion In Human Experience describes the transfer of the seat of our personal and personally chosen identity – it is about the formation of character – or at least that character that is based on reality and our reality recognition and reality response. And this progressive and transformative process delivers maturity and wisdom and strength and capacity and capability in our experience and the expressions of our experience as demonstrated by our choices. Sincerity does not equal wisdom…but, over time, it will or should deliver it by the experience of ever more decisions….(sincerity + decisions + time – think quantity) x (faith + discernment – think quality) = (experience + maturity) = (self mastery + the fruits of the Spirit) = Personal Identity, Character, Selfhood as resident in Soul.
Religion is transformative or it is not real or true or useful. We are taught in this Paper and others that there is immature and primitive forms of faith and religious experience and there is that enlightened form and experience exemplified by the Master and there is that everywhere on the spectrum in between. Jesus taught that no matter our position on this scale or spectrum, every decision and motive and intention and priority and decision and act at every intersection of choice is an opportunity to either progress or regress in our religious experience and transformative outcomes. We do not hold ground gained or fruit born on the branch without continuation of growth by choice and decision and sincerity and faithfulness and trust….the branch grows or weakens always.
Besides the errors and mistakes of judgment due to inexperience and immaturity which are improved primarily by repetition over time (experience) which should lead to better judgement and wisdom by that experience, we are taught that there are impediments to transformation, growth, wisdom, maturity, and the fruits of the Spirit….feelings and thoughts which weaken the branch’s hold and attachment and growth to the vine….these are called poisons. We choose to embrace them and ingest them. Some of us become either intoxicated, habituated, addicted, or otherwise obsessed by these poisons. Some of us only nibble on them time to time and they text our faith in their effects upon us. But for those who do successfully transfer the seat of our identity, we do also wean ourselves off of and away from these more material and animal identity influences that are normal enough but also peculiarly and uniquely human in their manifestations. We should note that it is these same attributes that also poison society and retard the growth and progress of civilization on every material world.
110:1.5 [Part III]
The Adjuster remains with you in all disaster and through every sickness which does not wholly destroy the mentality. But how unkind knowingly to defile or otherwise deliberately to pollute the physical body, which must serve as the earthly tabernacle of this marvelous gift from God. All physical poisons greatly retard the efforts of the Adjuster to exalt the material mind, while the mental poisons of fear, anger, envy, jealousy, suspicion, and intolerance likewise tremendously interfere with the spiritual progress of the evolving soul.48:7.20 [Part II]
18. Impatience is a spirit poison; anger is like a stone hurled into a hornet’s nest.111:7.5 [Part III]
“Much of my difficulty was due to the unending conflict between the two natures of my subject: the urge of ambition opposed by animal indolence; the ideals of a superior people crossed by the instincts of an inferior race; the high purposes of a great mind antagonized by the urge of a primitive inheritance; the long-distance view of a far-seeing Monitor counteracted by the nearsightedness of a creature of time; the progressive plans of an ascending being modified by the desires and longings of a material nature; the flashes of universe intelligence cancelled by the chemical-energy mandates of the evolving race; the urge of angels opposed by the emotions of an animal; the training of an intellect annulled by the tendencies of instinct; the experience of the individual opposed by the accumulated propensities of the race; the aims of the best overshadowed by the drift of the worst; the flight of genius neutralized by the gravity of mediocrity; the progress of the good retarded by the inertia of the bad; the art of the beautiful besmirched by the presence of evil; the buoyancy of health neutralized by the debility of disease; the fountain of faith polluted by the poisons of fear; the spring of joy embittered by the waters of sorrow; the gladness of anticipation disillusioned by the bitterness of realization; the joys of living ever threatened by the sorrows of death. Such a life on such a planet! And yet, because of the ever-present help and urge of the Thought Adjuster, this soul did achieve a fair degree of happiness and success and has even now ascended to the judgment halls of mansonia.”A link to the quotes for “anxiety OR anxieties”:
48:7.21 [Part II]
19. Anxiety must be abandoned. The disappointments hardest to bear are those which never come.Personally, I have found it not so easy to completely abandon anxiety. It has been many years since I was at all anxious about my soul or my destiny and in my yondering years I learned to trust in my daily bread and the bounty of God’s love for me. But then there are my children and grandchildren and parents and wife and clients and the strangers I meet and never meet who suffer and face life’s vicissitudes and conflicts….and my personal obligations to them and my service to them. I have few anxieties for myself but there are those who depend upon me…what of them? It is not just me….and has not been for a long, long time….the era of footloose and fancy free are now gone. And I am not so nimble or strong myself anymore. My anxieties now include my own dependence and loss of independence….am I to be served rather than serve? How does one get their mind around that? I see my own parents and my wife’s parents suffering from such transitions now.
Ahhhh…. the Master said:
140:6.13 [Part IV]
“….. be not anxious for your lives; much less be concerned with what you shall eat or what you shall drink; nor yet for your bodies, what clothing you shall wear. Already have you learned that willing hands and earnest hearts shall not go hungry. And now, when you prepare to devote all of your energies to the work of the kingdom, be assured that the Father will not be unmindful of your needs. Seek first the kingdom of God, and when you have found entrance thereto, all things needful shall be added to you. Be not, therefore, unduly anxious for the morrow. Sufficient for the day is the trouble thereof.”Me here: Sufficient Indeed!!! Hahahahahaha…..Jesus has quite the sense of humor!
101:2.7 (1106.6) Science ends its reason-search in the hypothesis of a First Cause. Religion does not stop in its flight of faith until it is sure of a God of salvation. The discriminating study of science logically suggests the reality and existence of an Absolute. Religion believes unreservedly in the existence and reality of a God who fosters personality survival. What metaphysics fails utterly in doing, and what even philosophy fails partially in doing, revelation does; that is, affirms that this First Cause of science and religion’s God of salvation are one and the same Deity.
101:2.8 (1106.7) Reason is the proof of science, faith the proof of religion, logic the proof of philosophy, but revelation is validated only by human experience. Science yields knowledge; religion yields happiness; philosophy yields unity; revelation confirms the experiential harmony of this triune approach to universal reality.
101:2.9 (1106.8) The contemplation of nature can only reveal a God of nature, a God of motion. Nature exhibits only matter, motion, and animation — life. Matter plus energy, under certain conditions, is manifested in living forms, but while natural life is thus relatively continuous as a phenomenon, it is wholly transient as to individualities. Nature does not afford ground for logical belief in human-personality survival. The religious man who finds God in nature has already and first found this same personal God in his own soul.
101:2.10 (1106.9) Faith reveals God in the soul. Revelation, the substitute for morontia insight on an evolutionary world, enables man to see the same God in nature that faith exhibits in his soul. Thus does revelation successfully bridge the gulf between the material and the spiritual, even between the creature and the Creator, between man and God.
101:2.11 (1107.1) The contemplation of nature does logically point in the direction of intelligent guidance, even living supervision, but it does not in any satisfactory manner reveal a personal God. On the other hand, nature discloses nothing which would preclude the universe from being looked upon as the handiwork of the God of religion. God cannot be found through nature alone, but man having otherwise found him, the study of nature becomes wholly consistent with a higher and more spiritual interpretation of the universe.
Me here: Let us consider the role of personal revelation to faith. Note that personal revelation not only reveals but also confirms, adjusts, aligns, integrates, and harmonizes….to the degree that our personal philosophy for living is truthful and based on reality we grow and become more mature and wise and grow the fruits of the Spirit! But faith alone and trust in the Lord will also deliver fruit and attach the branch to the vine….faith is itself a form of wisdom I think.
Personally, I have found it not so easy to completely abandon anxiety.
I don’t think it’s possible to completely abandon all anxiety. There are different kinds of anxiety and some I think are useful (see quotes). I think the kind of anxiety Jesus taught against is the kind that produces unreasonable fear and disproportionate concern for the self.
My own anxieties arise when it comes to decision making. Wanting most fervently to do God’s will, I do concern myself, perhaps too much, with weighing all the options, until I’m sure. And when I say sure, I’m saying that I’m sure I’ve come across a very good option. Whether or not it’s the best option God laid out for me, I cannot say. But I can be sure that there probably is a better or best option that I missed and I hope I get another opportunity some day to rediscover it. But I do stress over that sort of thing, the “what am I missing here,” “am I seeing the whole picture,” type of worry. I thought at one time it would be wise not to have those worries, then I laughed at myself. Only the religiously frothy flit about and go with their gut feelings. Reflecting on a problem/decision cannot be wrong. Becoming paralyzed by thoughts, however, is a mistake. At some point you just have to take your best decision and go with it, knowing it’s a learning curve and mistakes are a normal part of it.
23:2.5 Your anxieties and sorrows, your trials and disappointments, are just as much a part of the divine plan on your sphere as are the exquisite perfection and infinite adaptation of all things to their supreme purpose on the worlds of the central and perfect universe.
86:2.1 Anxiety was a natural state of the savage mind. When men and women fall victims to excessive anxiety, they are simply reverting to the natural estate of their far-distant ancestors; and when anxiety becomes actually painful, it inhibits activity and unfailingly institutes evolutionary changes and biologic adaptations. Pain and suffering are essential to progressive evolution.
111:6.1 Many of the temporal troubles of mortal man grow out of his twofold relation to the cosmos. Man is a part of nature—he exists in nature—and yet he is able to transcend nature. Man is finite, but he is indwelt by a spark of infinity. Such a dual situation not only provides the potential for evil but also engenders many social and moral situations fraught with much uncertainty and not a little anxiety.
. . . faith is itself a form of wisdom I think.
TUB mentions in three places that “the fear of the Lord which is the beginning of wisdom.”. Each time it’s in quotes, which means it’s from the Bible, so I looked it up. Sure enough, it’s from the following: Proverbs 9:10, 1:7; Psalms 111:1; Job 28:28.
But revelation is supposed to change that fear of what God does to praise for what God is.
(1675.6) 149:6.5 “Your forebears feared God because he was mighty and mysterious. You shall adore him because he is magnificent in love, plenteous in mercy, and glorious in truth. The power of God engenders fear in the heart of man, but the nobility and righteousness of his personality beget reverence, love, and willing worship. A dutiful and affectionate son does not fear or dread even a mighty and noble father. I have come into the world to put love in the place of fear, joy in the place of sorrow, confidence in the place of dread, loving service and appreciative worship in the place of slavish bondage and meaningless ceremonies. But it is still true of those who sit in darkness that ‘the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.’ But when the light has more fully come, the sons of God are led to praise the Infinite for what he is rather than to fear him for what he does.
We humans have the amazing gift of the full nature of God, what he is, actually living in our heads (sorry George). By having a relationship with him in our heads, (sharing the inner life with him), we have the opportunity to become more like him in our own nature. Sonship means we have inherited the divine nature. All that is left for us to do is self-realization, which is another way of saying self-revelation, allowing our true and divine self to be revealed to ourselves. And that comes from sharing the inner life and imitating what we discover there. Imitation will be imperfect at first, but as the ego/alter-ego relationship grows, the nearer to divinity we get in our attempts. We have less fear, less duty-bound thinking, and more love and loyalty.
111:5.1 The doing of the will of God is nothing more or less than an exhibition of creature willingness to share the inner life with God--with the very God who has made such a creature life of inner meaning-value possible. Sharing is Godlike–divine. God shares all with the Eternal Son and the Infinite Spirit, while they, in turn, share all things with the divine Sons and spirit Daughters of the universes.
111:5.2 The imitation of God is the key to perfection; the doing of his will is the secret of survival and of perfection in survival.
But is faith itself a form of wisdom? Great question. Isn’t wisdom part of the philosophical realm of cosmic mind ministry, and faith part of worship? I think true wisdom leads to faith, just like worship and wisdom opens the gateway to the soul. Open to other ideas though.
p1141:4 103:9.6 . . . In the higher philosophy of the universe, wisdom, like reason, becomes allied to faith. Reason, wisdom, and faith are man’s highest human attainments. Reason introduces man to the world of facts, to things; wisdom introduces him to a world of truth, to relationships; faith initiates him into a world of divinity, spiritual experience.
But is faith itself a form of wisdom? Great question. Isn’t wisdom part of the philosophical realm of cosmic mind ministry, and faith part of worship? I think true wisdom leads to faith, just like worship and wisdom opens the gateway to the soul. Open to other ideas though.
Or is it that faith is the foundation of and delivers wisdom? Perhaps both? Maybe faith is the first proof of and act of wisdom? To view life within and our life in the material world by faith immediately delivers a perspective of unity or required unification to both natures – the spiritual and material – and results in or requires a new paradigm of view and consideration of all feelings in and responses to the situations and circumstances and relationships in life. Faith forces a new dynamic of our philosophy of living that includes the Spirit nature…and by this view are we transformed by the spirit connection and the spiritization of soul in cooperation with our God Fragment. We transcend the animal view and seat of identity by simple faith….the beginning of wisdom? So faith is both the seed and the fruit of wisdom I think. The seed which sprouts and the source of the seed itself.
We are taught that nature is very illuminating in its demonstrations of greater realities and truths. The seed and stem and flower and fruit which delivers the seed and stem and flower and fruit has always been a miraculous demonstration of great truths. Gardening is recommended to us as a way to discern and learn and connect….and not merely to feed ourselves. The patterns of material reality and the connectivity of so many elements of supporting and dependent mechanisms of process and result are illustrative of the spirit nature and life and reality too.
Of course, there’s nothing really simple about it!! It’s beginning is simple enough I suppose…we feel a yearning within that we respond to for which we receive a confirmation which we also respond to and that becomes more personal and feelings of mutual affection in this deliver a relationship which makes us glad and satisfies the yearn, hunger, and thirst in mind….the personality response of the personality endowment within the mortal to the original or source personality…it’s all very personal! From there, faith in the person of God and the voice and touch of God within us changes us over time and grows soul which further transforms us and also reinforces and grows our very faith too….our mind transcends our origins and material nature by the power of faith. We are told that “faith reveals God in the soul” and “is the proof of religion”.
Remember that faith is not just an experience within but is also an expression in living and being and growing….faith is our primary fulcrum for becoming while the resulting spiritization is the lever of power and lift for transcendence and the transfer of the seat of identity…or so I understand it. Wisdom is the result of the experience of faith in time for those who are attentive and discerning – growing by learning….becoming by being. Faith brings personal revelation for the delivery of insight and understanding reality and integrating and harmonizing our perspective and our philosophy of living….mysteries become answered even if not understood and priorities are formed based on faith itself rather than knowledge and proofs….our trust in God and God’s reality and God’s creation, purpose, plan, and power overcomes all mystery, confusion, doubt, uncertainty, ignorance, blindness, and material disappointments. Faith delivers the fruits of happiness and contentment and patience and kindness to others and fortitude and courage and hope and assurance to the faith child.
101:2.12 (1107.2) Revelation as an epochal phenomenon is periodic; as a personal human experience it is continuous. Divinity functions in mortal personality as the Adjuster gift of the Father, as the Spirit of Truth of the Son, and as the Holy Spirit of the Universe Spirit, while these three supermortal endowments are unified in human experiential evolution as the ministry of the Supreme.
101:2.13 (1107.3) True religion is an insight into reality, the faith-child of the moral consciousness, and not a mere intellectual assent to any body of dogmatic doctrines. True religion consists in the experience that “the Spirit itself bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God.” Religion consists not in theologic propositions but in spiritual insight and the sublimity of the soul’s trust.
101:2.14 (1107.4) Your deepest nature — the divine Adjuster — creates within you a hunger and thirst for righteousness, a certain craving for divine perfection. Religion is the faith act of the recognition of this inner urge to divine attainment; and thus is brought about that soul trust and assurance of which you become conscious as the way of salvation, the technique of the survival of personality and all those values which you have come to look upon as being true and good.
101:2.15 (1107.5) The realization of religion never has been, and never will be, dependent on great learning or clever logic. It is spiritual insight, and that is just the reason why some of the world’s greatest religious teachers, even the prophets, have sometimes possessed so little of the wisdom of the world. Religious faith is available alike to the learned and the unlearned.
101:2.16 (1107.6) Religion must ever be its own critic and judge; it can never be observed, much less understood, from the outside. Your only assurance of a personal God consists in your own insight as to your belief in, and experience with, things spiritual. To all of your fellows who have had a similar experience, no argument about the personality or reality of God is necessary, while to all other men who are not thus sure of God no possible argument could ever be truly convincing.
101:2.17 (1107.7) Psychology may indeed attempt to study the phenomena of religious reactions to the social environment, but never can it hope to penetrate to the real and inner motives and workings of religion. Only theology, the province of faith and the technique of revelation, can afford any sort of intelligent account of the nature and content of religious experience.
In regards to the interplay between faith and wisdom, we know one thing: Wisdom is not necessary for survival, but faith is.
(739.8) 65:8.4 As mind evolution is dependent on, and delayed by, the slow development of physical conditions, so is spiritual progress dependent on mental expansion and unfailingly delayed by intellectual retardation. But this does not mean that spiritual evolution is dependent on education, culture, or wisdom. The soul may evolve regardless of mental culture but not in the absence of mental capacity and desire — the choice of survival and the decision to achieve ever-increasing perfection — to do the will of the Father in heaven. Although survival may not depend on the possession of knowledge and wisdom, progression most certainly does.
146:3.4 And Jesus said to Thomas: “Your assurance that you have entered into the kingdom family of the Father, and that you will eternally survive with the children of the kingdom, is wholly a matter of personal experience — faith in the word of truth. . . .
146:3.5 . . . You survive your life in the material world of the flesh because you are identified with the Father’s living spirit, the gift of eternal life. . . . .
Moreover, there are many types of wisdom. In one place (27:6.3) they tell us that there are seventy functional divisions of wisdom on Paradise. And even on this lowly world of existence, TUB refers to many different levels of wisdom. Mota is a form of morontia wisdom (45:7.6), which I think may require faith to discover, recognize and interpret; but, I can’t find a reference yet (not that there isn’t one) which says faith is a necessary component of worldly wisdom.
When it comes to wisdom, I find the following quote useful. Wisdom is that middle ground between fact and truth. I don’t think faith is necessary to become conscious of facts, but at some point the mind must draw upon faith in order to become conscious of ideal values (truth) which reside in the soul. Without spiritual insight wisdom could not evolve to its highest achievable level.
102:3.5 Science, knowledge, leads to fact consciousness; religion, experience, leads to value consciousness; philosophy, wisdom, leads to co-ordinate consciousness; revelation (the substitute for morontia mota) leads to the consciousness of true reality; while the co-ordination of the consciousness of fact, value, and true reality constitutes awareness of personality reality, maximum of being, together with the belief in the possibility of the survival of that very personality.
Below is a list of the ascending levels of mortal wisdom. I’m not sure what exact role faith plays in the first level, the knowledge of things, but it certainly does play a role in the integration of knowledge with higher meanings and values. It is interesting that spiritual insight is the highest level of mortal wisdom, and yet they also tell us that spiritual insight is a gift, while human wisdom must evolve (101:4.2). TUB also mentions that spiritual insight is not dependent upon worldly wisdom (101:2.15). TUB additionally mentions that a seventh circler can be God-conscious just as a first circler (110:6.16).
(806.5) 71:7.5 Education is the business of living; it must continue throughout a lifetime so that mankind may gradually experience the ascending levels of mortal wisdom, which are:
(806.6) 71:7.6 1. The knowledge of things.
(806.7) 71:7.7 2. The realization of meanings.
(806.8) 71:7.8 3. The appreciation of values.
(806.9) 71:7.9 4. The nobility of work — duty.
(806.10) 71:7.10 5. The motivation of goals — morality.
(806.11) 71:7.11 6. The love of service — character.
(806.12) 71:7.12 7. Cosmic insight — spiritual discernment.
(806.13) 71:7.13 And then, by means of these achievements, many will ascend to the mortal ultimate of mind attainment, God-consciousness.
Wonderful Bonita…so much to consider! I noticed the last quote is about both the individual and “mankind”. As go the parts so goes the whole…an interesting additional consideration to the Mortal Epochs of those progressive accomplishments of humanity over time.
Personal wisdom also requires time and growth which brings change and progress…doing the same things better and learning to do new things by such experience…and then do them better too. An accretion and aggregation as well as an integration and utilization of all prior aggregation. The mind and the soul and the world and the universe and the Supreme all thusly progress toward potential and destiny.
The fact that new potential comes by the realization and actualization of prior potential is a powerful and profound concept to me. There can be no end to becoming by such pattern of truth and reality. The Real Nature of Religion is this eternal expansion of potential and realization of potential and perfecting….only that and those originated in perfection and eternity (an impossibility of gross inaccuracy as nothing or no one IN eternity originate at all) might ever be perfect I think….all the rest of us originated in time and space may find perfecting to be endless rather than perfection as our destiny? We will always be the beloved children of God….we will never BE God.
We will never be without origin even if we are without end. God has given us the greatest of all gifts – potential and progress and realization of both which only results in more of both….forevermore! We get adventure! We are blessed with uncertainty! May we feast upon it!
Sorry for so much text…but it is so relevant to the current discussion….the acquisition of wisdom from spiritual insight by the personal revelations of the God Fragment. Remember…the Master, born in his final bestowal as the Son of Man as a ‘normal’ babe of the realm, acquired experiential and revelatory wisdom the same way we do….or did so up to the transformation in the Perean Hills. His story and example are the most extensive and personalized presentations of Religion In Human Experience and The Real Nature Of Religion ever known in the history of our world.
We are taught below that mortal, material experience does not yield universe insight….wisdom, evidently yes…but not spiritual or universe insight – this comes by personal revelation from our TA. The mortal/material mind may only “…discover, recognize, interpret, and choose.” We may hear, discern, respond, and choose to act (faith acts/responses) and in such a partnership with our TA’s delivery of personal revelation, we may gain universe insights of truth and reality and thusly…”….all human progress is effected by a technique of conjoint revelational evolution.” (emphasis IN text of UB)
Faith is our response to the yearning within and the feeling/knowledge/growing certainty of the personal nature of its source within and the caring/loving/comforting/confirming nature of this relationship within….this conjoint revelational evolution experience!!
From Paper 196 The Faith of Jesus:
196:3.1 (2093.6) Personal, spiritual religious experience is an efficient solvent for most mortal difficulties; it is an effective sorter, evaluator, and adjuster of all human problems. Religion does not remove or destroy human troubles, but it does dissolve, absorb, illuminate, and transcend them. True religion unifies the personality for effective adjustment to all mortal requirements. Religious faith — the positive leading of the indwelling divine presence — unfailingly enables the God-knowing man to bridge that gulf existing between the intellectual logic which recognizes the Universal First Cause as It and those positive affirmations of the soul which aver this First Cause is He, the heavenly Father of Jesus’ gospel, the personal God of human salvation.
196:3.2 (2094.1) There are just three elements in universal reality: fact, idea, and relation. The religious consciousness identifies these realities as science, philosophy, and truth. Philosophy would be inclined to view these activities as reason, wisdom, and faith — physical reality, intellectual reality, and spiritual reality. We are in the habit of designating these realities as thing, meaning, and value.
196:3.3 (2094.2) The progressive comprehension of reality is the equivalent of approaching God. The finding of God, the consciousness of identity with reality, is the equivalent of the experiencing of self-completion — self-entirety, self-totality. The experiencing of total reality is the full realization of God, the finality of the God-knowing experience.
196:3.4 (2094.3) The full summation of human life is the knowledge that man is educated by fact, ennobled by wisdom, and saved — justified — by religious faith.
196:3.5 (2094.4) Physical certainty consists in the logic of science; moral certainty, in the wisdom of philosophy; spiritual certainty, in the truth of genuine religious experience.
196:3.6 (2094.5) The mind of man can attain high levels of spiritual insight and corresponding spheres of divinity of values because it is not wholly material. There is a spirit nucleus in the mind of man — the Adjuster of the divine presence. There are three separate evidences of this spirit indwelling of the human mind:
196:3.7 (2094.6) 1. Humanitarian fellowship — love. The purely animal mind may be gregarious for self-protection, but only the spirit-indwelt intellect is unselfishly altruistic and unconditionally loving.
196:3.8 (2094.7) 2. Interpretation of the universe — wisdom. Only the spirit-indwelt mind can comprehend that the universe is friendly to the individual.
196:3.9 (2094.8) 3. Spiritual evaluation of life — worship. Only the spirit-indwelt man can realize the divine presence and seek to attain a fuller experience in and with this foretaste of divinity.
196:3.10 (2094.9) The human mind does not create real values; human experience does not yield universe insight. Concerning insight, the recognition of moral values and the discernment of spiritual meanings, all that the human mind can do is to discover, recognize, interpret, and choose.
196:3.11 (2094.10) The moral values of the universe become intellectual possessions by the exercise of the three basic judgments, or choices, of the mortal mind:
196:3.12 (2094.11) 1. Self-judgment — moral choice.
196:3.13 (2094.12) 2. Social-judgment — ethical choice.
196:3.14 (2094.13) 3. God-judgment — religious choice.196:3.15 (2094.14) Thus it appears that all human progress is effected by a technique of conjoint revelational evolution.
196:3.16 (2094.15) Unless a divine lover lived in man, he could not unselfishly and spiritually love. Unless an interpreter lived in the mind, man could not truly realize the unity of the universe. Unless an evaluator dwelt with man, he could not possibly appraise moral values and recognize spiritual meanings. And this lover hails from the very source of infinite love; this interpreter is a part of Universal Unity; this evaluator is the child of the Center and Source of all absolute values of divine and eternal reality.
196:3.17 (2095.1) Moral evaluation with a religious meaning — spiritual insight — connotes the individual’s choice between good and evil, truth and error, material and spiritual, human and divine, time and eternity. Human survival is in great measure dependent on consecrating the human will to the choosing of those values selected by this spirit-value sorter — the indwelling interpreter and unifier. Personal religious experience consists in two phases: discovery in the human mind and revelation by the indwelling divine spirit….
101:3.4 (1108.3) Through religious faith the soul of man reveals itself and demonstrates the potential divinity of its emerging nature by the characteristic manner in which it induces the mortal personality to react to certain trying intellectual and testing social situations. Genuine spiritual faith (true moral consciousness) is revealed in that it:
101:3.5 (1108.4) 1. Causes ethics and morals to progress despite inherent and adverse animalistic tendencies. *
101:3.6 (1108.5) 2. Produces a sublime trust in the goodness of God even in the face of bitter disappointment and crushing defeat.
101:3.7 (1108.6) 3. Generates profound courage and confidence despite natural adversity and physical calamity.
101:3.8 (1108.7) 4. Exhibits inexplicable poise and sustaining tranquillity notwithstanding baffling diseases and even acute physical suffering.
101:3.9 (1108.8) 5. Maintains a mysterious poise and composure of personality in the face of maltreatment and the rankest injustice.
101:3.10 (1108.9) 6. Maintains a divine trust in ultimate victory in spite of the cruelties of seemingly blind fate and the apparent utter indifference of natural forces to human welfare.
101:3.11 (1108.10) 7. Persists in the unswerving belief in God despite all contrary demonstrations of logic and successfully withstands all other intellectual sophistries.
101:3.12 (1108.11) 8. Continues to exhibit undaunted faith in the soul’s survival regardless of the deceptive teachings of false science and the persuasive delusions of unsound philosophy.
101:3.13 (1108.12) 9. Lives and triumphs irrespective of the crushing overload of the complex and partial civilizations of modern times.
101:3.14 (1108.13) 10. Contributes to the continued survival of altruism in spite of human selfishness, social antagonisms, industrial greeds, and political maladjustments.
101:3.15 (1108.14) 11. Steadfastly adheres to a sublime belief in universe unity and divine guidance regardless of the perplexing presence of evil and sin.
101:3.16 (1108.15) 12. Goes right on worshiping God in spite of anything and everything. Dares to declare, “Even though he slay me, yet will I serve him.”
101:3.17 (1108.16) We know, then, by three phenomena, that man has a divine spirit or spirits dwelling within him: first, by personal experience — religious faith; second, by revelation — personal and racial; and third, by the amazing exhibition of such extraordinary and unnatural reactions to his material environment as are illustrated by the foregoing recital of twelve spiritlike performances in the presence of the actual and trying situations of real human existence. And there are still others.
101:3.18 (1109.1) And it is just such a vital and vigorous performance of faith in the domain of religion that entitles mortal man to affirm the personal possession and spiritual reality of that crowning endowment of human nature, religious experience.
Me here: We are taught that while there are no proofs of God one might give another, still there is ample evidence of God available to all – empirical, objective, rational, and logical evidence for consideration and contemplation – such as the inability of science to define, discover, or replicate the spark of life itself, and the Divine order and intricate intimacy of interconnectedness and interdependence of material functionality (lack of chaos), and the very presence and function and effect of LOVE, ….and the 12 evidences listed above of moral courage and the reality results of faith.
The only true proof of God is the experience OF God within and those fruits of the Spirit which grow upon every branch attached to the vine by faith….the “…vital and vigorous performance of faith…”. Faith changes us and it changes the world and it changes how the faith child perceives the world…
One might claim that those who live in despair and doubt and believe in doom and promote the gloom for our world and its peoples, have a very definite personal issue regarding faith and the attachment of their branch to the vine….for the Papers teach clearly the fruits of the Spirit for faith children and the attributes that faith delivers to those with it. If the fruits and the attributes are the evidence for faith, then there lack must be evidence of something else…and something less. Those who claim that few survive this life by their own critical judgments of others’ faith and fruits and ‘share’ their disappointments in humanity and our world’s progress by their own standards of faith and fruits, might consider their own presumptuousness of personal superiority and the beams of obstruction to such a view and such claims within their own eye:
101:9.2 (1115.3) When you presume to sit in critical judgment on the primitive religion of man (or on the religion of primitive man), you should remember to judge such savages and to evaluate their religious experience in accordance with their enlightenment and status of conscience. Do not make the mistake of judging another’s religion by your own standards of knowledge and truth.
I think perhaps it is true that those with the greatest beams of blinding obstacle to their vision, perception, perspective, and judgment are those with the weakest attachment to the vine….for the faithful celebrate life and the friendly universe while the weak wail and suffer from their endless anxieties and doubts and fears….and blames.
The attributes are: Trust, Courage, Confidence, Poise, Tranquility, Composure.
And the fruits are: Love, Joy, Peace, Long-suffering, Gentleness, Goodness, Faith, Meekness, Temperance.
5:2.4 (64.7) It is because of this God fragment that indwells you that you can hope, as you progress in harmonizing with the Adjuster’s spiritual leadings, more fully to discern the presence and transforming power of those other spiritual influences that surround you and impinge upon you but do not function as an integral part of you. The fact that you are not intellectually conscious of close and intimate contact with the indwelling Adjuster does not in the least disprove such an exalted experience. The proof of fraternity with the divine Adjuster consists wholly in the nature and extent of the fruits of the spirit which are yielded in the life experience of the individual believer. “By their fruits you shall know them.”
And the Master said:
159:3.10 (1766.6) You shall not portray your teacher as a man of sorrows. Future generations shall know also the radiance of our joy, the buoyance of our good will, and the inspiration of our good humor. We proclaim a message of good news which is infectious in its transforming power. Our religion is throbbing with new life and new meanings. Those who accept this teaching are filled with joy and in their hearts are constrained to rejoice evermore. Increasing happiness is always the experience of all who are certain about God.
Reading ahead in the Papers on the Adjuster and in review of the first two Papers studied here (100/101)…it has occurred to me that I have an obligation and opportunity to consider my soul as one might consider one’s biological child. Every being in time and space and more than a few created in Paradise are a result of the co-creative efforts of parents, whereby the created being takes on aspects or traits of each parent and yet also has new combinations of attributes and abilities not found in either parent alone.
This life is not really about me (the material, temporal, ego-me)….it is about my soul….a whole new being that is the child of two….mortal/material mind (the material, temporal, ego-me) and the Spirit of the Father within….a co-created progeny….with eternal potential when fused with the God Fragment parent….at a specific time of perfecting and experiential wisdom of that morontia mind/soul so co-created. So….am I acting like a parent? Isn’t mortal paternity the example and pattern of this more universal paternity? Don’t mortal parents exemplify the core values of self sacrificing love and duty and loyalty and abiding affection and forgiveness and longsuffering? Isn’t our paternal experience the obvious lens for understanding God and the family of God?
Isn’t then the Real Nature of Religion learning how to be a parent to soul? To cooperate and coordinate with the co-parent in the nurturing and raising and education of the created being – our very soul? Do we care as much about our soul as our material children? Do we recognize that the future, our future, is determined by the way we parent and the outcome of our parenting?
111:2.2 (1217.6) The material mind of mortal man is the cosmic loom that carries the morontia fabrics on which the indwelling Thought Adjuster threads the spirit patterns of a universe character of enduring values and divine meanings — a surviving soul of ultimate destiny and unending career, a potential finaliter.
111:2.3 (1218.1) The human personality is identified with mind and spirit held together in functional relationship by life in a material body. This functioning relationship of such mind and spirit does not result in some combination of the qualities or attributes of mind and spirit but rather in an entirely new, original, and unique universe value of potentially eternal endurance, the soul.
I am reflecting on all my mistakes as a parent and how I improved as a grandparent…which reminds me of the many forms and opportunities for improvement I have still in my parenting skills…the nurture of my very soul…..a child of the universe with an eternal and sublime adventure to anticipate and relish.
Perhaps I let my self and self importance interfere too much and too often with the more noble attitude of the parent seeking the best outcome and future for my child of great promise? I remember the story early in Paper 100 of the cave man and how such a savage so focused on serving his children are a glimpse of what is most noble about being human….just thinking out loud.
Greetings to All who are following along and those who might post questions, comments, insights, stories, and/or additional supporting and illuminating text for sharing!
It is true, or so I have it found it so, that there are no superfluous or unimportant or uninteresting contents in the Papers. But I think each person and mind does find those concepts and contents that are of greater importance to us relative to our personal religious experience and progress in the Spirit…at the time of reading and study. Those concepts which leap from the page to mind in confirmation of belief and experience and those which trigger insights of connection, completion, and profound truth realizations lead each mind forward further and further into the text for more and greater discoveries!! This curiosity cycle of hunger and its satisfaction is a natural function of the human mind.
The Holy Spirit through the Adjutants and the Thought Adjusters and Son’s Spirit each and all utilize this same mind circuitry – we feel the yearn and the hunger and the thirst – and our personal response to the Spirit within brings us satisfaction. Science teaches us that the brain – the electro/chemical aspect of mind or the host of our mind if you will – has similar craving and satisfaction centers and neuro response mechanisms, pleasure centers which trigger/cause certain behaviors and respond/effects to certain stimuli. This pattern of our physiology is also very present and active in-mind, the host of belief, faith, emotion, feelings, trusts, loyalties, insight, religion, and Spirit; mind, the arena of choice.
1. The Mind Arena of Choice
111:1.1 (1216.2) Though the work of Adjusters is spiritual in nature, they must, perforce, do all their work upon an intellectual foundation. Mind is the human soil from which the spirit Monitor must evolve the morontia soul with the co-operation of the indwelt personality.
111:1.3 (1216.4) Material mind is the arena in which human personalities live, are self-conscious, make decisions, choose God or forsake him, eternalize or destroy themselves.
111:1.6 (1217.1) Mind is the cosmic instrument on which the human will can play the discords of destruction, or upon which this same human will can bring forth the exquisite melodies of God identification and consequent eternal survival. The Adjuster bestowed upon man is, in the last analysis, impervious to evil and incapable of sin, but mortal mind can actually be twisted, distorted, and rendered evil and ugly by the sinful machinations of a perverse and self-seeking human will. Likewise can this mind be made noble, beautiful, true, and good — actually great — in accordance with the spirit-illuminated will of a God-knowing human being.
111:2.2 (1217.6) The material mind of mortal man is the cosmic loom that carries the morontia fabrics on which the indwelling Thought Adjuster threads the spirit patterns of a universe character of enduring values and divine meanings — a surviving soul of ultimate destiny and unending career, a potential finaliter.
Me here: Sometimes I feel like the UB is also a loom which manages to weave a very unique fabric and pattern of color and texture for each student – each of us has a very unique student experience by our studies and in our mind. Knowledge is personalized based on prior experience and our appreciation, cognition/discernment, and integration with other knowledge. So….all the tens of thousands of facts or bits of knowledge within this Epochal Revelation result in a very personalized appreciation of them and utilization of them in our own experience and expressions of understanding and realization. Even more amazing is the ability of these Papers and Teachings to stimulate and deliver ever-new and expanding conceptualizations, understandings, appreciation, integrations, and the enhanced and expanded perspective of the student with each reading or study of the text.
The reading and study of the UB is sort of metaphorical in its effects and results compared to the spiritualization of mind and growth of soul I think – meaning only that it is also transformative in its effects over time and experience…it is dynamic and responsive to experience and the growth of wisdom over time. Now this is only true of course if one actually applies the information and the teachings and truly gains insights and realizes truths by the experience of such applications….reading, like mere believing delivers no true or valid or useful effects. Reading and/or believing are truly the causes of little or no effect!
My own experience with the Papers has been very accumulative over time whereby I enjoy a growing appreciation and expanding perspective that seems both greater in content and also in integration and harmonization of its contents and of the universe of universes it factually describes….it’s not just that’s there more content but that there is more meaning and value too….more and more effect from the same source of cause, the same facts, the same knowledge – both source and content delivers new meanings to discover and values to apply in the daily walk of mortal life. It reminds me of the feedback loop of potential and its realization leading always to ever more potential by its ever greater realization…ad infintum!
This describes the human condition…and our adventure to come. The universes we are told are a vast university….learning, adapting to learning, and harmonizing our experience with others also learning in loving service to one another is the grand wheel of our destiny. This will never end…this perfecting of wisdom by experience as we and once we have perfected our will and inner natures regarding motive, intention, and priority. These 3 realities and causes we may perfect…but I doubt if we might ever exhaust the potential of experiential wisdom and the cause and effect potential of the unintended and unexpected outcomes NO MATTER our perfected motives, intention, and priorities??!! Will we ever experience an end to surprise? Or uncertainty? Or adventure? I have my doubts about such an eventuation of outcomes for those born/created in time and space. I think our destiny is endless and eternal….but it will be an eternally endless adventure!
Of course the cause of this transformative and transcendent experience I describe above, related to the study of the Urantia Papers (whether one comes to believe its claims for itself or not), is a function of the mind and its truth recognition role related to: 1). Evolutionary religion, science, and philosophy, 2). Personal experience with all those, and 3). Epochal Revelation. Each of these three realities have there own limitations and each depends upon the other two for greatest effect.
Naturally we must first have curiosity and a mind which seeks understanding and truth in general, and we must have enough self control and will that we seek to overcome personal ignorance and the ego attachments which deliver prejudice (the love of our current beliefs and knowledge), and it helps if we have sufficient hope and faith and trust that we can lay aside anxieties in such pursuits. By this WAY may the mind be transformed by the transcendent experience for which it is designed and created!
It takes the personal poise and trust of a faith child to overcome the limitations of revelation while gaining the full harvest of its potential fruits!
4. The Limitations of Revelation
101:4.1 (1109.2) Because your world is generally ignorant of origins, even of physical origins, it has appeared to be wise from time to time to provide instruction in cosmology. And always has this made trouble for the future. The laws of revelation hamper us greatly by their proscription of the impartation of unearned or premature knowledge. Any cosmology presented as a part of revealed religion is destined to be outgrown in a very short time. Accordingly, future students of such a revelation are tempted to discard any element of genuine religious truth it may contain because they discover errors on the face of the associated cosmologies therein presented.
101:4.2 (1109.3) Mankind should understand that we who participate in the revelation of truth are very rigorously limited by the instructions of our superiors. We are not at liberty to anticipate the scientific discoveries of a thousand years. Revelators must act in accordance with the instructions which form a part of the revelation mandate. We see no way of overcoming this difficulty, either now or at any future time. We full well know that, while the historic facts and religious truths of this series of revelatory presentations will stand on the records of the ages to come, within a few short years many of our statements regarding the physical sciences will stand in need of revision in consequence of additional scientific developments and new discoveries. These new developments we even now foresee, but we are forbidden to include such humanly undiscovered facts in the revelatory records. Let it be made clear that revelations are not necessarily inspired. The cosmology of these revelations is not inspired. It is limited by our permission for the co-ordination and sorting of present-day knowledge. While divine or spiritual insight is a gift, human wisdom must evolve.
101:4.3 (1109.4) Truth is always a revelation: autorevelation when it emerges as a result of the work of the indwelling Adjuster; epochal revelation when it is presented by the function of some other celestial agency, group, or personality.
101:4.4 (1109.5) In the last analysis, religion is to be judged by its fruits, according to the manner and the extent to which it exhibits its own inherent and divine excellence.
Login to reply to this topic.
Not registered? Sign up here.