Urantia Book Paper 52 Planetary Mortal Epochs
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Subjects Archive The Urantia Book Urantia Book PART II: The Local Universe :
The Evolution Of Local Universes Administration Of The Local Universe The Local
Universe Mother Spirit The Local Universe Sons Of God The Life Carriers
Personalities Of The Local Universe Ministering Spirits Of The Local Universe
The Seraphic Hosts The Ascending Sons Of God Physical Aspects Of The Local
Universe Energy--mind And Matter The Constellations The Celestial Artisans The
Local System Administration The Local System Headquarters The Seven Mansion
Worlds The Morontia Life The Inhabited Worlds The Planetary Princes The
Planetary Adams Planetary Mortal Epochs The Lucifer Rebellion Problems Of The
Lucifer Rebellion The Spheres Of Light And Life Universal Unity
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Paper 52 Planetary Mortal Epochs
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Introduction
FROM the inception of life on an evolutionary planet to the time of its final
flowering in the era of light and life, there appear upon the stage of world
action at least seven epochs of human life. These successive ages are
determined by the planetary missions of the divine Sons, and on an average
inhabited world these epochs appear in the following order:
1. Pre-Planetary Prince Man.
2. Post-Planetary Prince Man.
3. Post-Adamic Man.
4. Post-Magisterial Son Man.
5. Post-Bestowal Son Man.
6. Post-Teacher Son Man.
7. The Era of Light and Life.
The worlds of space, as soon as they are physically suitable for life, are
placed on the registry of the Life Carriers, and in due time these Sons are
dispatched to such planets for the purpose of initiating life. The entire
period from life initiation to the appearance of man is designated the prehuman
era and precedes the successive mortal epochs considered in this narrative.
1. PRIMITIVE MAN
From the time of man's emergence from the animal level--when he can choose to
worship the Creator--to the arrival of the Planetary Prince, mortal will
creatures are called primitive men. There are six basic types or races of
primitive men, and these early peoples successively appear in the order of the
spectrum colors, beginning with the red. The length of time consumed in this
early life evolution varies greatly on the different worlds, ranging from one
hundred and fifty thousand years to over one million years of Urantia time.
The evolutionary races of color--red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and
indigo--begin to appear about the time that primitive man is developing a
simple language and is beginning to exercise the creative imagination. By this
time man is well accustomed to standing erect.
Primitive men are mighty hunters and fierce fighters. The law of this age is
the physical survival of the fittest; the government of these times is wholly
tribal. During the early racial struggles on many worlds some of the
evolutionary races are obliterated, as occurred on Urantia. Those who survive
are usually subsequently blended with the later imported violet race, the
Adamic peoples.
In the light of subsequent civilization, this era of primitive man is a long,
dark, and bloody chapter. The ethics of the jungle and the morals of the pri-
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meval forests are not in keeping with the standards of later dispensations of
revealed religion and higher spiritual development. On normal and
nonexperimental worlds this epoch is very different from the prolonged and
extraordinarily brutal struggles which characterized this age on Urantia. When
you have emerged from your first world experience, you will begin to see why
this long and painful struggle on the evolutionary worlds occurs, and as you go
forward in the Paradise path, you will increasingly understand the wisdom of
these apparently strange doings. But notwithstanding all the vicissitudes of
the early ages of human emergence, the performances of primitive man represent
a splendid, even a heroic, chapter in the annals of an evolutionary world of
time and space.
Early evolutionary man is not a colorful creature. In general, these primitive
mortals are cave dwellers or cliff residents. They also build crude huts in the
large trees. Before they acquire a high order of intelligence, the planets are
sometimes overrun with the larger types of animals. But early in this era
mortals learn to kindle and maintain fire, and with the increase of inventive
imagination and the improvement in tools, evolving man soon vanquishes the
larger and more unwieldy animals. The early races also make extensive use of
the larger flying animals. These enormous birds are able to carry one or two
average-sized men for a nonstop flight of over five hundred miles. On some
planets these birds are of great service since they possess a high order of
intelligence, often being able to speak many words of the languages of the
realm. These birds are most intelligent, very obedient, and unbelievably
affectionate. Such passenger birds have been long extinct on Urantia, but your
early ancestors enjoyed their services.
Man's acquirement of ethical judgment, moral will, is usually coincident with
the appearance of early language. Upon attaining the human level, after this
emergence of mortal will, these beings become receptive to the temporary
indwelling of the divine Adjusters, and upon death many are duly elected as
survivors and sealed by the archangels for subsequent resurrection and Spirit
fusion. The archangels always accompany the Planetary Princes, and a
dispensational adjudication of the realm is simultaneous with the prince's
arrival.
All mortals who are indwelt by Thought Adjusters are potential worshipers; they
have been "lighted by the true light," and they possess capacity for seeking
reciprocal contact with divinity. Nevertheless, the early or biologic religion
of primitive man is largely a persistence of animal fear coupled with ignorant
awe and tribal superstition. The survival of superstition in the Urantia races
is hardly complimentary to your evolutionary development nor compatible with
your otherwise splendid achievements in material progress. But this early fear
religion serves a very valuable purpose in subduing the fiery tempers of these
primitive creatures. It is the forerunner of civilization and the soil for the
subsequent planting of the seeds of revealed religion by the Planetary Prince
and his ministers.
Within one hundred thousand years from the time man acquires erect posture, the
Planetary Prince usually arrives, having been dispatched by the System
Sovereign upon the report of the Life Carriers that will is functioning, even
though comparatively few individuals have thus developed. Primitive mortals
usually welcome the Planetary Prince and his visible staff; in fact, they often
look upon them with awe and reverence, almost with worshipfulness, if they are
not restrained.
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2. POST-PLANETARY PRINCE MAN
With the arrival of the Planetary Prince a new dispensation begins. Government
appears on earth, and the advanced tribal epoch is attained. Great social
strides are made during a few thousand years of this regime. Under normal
conditions mortals attain a high state of civilization during this age. They do
not struggle so long in barbarism as did the Urantia races. But life on an
inhabited world is so changed by rebellion that you can have little or no idea
of such a regime on a normal planet.
The average length of this dispensation is around five hundred thousand years,
some longer, some shorter. During this era the planet is established in the
circuits of the system, and a full quota of seraphic and other celestial
helpers is assigned to its administration. The Thought Adjusters come in
increasing numbers, and the seraphic guardians amplify their regime of mortal
supervision.
When the Planetary Prince arrives on a primitive world, the evolved religion of
fear and ignorance prevails. The prince and his staff make the first
revelations of higher truth and universe organization. These initial
presentations of revealed religion are very simple, and they usually pertain to
the affairs of the local system. Religion is wholly an evolutionary process
prior to the arrival of the Planetary Prince. Subsequently, religion progresses
by graduated revelation as well as by evolutionary growth. Each dispensation,
each mortal epoch, receives an enlarged presentation of spiritual truth and
religious ethics. The evolution of the religious capacity of receptivity in the
inhabitants of a world largely determines their rate of spiritual advancement
and the extent of religious revelation.
This dispensation witnesses a spiritual dawn, and the different races and their
various tribes tend to develop specialized systems of religious and philosophic
thought. There uniformly run through all of these racial religions two strains:
the early fears of primitive men and the later revelations of the Planetary
Prince. In some respects Urantians do not seem to have wholly emerged from this
stage of planetary evolution. As you pursue this study, you will the more
clearly discern how far your world departs from the average course of
evolutionary progress and development.
But the Planetary Prince is not "the Prince of Peace." Racial struggles and
tribal wars continue over into this dispensation but with diminishing frequency
and severity. This is the great age of racial dispersion, and it culminates in
a period of intense nationalism. Color is the basis of tribal and national
groupings, and the different races often develop separate languages. Each
expanding group of mortals tends to seek isolation. This segregation is favored
by the existence of many languages. Before the unification of the several races
their relentless warfare sometimes results in the obliteration of whole
peoples; the orange and green men are particularly subject to such extinction.
On average worlds, during the latter part of the prince's rule, national life
begins to replace tribal organization or rather to be superimposed upon the
existing tribal groupings. But the great social achievement of the prince's
epoch is the emergence of family life. Heretofore, human relationships have
been chiefly tribal; now, the home begins to materialize.
This is the dispensation of the realization of sex equality. On some planets
the male may rule the female; on others the reverse prevails. During this age
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normal worlds establish full equality of the sexes, this being preliminary to
the fuller realization of the ideals of home life. This is the dawn of the
golden age of the home. The idea of tribal rule gradually gives way to the dual
concept of national life and family life.
During this age agriculture makes its appearance. The growth of the family idea
is incompatible with the roving and unsettled life of the hunter. Gradually the
practices of settled habitations and the cultivation of the soil become
established. The domestication of animals and the development of home arts
proceed apace. Upon reaching the apex of biologic evolution, a high level of
civilization has been attained, but there is little development of a mechanical
order; invention is the characteristic of the succeeding age.
The races are purified and brought up to a high state of physical perfection
and intellectual strength before the end of this era. The early development of
a normal world is greatly helped by the plan of promoting the increase of the
higher types of mortals with proportionate curtailment of the lower. And it is
the failure of your early peoples to thus discriminate between these types that
accounts for the presence of so many defective and degenerate individuals among
the present-day Urantia races.
One of the great achievements of the age of the prince is this restriction of
the multiplication of mentally defective and socially unfit individuals. Long
before the times of the arrival of the second Sons, the Adams, most worlds
seriously address themselves to the tasks of race purification, something which
the Urantia peoples have not even yet seriously undertaken.
This problem of race improvement is not such an extensive undertaking when it
is attacked at this early date in human evolution. The preceding period of
tribal struggles and rugged competition in race survival has weeded out most of
the abnormal and defective strains. An idiot does not have much chance of
survival in a primitive and warring tribal social organization. It is the false
sentiment of your partially perfected civilizations that fosters, protects, and
perpetuates the hopelessly defective strains of evolutionary human stocks.
It is neither tenderness nor altruism to bestow futile sympathy upon
degenerated human beings, unsalvable abnormal and inferior mortals. There exist
on even the most normal of the evolutionary worlds sufficient differences
between individuals and between numerous social groups to provide for the full
exercise of all those noble traits of altruistic sentiment and unselfish mortal
ministry without perpetuating the socially unfit and the morally degenerate
strains of evolving humanity. There is abundant opportunity for the exercise of
tolerance and the function of altruism in behalf of those unfortunate and needy
individuals who have not irretrievably lost their moral heritage and forever
destroyed their spiritual birthright.
3. POST-ADAMIC MAN
When the original impetus of evolutionary life has run its biologic course,
when man has reached the apex of animal development, there arrives the second
order of sonship, and the second dispensation of grace and ministry is
inaugurated. This is true on all evolutionary worlds. When the highest possible
level of evolutionary life has been attained, when primitive man has ascended
as far as possible in the biologic scale, a Material Son and Daughter always
appear on the planet, having been dispatched by the System Sovereign.
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Thought Adjusters are increasingly bestowed upon the post-Adamic men, and in
constantly augmented numbers these mortals attain capacity for subsequent
Adjuster fusion. While functioning as descending Sons, the Adams do not possess
Adjusters, but their planetary offspring--direct and mixed--become legitimate
candidates for the reception, in due time, of the Mystery Monitors. By the
termination of the post-Adamic age the planet is in possession of its full
quota of celestial ministers; only the fusion Adjusters are not yet universally
bestowed.
It is the prime purpose of the Adamic regime to influence evolving man to
complete the transit from the hunter and herder stage of civilization to that
of the agriculturist and horticulturist, to be later supplemented by the
appearance of the urban and industrial adjuncts to civilization. Ten thousand
years of this dispensation of the biologic uplifters is sufficient to effect a
marvelous transformation. Twenty-five thousand years of such an administration
of the conjoint wisdom of the Planetary Prince and the Material Sons usually
ripens the sphere for the advent of a Magisterial Son.
This age usually witnesses the completion of the elimination of the unfit and
the still further purification of the racial strains; on normal worlds the
defective bestial tendencies are very nearly eliminated from the reproducing
stocks of the realm.
The Adamic progeny never amalgamate with the inferior strains of the
evolutionary races. Neither is it the divine plan for the Planetary Adam or Eve
to mate, personally, with the evolutionary peoples. This race-improvement
project is the task of their progeny. But the offspring of the Material Son and
Daughter are mobilized for generations before the racial-amalgamation ministry
is inaugurated.
The result of the gift of the Adamic life plasm to the mortal races is an
immediate upstepping of intellectual capacity and an acceleration of spiritual
progress. There is usually some physical improvement also. On an average world
the post-Adamic dispensation is an age of great invention, energy control, and
mechanical development. This is the era of the appearance of multiform
manufacture and the control of natural forces; it is the golden age of
exploration and the final subduing of the planet. Much of the material progress
of a world occurs during this time of the inauguration of the development of
the physical sciences, just such an epoch as Urantia is now experiencing. Your
world is a full dispensation and more behind the average planetary schedule.
By the end of the Adamic dispensation on a normal planet the races are
practically blended, so that it can be truly proclaimed that "God has made of
one blood all the nations," and that his Son "has made of one color all
peoples." The color of such an amalgamated race is somewhat of an olive shade
of the violet hue, the racial "white" of the spheres.
Primitive man is for the most part carnivorous; the Material Sons and Daughters
do not eat meat, but their offspring within a few generations usually gravitate
to the omnivorous level, although whole groups of their descendants sometimes
remain nonflesh eaters. This double origin of the post-Adamic races explains
how such blended human stocks exhibit anatomic vestiges belonging to both the
herbivorous and carnivorous animal groups.
Within ten thousand years of racial amalgamation the resultant stocks show
varying degrees of anatomic blend, some strains carrying more of the marks
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of the nonflesh-eating ancestry, others exhibiting more of the distinguishing
traits and physical characteristics of their carnivorous evolutionary
progenitors. The majority of these world races soon become omnivorous,
subsisting upon a wide range of viands from both the animal and vegetable
kingdoms.
The post-Adamic epoch is the dispensation of internationalism. With the near
completion of the task of race blending, nationalism wanes, and the brotherhood
of man really begins to materialize. Representative government begins to take
the place of the monarchial or paternal form of rulership. The educational
system becomes world-wide, and gradually the languages of the races give way to
the tongue of the violet people. Universal peace and co-operation are seldom
attained until the races are fairly well blended, and until they speak a common
language.
During the closing centuries of the post-Adamic age there develops new interest
in art, music, and literature, and this world-wide awakening is the signal for
the appearance of a Magisterial Son. The crowning development of this era is
the universal interest in intellectual realities, true philosophy. Religion
becomes less nationalistic, becomes more and more a planetary affair. New
revelations of truth characterize these ages, and the Most Highs of the
constellations begin to rule in the affairs of men. Truth is revealed up to the
administration of the constellations.
Great ethical advancement characterizes this era; the brotherhood of man is the
goal of its society. World-wide peace--the cessation of race conflict and
national animosity--is the indicator of planetary ripeness for the advent of
the third order of sonship, the Magisterial Son.
4. POST-MAGISTERIAL SON MAN
On normal and loyal planets this age opens with the mortal races blended and
biologically fit. There are no race or color problems; literally all nations
and races are of one blood. The brotherhood of man flourishes, and the nations
are learning to live on earth in peace and tranquillity. Such a world stands on
the eve of a great and culminating intellectual development.
When an evolutionary world becomes thus ripe for the magisterial age, one of
the high order of Avonal Sons makes his appearance on a magisterial mission.
The Planetary Prince and the Material Sons are of local universe origin; the
Magisterial Son hails from Paradise.
When the Paradise Avonals come to the mortal spheres on judicial actions,
solely as dispensation adjudicators, they are never incarnated. But when they
come on magisterial missions, at least the initial one, they are always
incarnated, though they do not experience birth, neither do they die the death
of the realm. They may live on for generations in those cases where they remain
as rulers on certain planets. When their missions are concluded, they yield up
their planetary lives and return to their former status of divine sonship.
Each new dispensation extends the horizon of revealed religion, and the
Magisterial Sons extend the revelation of truth to portray the affairs of the
local universe and all its tributaries.
After the initial visitation of a Magisterial Son the races soon effect their
economic liberation. The daily work required to sustain one's independence
would be represented by two and one-half hours of your time. It is perfectly
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safe to liberate such ethical and intelligent mortals. Such refined peoples
well know how to utilize leisure for self-improvement and planetary
advancement. This age witnesses the further purification of the racial stocks
by the restriction of reproduction among the less fit and poorly endowed
individuals.
The political government and social administration of the races continue to
improve, self-government being fairly well established by the end of this age.
By self-government we refer to the highest type of representative government.
Such worlds advance and honor only those leaders and rulers who are most fit to
bear social and political responsibilities.
During this epoch the majority of the world mortals are Adjuster indwelt. But
even yet the bestowal of divine Monitors is not always universal. The Adjusters
of fusion destiny are not yet bestowed upon all planetary mortals; it is still
necessary for the will creatures to choose the Mystery Monitors.
During the closing ages of this dispensation, society begins to return to more
simplified forms of living. The complex nature of an advancing civilization is
running its course, and mortals are learning to live more naturally and
effectively. And this trend increases with each succeeding epoch. This is the
age of the flowering of art, music, and higher learning. The physical sciences
have already reached their height of development. The termination of this age,
on an ideal world, witnesses the fullness of a great religious awakening, a
world-wide spiritual enlightenment. And this extensive arousal of the spiritual
natures of the races is the signal for the arrival of the bestowal Son and for
the inauguration of the fifth mortal epoch.
On many worlds it develops that the planet is not made ready for a bestowal Son
by one magisterial mission; in that event there will be a second, even a
succession of Magisterial Sons, each of whom will advance the races from one
dispensation to another until the planet is made ready for the gift of the
bestowal Son. On the second and subsequent missions the Magisterial Sons may or
may not be incarnated. But no matter how many Magisterial Sons may appear--and
they may also come as such after the bestowal Son--the advent of each one marks
the end of one dispensation and the beginning of another.
These dispensations of the Magisterial Sons cover anywhere from twenty-five
thousand to fifty thousand years of Urantia time. Sometimes such an epoch is
much shorter and in rare instances even longer. But in the fullness of time one
of these same Magisterial Sons will be born as the Paradise bestowal Son.
5. POST-BESTOWAL SON MAN
When a certain standard of intellectual and spiritual development is attained
on an inhabited world, a Paradise bestowal Son always arrives. On normal worlds
he does not appear in the flesh until the races have ascended to the highest
levels of intellectual development and ethical attainment. But on Urantia the
bestowal Son, even your own Creator Son, appeared at the close of the Adamic
dispensation, but that is not the usual order of events on the worlds of space.
When the worlds have become ripe for spiritualization, the bestowal Son
arrives. These Sons always belong to the Magisterial or Avonal order except in
that case, once in each local universe, when the Creator Son prepares for his
terminal bestowal on some evolutionary world, as occurred when Michael of
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Nebadon appeared on Urantia to bestow himself upon your mortal races. Only one
world in near ten million can enjoy such a gift; all other worlds are
spiritually advanced by the bestowal of a Paradise Son of the Avonal order.
The bestowal Son arrives on a world of high educational culture and encounters
a race spiritually trained and prepared to assimilate advanced teachings and to
appreciate the bestowal mission. This is an age characterized by the world-wide
pursuit of moral culture and spiritual truth. The mortal passion of this
dispensation is the penetration of cosmic reality and communion with spiritual
reality. The revelations of truth are extended to include the superuniverse.
Entirely new systems of education and government grow up to supplant the crude
regimes of former times. The joy of living takes on new color, and the
reactions of life are exalted to heavenly heights of tone and timbre.
The bestowal Son lives and dies for the spiritual uplift of the mortal races of
a world. He establishes the "new and living way"; his life is an incarnation of
Paradise truth in mortal flesh, that very truth--even the Spirit of Truth--in
the knowledge of which men shall be free.
On Urantia the establishment of this "new and living way" was a matter of fact
as well as of truth. The isolation of Urantia in the Lucifer rebellion had
suspended the procedure whereby mortals can pass, upon death, directly to the
shores of the mansion worlds. Before the days of Christ Michael on Urantia all
souls slept on until the dispensational or special millennial resurrections.
Even Moses was not permitted to go over to the other side until the occasion of
a special resurrection, the fallen Planetary Prince, Caligastia, contesting
such a deliverance. But ever since the day of Pentecost, Urantia mortals again
may proceed directly to the morontia spheres.
Upon the resurrection of a bestowal Son, on the third day after yielding up his
incarnated life, he ascends to the right hand of the Universal Father, receives
the assurance of the acceptance of the bestowal mission, and returns to the
Creator Son at the headquarters of the local universe. Thereupon the bestowal
Avonal and the Creator Michael send their joint spirit, the Spirit of Truth,
into the bestowal world. This is the occasion when the "spirit of the
triumphant Son is poured out upon all flesh." The Universe Mother Spirit also
participates in this bestowal of the Spirit of Truth, and concomitant therewith
there issues the bestowal edict of the Thought Adjusters. Thereafter all
normal-minded will creatures of that world will receive Adjusters as soon as
they attain the age of moral responsibility, of spiritual choice.
If such a bestowal Avonal should return to a world after the bestowal mission,
he would not incarnate but would come "in glory with the seraphic hosts."
The postbestowal Son age may extend from ten thousand to a hundred thousand
years. There is no arbitrary time allotted to any of these dispensational eras.
This is a time of great ethical and spiritual progress. Under the spiritual
influence of these ages, human character undergoes tremendous transformations
and experiences phenomenal development. It becomes possible to put the golden
rule into practical operation. The teachings of Jesus are really applicable to
a mortal world which has had the preliminary training of the prebestowal Sons
with their dispensations of character ennoblement and culture augmentation.
During this era the problems of disease and delinquency are virtually solved.
Degeneracy has already been largely eliminated by selective reproduction.
Disease has been practically mastered through the high resistant qualities of
the
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Adamic strains and by the intelligent and world-wide application of the
discoveries of the physical sciences of preceding ages. The average length of
life, during this period, climbs well above the equivalent of three hundred
years of Urantia time.
Throughout this epoch there is a gradual lessening of governmental supervision.
True self-government is beginning to function; fewer and fewer restrictive laws
are necessary. The military branches of national resistance are passing away;
the era of international harmony is really arriving. There are many nations,
mostly determined by land distribution, but only one race, one language, and
one religion. Mortal affairs are almost, but not quite, utopian. This truly is
a great and glorious age!
6. URANTIA'S POSTBESTOWAL AGE
The bestowal Son is the Prince of Peace. He arrives with the message, "Peace on
earth and good will among men." On normal worlds this is a dispensation of
world-wide peace; the nations no more learn war. But such salutary influences
did not attend the coming of your bestowal Son, Christ Michael. Urantia is not
proceeding in the normal order. Your world is out of step in the planetary
procession. Your Master, when on earth, warned his disciples that his advent
would not bring the usual reign of peace on Urantia. He distinctly told them
that there would be "wars and rumors of wars," and that nation would rise
against nation. At another time he said, "Think not that I have come to bring
peace upon earth."
Even on normal evolutionary worlds the realization of the world-wide
brotherhood of man is not an easy accomplishment. On a confused and disordered
planet like Urantia such an achievement requires a much longer time and
necessitates far greater effort. Unaided social evolution can hardly achieve
such happy results on a spiritually isolated sphere. Religious revelation is
essential to the realization of brotherhood on Urantia. While Jesus has shown
the way to the immediate attainment of spiritual brotherhood, the realization
of social brotherhood on your world depends much on the achievement of the
following personal transformations and planetary adjustments:
1. Social fraternity. Multiplication of international and interracial social
contacts and fraternal associations through travel, commerce, and competitive
play. Development of a common language and the multiplication of
multilinguists. The racial and national interchange of students, teachers,
industrialists, and religious philosophers.
2. Intellectual cross-fertilization. Brotherhood is impossible on a world whose
inhabitants are so primitive that they fail to recognize the folly of
unmitigated selfishness. There must occur an exchange of national and racial
literature. Each race must become familiar with the thought of all races; each
nation must know the feelings of all nations. Ignorance breeds suspicion, and
suspicion is incompatible with the essential attitude of sympathy and love.
3. Ethical awakening. Only ethical consciousness can unmask the immorality of
human intolerance and the sinfulness of fratricidal strife. Only a moral
conscience can condemn the evils of national envy and racial jealousy. Only
moral beings will ever seek for that spiritual insight which is essential to
living the golden rule.
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4. Political wisdom. Emotional maturity is essential to self-control. Only
emotional maturity will insure the substitution of international techniques of
civilized adjudication for the barbarous arbitrament of war. Wise statesmen
will sometime work for the welfare of humanity even while they strive to
promote the interest of their national or racial groups. Selfish political
sagacity is ultimately suicidal--destructive of all those enduring qualities
which insure planetary group survival.
5. Spiritual insight. The brotherhood of man is, after all, predicated on the
recognition of the fatherhood of God. The quickest way to realize the
brotherhood of man on Urantia is to effect the spiritual transformation of
present-day humanity. The only technique for accelerating the natural trend of
social evolution is that of applying spiritual pressure from above, thus
augmenting moral insight while enhancing the soul capacity of every mortal to
understand and love every other mortal. Mutual understanding and fraternal love
are transcendent civilizers and mighty factors in the world-wide realization of
the brotherhood of man.
If you could be transplanted from your backward and confused world to some
normal planet now in the postbestowal Son age, you would think you had been
translated to the heaven of your traditions. You would hardly believe that you
were observing the normal evolutionary workings of a mortal sphere of human
habitation. These worlds are in the spiritual circuits of their realm, and they
enjoy all the advantages of the universe broadcasts and the reflectivity
services of the superuniverse.
7. POST-TEACHER SON MAN
The Sons of the next order to arrive on the average evolutionary world are the
Trinity Teacher Sons, the divine Sons of the Paradise Trinity. Again we find
Urantia out of step with its sister spheres in that your Jesus has promised to
return. That promise he will certainly fulfill, but no one knows whether his
second coming will precede or follow the appearances of Magisterial or Teacher
Sons on Urantia.
The Teacher Sons come in groups to the spiritualizing worlds. A planetary
Teacher Son is assisted and supported by seventy primary Sons, twelve secondary
Sons, and three of the highest and most experienced of the supreme order of
Daynals. This corps will remain for some time on the world, long enough to
effect the transition from the evolutionary ages to the era of light and
life--not less than one thousand years of planetary time and often considerably
longer. This mission is a Trinity contribution to the antecedent efforts of all
the divine personalities who have ministered to an inhabited world.
The revelation of truth is now extended to the central universe and to
Paradise. The races are becoming highly spiritual. A great people has evolved
and a great age is approaching. The educational, economic, and administrative
systems of the planet are undergoing radical transformations. New values and
relationships are being established. The kingdom of heaven is appearing on
earth, and the glory of God is being shed abroad in the world.
This is the dispensation when many mortals are translated from among the
living. As the era of Trinity Teacher Sons progresses, the spiritual allegiance
of the mortals of time becomes more and more universal. Natural death becomes
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less frequent as the Adjusters increasingly fuse with their subjects during the
lifetime in the flesh. The planet eventually is classed as of the primary
modified order of mortal ascension.
Life during this era is pleasant and profitable. Degeneracy and the antisocial
end products of the long evolutionary struggle have been virtually obliterated.
The length of life approaches five hundred Urantia years, and the reproductive
rate of racial increase is intelligently controlled. An entirely new order of
society has arrived. There are still great differences among mortals, but the
state of society more nearly approaches the ideals of social brotherhood and
spiritual equality. Representative government is vanishing, and the world is
passing under the rule of individual self-control. The function of government
is chiefly directed to collective tasks of social administration and economic
co-ordination. The golden age is coming on apace; the temporal goal of the long
and intense planetary evolutionary struggle is in sight. The reward of the ages
is soon to be realized; the wisdom of the Gods is about to be manifested.
The physical administration of a world during this age requires about one hour
each day on the part of every adult individual; that is, the equivalent of one
Urantia hour. The planet is in close touch with universe affairs, and its
people scan the latest broadcasts with the same keen interest you now manifest
in the latest editions of your daily newspapers. These races are occupied with
a thousand things of interest unknown on your world.
Increasingly, true planetary allegiance to the Supreme Being grows. Generation
after generation, more and more of the race step into line with those who
practice justice and live mercy. Slowly but surely the world is being won to
the joyous service of the Sons of God. The physical difficulties and material
problems have been largely solved; the planet is ripening for advanced life and
a more settled existence.
From time to time throughout their dispensation, Teacher Sons continue to come
to these peaceful worlds. They do not leave a world until they observe that the
evolutionary plan, as it concerns that planet, is working smoothly. A
Magisterial Son of judgment usually accompanies the Teacher Sons on their
successive missions, while another such Son functions at the time of their
departure, and these judicial actions continue from age to age throughout the
duration of the mortal regime of time and space.
Each recurring mission of the Trinity Teacher Sons successively exalts such a
supernal world to ever-ascending heights of wisdom, spirituality, and cosmic
illumination. But the noble natives of such a sphere are still finite and
mortal. Nothing is perfect; nevertheless, there is evolving a quality of near
perfection in the operation of an imperfect world and in the lives of its human
inhabitants.
The Trinity Teacher Sons may return many times to the same world. But sooner or
later, in connection with the termination of one of their missions, the
Planetary Prince is elevated to the position of Planetary Sovereign, and the
System Sovereign appears to proclaim the entrance of such a world upon the era
of light and life.
It was of the conclusion of the terminal mission of the Teacher Sons (at least
that would be the chronology on a normal world) that John wrote: "I saw a new
heaven and a new earth and the new Jerusalem coming down from God out of
heaven, prepared as a princess adorned for the prince."
top of page - 600
This is the same renovated earth, the advanced planetary stage, that the olden
seer envisioned when he wrote: "`For, as the new heavens and the new earth,
which I will make, shall remain before me, so shall you and your children
survive; and it shall come to pass that from one new moon to another and from
one Sabbath to another all flesh shall come to worship before me,' says the
Lord."
It is the mortals of such an age who are described as "a chosen generation, a
royal priesthood, a holy nation, an exalted people; and you shall show forth
the praises of Him who has called you out of darkness into this marvelous
light."
No matter what the special natural history of an individual planet may be, no
difference whether a realm has been wholly loyal, tainted with evil, or cursed
by sin--no matter what the antecedents may be--sooner or later the grace of God
and the ministry of angels will usher in the day of the advent of the Trinity
Teacher Sons; and their departure, following their final mission, will
inaugurate this superb era of light and life.
All the worlds of Satania can join in the hope of the one who wrote:
"Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for a new heaven and a new
earth, wherein dwells righteousness. Wherefore, beloved, seeing that you look
for such things, be diligent that you may be found by Him in peace, without
spot and blameless."
The departure of the Teacher Son corps, at the end of their first or some
subsequent reign, ushers in the dawn of the era of light and life--the
threshold of the transition from time to the vestibule of eternity. The
planetary realization of this era of light and life far more than equals the
fondest expectations of Urantia mortals who have entertained no more farseeing
concepts of the future life than those embraced within religious beliefs which
depict heaven as the immediate destiny and final dwelling place of surviving
mortals.
[Sponsored by a Mighty Messenger temporarily attached to the staff of Gabriel.]
top of page - 601
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Subjects Archive The Urantia Book Urantia Book PART II: The Local Universe :
The Evolution Of Local Universes Administration Of The Local Universe The Local
Universe Mother Spirit The Local Universe Sons Of God The Life Carriers
Personalities Of The Local Universe Ministering Spirits Of The Local Universe
The Seraphic Hosts The Ascending Sons Of God Physical Aspects Of The Local
Universe Energy--mind And Matter The Constellations The Celestial Artisans The
Local System Administration The Local System Headquarters The Seven Mansion
Worlds The Morontia Life The Inhabited Worlds The Planetary Princes The
Planetary Adams Planetary Mortal Epochs The Lucifer Rebellion Problems Of The
Lucifer Rebellion The Spheres Of Light And Life Universal Unity
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