PART II
The Local Universe
PAPER 32
THE EVOLUTION OF LOCAL UNIVERSES
32:0.1 A LOCAL universe is the handiwork of a
Creator Son of the Paradise order of Michael. It comprises one hundred
constellations, each embracing one hundred systems of inhabited worlds. Each
system will eventually contain approximately one thousand inhabited
spheres.
32:0.2 These universes of time and space are all
evolutionary. The creative plan of the Paradise Michaels always proceeds along
the path of gradual evolvement and progressive development of the physical,
intellectual, and spiritual natures and capacities of the manifold creatures
who inhabit the varied orders of spheres comprising such a local
universe.
32:0.3 Urantia belongs to a local universe whose
sovereign is the God-man of Nebadon, Jesus of Nazareth and Michael of
Salvington. And all of Michael's plans for this local universe were fully
approved by the Paradise Trinity before he ever embarked upon the supreme
adventure of space.
32:0.4 The Sons of God may choose the realms of
their creator activities, but these material creations were originally
projected and planned by the Paradise Architects of the Master
Universe.
1. PHYSICAL EMERGENCE OF UNIVERSES
32:1.1 The preuniverse manipulations of space-force
and the primordial energies are the work of the Paradise Master Force
Organizers; but in the superuniverse domains, when emergent energy becomes
responsive to local or linear gravity, they retire in favor of the power
directors of the superuniverse concerned.
32:1.2 These power directors function alone in the
prematerial and postforce phases of a local universe creation. There is no
opportunity for a Creator Son to begin universe organization until the power
directors have effected the mobilization of the space-energies sufficiently to
provide a material foundation -- literal suns and material spheres -- for the
emerging universe.
32:1.3 The local universes are all approximately of
the same energy potential, though they differ greatly in physical dimensions
and may vary in visible-matter content from time to time. The power charge and
potential-matter endowment of a local universe are determined by the
manipulations of the power directors and their predecessors as well as by the
Creator Son's activities and by the endowment of the inherent physical control
possessed by his creative associate.
32:1.4 The energy charge of a local universe is
approximately one one-hundred-thousandth of the force endowment of its
superuniverse. In the case of Nebadon, your local universe, the mass
materialization is a trifle less. Physically speaking, Nebadon possesses all
of the physical endowment of energy and matter that may be found in any of the
Orvonton local creations. The only physical limitation upon the developmental
expansion of the Nebadon universe consists in the quantitative charge of
space-energy held captive by the gravity control of the associated powers and
personalities of the combined universe mechanism.
32:1.5 When energy-matter has attained a certain
stage in mass materialization, a Paradise Creator Son appears upon the scene,
accompanied by a Creative Daughter of the Infinite Spirit. Simultaneously with
the arrival of the Creator Son, work is begun upon the architectural sphere
which is to become the headquarters world of the projected local universe. For
long ages such a local creation evolves, suns become stabilized, planets form
and swing into their orbits, while the work of creating the architectural
worlds which are to serve as constellation headquarters and system capitals
continues.
2. UNIVERSE ORGANIZATION
32:2.1 The Creator Sons are preceded in universe
organization by the power directors and other beings originating in the Third
Source and Center. From the energies of space, thus previously organized,
Michael, your Creator Son, established the inhabited realms of the universe of
Nebadon and ever since has been painstakingly devoted to their administration.
From pre-existent energy these divine Sons materialize visible matter, project
living creatures, and with the co-operation of the universe presence of the
Infinite Spirit, create a diverse retinue of spirit personalities.
32:2.2 These power directors and energy controllers
who long preceded the Creator Son in the preliminary physical work of universe
organization later serve in magnificent liaison with this Universe Son,
forever remaining in associated control of those energies which they
originally organized and circuitized. On Salvington there now function the
same one hundred power centers who co-operated with your Creator Son in the
original formation of this local universe.
32:2.3 The first completed act of physical creation
in Nebadon consisted in the organization of the headquarters world, the
architectural sphere of Salvington, with its satellites. From the time of the
initial moves of the power centers and physical controllers to the arrival of
the living staff on the completed spheres of Salvington, there intervened a
little over one billion years of your present planetary time. The construction
of Salvington was immediately followed by the creation of the one hundred
headquarters worlds of the projected constellations and the ten thousand
headquarters spheres of the projected local systems of planetary control and
administration, together with their architectural satellites. Such
architectural worlds are designed to accommodate both physical and spiritual
personalities as well as the intervening morontia or transition stages of
being.
32:2.4 Salvington, the headquarters of Nebadon, is
situated at the exact energy-mass center of the local universe. But your local
universe is not a single astronomic system, though a large system does exist
at its physical center.
32:2.5 Salvington is the personal headquarters of
Michael of Nebadon, but he will not always be found there. While the smooth
functioning of your local universe no longer requires the fixed presence of
the Creator Son at the capital sphere, this was not true of the earlier epochs
of physical organization. A Creator Son is unable to leave his headquarters
world until such a time as gravity stabilization of the realm has been
effected through the materialization of sufficient energy to enable the
various circuits and systems to counterbalance one another by mutual material
attraction.
32:2.6 Presently, the physical plan of a universe is
completed, and the Creator Son, in association with the Creative Spirit,
projects his plan of life creation; whereupon does this representation of the
Infinite Spirit begin her universe function as a distinct creative
personality. When this first creative act is formulated and executed, there
springs into being the Bright and Morning Star, the personification of this
initial creative concept of identity and ideal of divinity. This is the chief
executive of the universe, the personal associate of the Creator Son, one like
him in all aspects of character, though markedly limited in the attributes of
divinity.
32:2.7 And now that the right-hand helper and chief
executive of the Creator Son has been provided, there ensues the bringing into
existence of a vast and wonderful array of diverse creatures. The sons and
daughters of the local universe are forthcoming, and soon thereafter the
government of such a creation is provided, extending from the supreme councils
of the universe to the fathers of the constellations and the sovereigns of the
local systems -- the aggregations of those worlds which are designed
subsequently to become the homes of the varied mortal races of will creatures;
and each of these worlds will be presided over by a Planetary
Prince.
32:2.8 And then, when such a universe has been so
completely organized and so repletely manned, does the Creator Son enter into
the Father's proposal to create mortal man in their divine image.
32:2.9 The organization of planetary abodes is still
progressing in Nebadon, for this universe is, indeed, a young cluster in the
starry and planetary realms of Orvonton. At the last registry there were
3,840,101 inhabited planets in Nebadon, and Satania, the local system of your
world, is fairly typical of other systems.
32:2.10 Satania is not a uniform physical system, a
single astronomic unit or organization. Its 619 inhabited worlds are located
in over five hundred different physical systems. Only five have more than two
inhabited worlds, and of these only one has four peopled planets, while there
are forty-six having two inhabited worlds.
32:2.11 The Satania system of inhabited worlds is
far removed from Uversa and that great sun cluster which functions as the
physical or astronomic center of the seventh superuniverse. From Jerusem, the
headquarters of Satania, it is over two hundred thousand light-years to the
physical center of the superuniverse of Orvonton, far, far away in the dense
diameter of the Milky Way. Satania is on the periphery of the local universe,
and Nebadon is now well out towards the edge of Orvonton. From the outermost
system of inhabited worlds to the center of the superuniverse is a trifle less
than two hundred and fifty thousand light-years.
32:2.12 The universe of Nebadon now swings far to
the south and east in the superuniverse circuit of Orvonton. The nearest
neighboring universes are: Avalon, Henselon, Sanselon, Portalon, Wolvering,
Fanoving, and Alvoring.
32:2.13 But the evolution of a local universe is a
long narrative. Papers dealing with the superuniverse introduce this subject,
those of this section, treating of the local creations, continue it, while
those to follow, touching upon the history and destiny of Urantia, complete
the story. But you can adequately comprehend the destiny of the mortals of
such a local creation only by a perusal of the narratives of the life and
teachings of your Creator Son as he once lived the life of man, in the
likeness of mortal flesh, on your own evolutionary world.
3. THE EVOLUTIONARY IDEA
32:3.1 The only creation that is perfectly settled
is Havona, the central universe, which was made directly by the thought of the
Universal Father and the word of the Eternal Son. Havona is an existential,
perfect, and replete universe, surrounding the home of the eternal Deities,
the center of all things. The creations of the seven superuniverses are
finite, evolutionary, and consistently progressive.
32:3.2 The physical systems of time and space are
all evolutionary in origin. They are not even physically stabilized until they
are swung into the settled circuits of their superuniverses. Neither is a
local universe settled in light and life until its physical possibilities of
expansion and development have been exhausted, and until the spiritual status
of all its inhabited worlds has been forever settled and
stabilized.
32:3.3 Except in the central universe, perfection is
a progressive attainment. In the central creation we have a pattern of
perfection, but all other realms must attain that perfection by the methods
established for the advancement of those particular worlds or universes. And
an almost infinite variety characterizes the plans of the Creator Sons for
organizing, evolving, disciplining, and settling their respective local
universes.
32:3.4 With the exception of the deity presence of
the Father, every local universe is, in a certain sense, a duplication of the
administrative organization of the central or pattern creation. Although the
Universal Father is personally present in the residential universe, he does
not indwell the minds of the beings originating in that universe as he does
literally dwell with the souls of the mortals of time and space. There seems
to be an all-wise compensation in the adjustment and regulation of the
spiritual affairs of the far-flung creation. In the central universe the
Father is personally present as such but absent in the minds of the children
of that perfect creation; in the universes of space the Father is absent in
person, being represented by his Sovereign Sons, while he is intimately
present in the minds of his mortal children, being spiritually represented by
the prepersonal presence of the Mystery Monitors that reside in the minds of
these will creatures.
32:3.5 On the headquarters of a local universe there
reside all those creator and creative personalities who represent
self-contained authority and administrative autonomy except the personal
presence of the Universal Father. In the local universe there are to be found
something of everyone and someone of almost every class of intelligent beings
existing in the central universe except the Universal Father. Although the
Universal Father is not personally present in a local universe, he is
personally represented by its Creator Son, sometime vicegerent of God and
subsequently supreme and sovereign ruler in his own right.
32:3.6 The farther down the scale of life we go, the
more difficult it becomes to locate, with the eye of faith, the invisible
Father. The lower creatures -- and sometimes even the higher personalities --
find it difficult always to envisage the Universal Father in his Creator Sons.
And so, pending the time of their spiritual exaltation, when perfection of
development will enable them to see God in person, they grow weary in
progression, entertain spiritual doubts, stumble into confusion, and thus
isolate themselves from the progressive spiritual aims of their time and
universe. In this way they lose the ability to see the Father when beholding
the Creator Son. The surest safeguard for the creature throughout the long
struggle to attain the Father, during this time when inherent conditions make
such attainment impossible, is tenaciously to hold on to the truth-fact of the
Father's presence in his Sons. Literally and figuratively, spiritually and
personally, the Father and the Sons are one. It is a fact: He who has seen a
Creator Son has seen the Father.
32:3.7 The personalities of a given universe are
settled and dependable, at the start, only in accordance with their degree of
kinship to Deity. When creature origin departs sufficiently far from the
original and divine Sources, whether we are dealing with the Sons of God or
the creatures of ministry belonging to the Infinite Spirit, there is an
increase in the possibility of disharmony, confusion, and sometimes rebellion
-- sin.
32:3.8 Excepting perfect beings of Deity origin, all
will creatures in the superuniverses are of evolutionary nature, beginning in
lowly estate and climbing ever upward, in reality inward. Even highly
spiritual personalities continue to ascend the scale of life by progressive
translations from life to life and from sphere to sphere. And in the case of
those who entertain the Mystery Monitors, there is indeed no limit to the
possible heights of their spiritual ascent and universe attainment.
32:3.9 The perfection of the creatures of time, when
finally achieved, is wholly an acquirement, a bona fide personality
possession. While the elements of grace are freely admixed, nevertheless, the
creature attainments are the result of individual effort and actual living,
personality reaction to the existing environment.
32:3.10 The fact of animal evolutionary origin does
not attach stigma to any personality in the sight of the universe as that is
the exclusive method of producing one of the two basic types of finite
intelligent will creatures. When the heights of perfection and eternity are
attained, all the more honor to those who began at the bottom and joyfully
climbed the ladder of life, round by round, and who, when they do reach the
heights of glory, will have gained a personal experience which embodies an
actual knowledge of every phase of life from the bottom to the top.
32:3.11 In all this is shown the wisdom of the
Creators. It would be just as easy for the Universal Father to make all
mortals perfect beings, to impart perfection by his divine word. But that
would deprive them of the wonderful experience of the adventure and training
associated with the long and gradual inward climb, an experience to be had
only by those who are so fortunate as to begin at the very bottom of living
existence.
32:3.12 In the universes encircling Havona there are
provided only a sufficient number of perfect creatures to meet the need for
pattern teacher guides for those who are ascending the evolutionary scale of
life. The experiential nature of the evolutionary type of personality is the
natural cosmic complement of the ever-perfect natures of the Paradise-Havona
creatures. In reality, both perfect and perfected creatures are incomplete as
regards finite totality. But in the complemental association of the
existentially perfect creatures of the Paradise-Havona system with the
experientially perfected finaliters ascending from the evolutionary universes,
both types find release from inherent limitations and thus may conjointly
attempt to reach the sublime heights of the ultimate of creature
status.
32:3.13 These creature transactions are the universe
repercussions of actions and reactions within the Sevenfold Deity, wherein the
eternal divinity of the Paradise Trinity is conjoined with the evolving
divinity of the Supreme Creators of the time-space universes in, by, and
through the power-actualizing Deity of the Supreme Being.
32:3.14 The divinely perfect creature and the
evolutionary perfected creature are equal in degree of divinity potential, but
they differ in kind. Each must depend on the other to attain supremacy of
service. The evolutionary superuniverses depend on perfect Havona to provide
the final training for their ascending citizens, but so does the perfect
central universe require the existence of the perfecting superuniverses to
provide for the full development of its descending inhabitants.
32:3.15 The two prime manifestations of finite
reality, innate perfection and evolved perfection, be they personalities or
universes, are co-ordinate, dependent, and integrated. Each requires the other
to achieve completion of function, service, and destiny.
4. GOD'S RELATION TO A LOCAL UNIVERSE
32:4.1 Do not entertain the idea that, since the
Universal Father has delegated so much of himself and his power to others, he
is a silent or inactive member of the Deity partnership. Aside from
personality domains and Adjuster bestowal, he is apparently the least active
of the Paradise Deities in that he allows his Deity co-ordinates, his Sons,
and numerous created intelligences to perform so much in the carrying out of
his eternal purpose. He is the silent member of the creative trio only in that
he never does aught which any of his co-ordinate or subordinate associates can
do.
32:4.2 God has full understanding of the need of
every intelligent creature for function and experience, and therefore, in
every situation, be it concerned with the destiny of a universe or the welfare
of the humblest of his creatures, God retires from activity in favor of the
galaxy of creature and Creator personalities who inherently intervene between
himself and any given universe situation or creative event. But
notwithstanding this retirement, this exhibition of infinite co-ordination,
there is on God's part an actual, literal, and personal participation in these
events by and through these ordained agencies and personalities. The Father is
working in and through all these channels for the welfare of all his far-flung
creation.
32:4.3 As regards the policies, conduct, and
administration of a local universe, the Universal Father acts in the person of
his Creator Son. In the interrelationships of the Sons of God, in the group
associations of the personalities of origin in the Third Source and Center, or
in the relationship between any other creatures, such as human beings -- as
concerns such associations the Universal Father never intervenes. The law of
the Creator Son, the rule of the Constellation Fathers, the System Sovereigns,
and the Planetary Princes -- the ordained policies and procedures for that
universe -- always prevail. There is no division of authority; never is there
a cross working of divine power and purpose. The Deities are in perfect and
eternal unanimity.
32:4.4 The Creator Son rules supreme in all matters
of ethical associations, the relations of any division of creatures to any
other class of creatures or of two or more individuals within any given group;
but such a plan does not mean that the Universal Father may not in his own way
intervene and do aught that pleases the divine mind with any individual
creature throughout all creation, as pertains to that individual's present
status or future prospects and as concerns the Father's eternal plan and
infinite purpose.
32:4.5 In the mortal will creatures the Father is
actually present in the indwelling Adjuster, a fragment of his prepersonal
spirit; and the Father is also the source of the personality of such a mortal
will creature.
32:4.6 These Thought Adjusters, the bestowals of the
Universal Father, are comparatively isolated; they indwell human minds but
have no discernible connection with the ethical affairs of a local creation.
They are not directly co-ordinated with the seraphic service nor with the
administration of systems, constellations, or a local universe, not even with
the rule of a Creator Son, whose will is the supreme law of his
universe.
32:4.7 The indwelling Adjusters are one of God's
separate but unified modes of contact with the creatures of his all but
infinite creation. Thus does he who is invisible to mortal man manifest his
presence, and could he do so, he would show himself to us in still other ways,
but such further revelation is not divinely possible.
32:4.8 We can see and understand the mechanism
whereby the Sons enjoy intimate and complete knowledge regarding the universes
of their jurisdiction; but we cannot fully comprehend the methods whereby God
is so fully and personally conversant with the details of the universe of
universes, although we at least can recognize the avenue whereby the Universal
Father can receive information regarding, and manifest his presence to, the
beings of his immense creation. Through the personality circuit the Father is
cognizant -- has personal knowledge -- of all the thoughts and acts of all the
beings in all the systems of all the universes of all creation. Though we
cannot fully grasp this technique of God's communion with his children, we can
be strengthened in the assurance that the "Lord knows his children," and that
of each one of us "he takes note where we were born."
32:4.9 In your universe and in your heart the
Universal Father is present, spiritually speaking, by one of the Seven Master
Spirits of central abode and, specifically, by the divine Adjuster who lives
and works and waits in the depths of the mortal mind.
32:4.10 God is not a self-centered personality; the
Father freely distributes himself to his creation and to his creatures. He
lives and acts, not only in the Deities, but also in his Sons, whom he
intrusts with the doing of everything that it is divinely possible for them to
do. The Universal Father has truly divested himself of every function which it
is possible for another being to perform. And this is just as true of mortal
man as of the Creator Son who rules in God's stead at the headquarters of a
local universe. Thus we behold the outworking of the ideal and infinite love
of the Universal Father.
32:4.11 In this universal bestowal of himself we
have abundant proof of both the magnitude and the magnanimity of the Father's
divine nature. If God has withheld aught of himself from the universal
creation, then of that residue he is in lavish generosity bestowing the
Thought Adjusters upon the mortals of the realms, the Mystery Monitors of
time, who so patiently indwell the mortal candidates for life
everlasting.
32:4.12 The Universal Father has poured out himself,
as it were, to make all creation rich in personality possession and potential
spiritual attainment. God has given us himself that we may be like him, and he
has reserved for himself of power and glory only that which is necessary for
the maintenance of those things for the love of which he has thus divested
himself of all things else.
5. THE ETERNAL AND DIVINE PURPOSE
32:5.1 There is a great and glorious purpose in the
march of the universes through space. All of your mortal struggling is not in
vain. We are all part of an immense plan, a gigantic enterprise, and it is the
vastness of the undertaking that renders it impossible to see very much of it
at any one time and during any one life. We are all a part of an eternal
project which the Gods are supervising and outworking. The whole marvelous and
universal mechanism moves on majestically through space to the music of the
meter of the infinite thought and the eternal purpose of the First Great
Source and Center.
32:5.2 The eternal purpose of the eternal God is a
high spiritual ideal. The events of time and the struggles of material
existence are but the transient scaffolding which bridges over to the other
side, to the promised land of spiritual reality and supernal existence. Of
course, you mortals find it difficult to grasp the idea of an eternal purpose;
you are virtually unable to comprehend the thought of eternity, something
never beginning and never ending. Everything familiar to you has an end.
32:5.3 As regards an individual life, the duration
of a realm, or the chronology of any connected series of events, it would seem
that we are dealing with an isolated stretch of time; everything seems to have
a beginning and an end. And it would appear that a series of such experiences,
lives, ages, or epochs, when successively arranged, constitutes a straightaway
drive, an isolated event of time flashing momentarily across the infinite face
of eternity. But when we look at all this from behind the scenes, a more
comprehensive view and a more complete understanding suggest that such an
explanation is inadequate, disconnected, and wholly unsuited properly to
account for, and otherwise to correlate, the transactions of time with the
underlying purposes and basic reactions of eternity.
32:5.4 To me it seems more fitting, for purposes of
explanation to the mortal mind, to conceive of eternity as a cycle and the
eternal purpose as an endless circle, a cycle of eternity in some way
synchronized with the transient material cycles of time. As regards the
sectors of time connected with, and forming a part of, the cycle of eternity,
we are forced to recognize that such temporary epochs are born, live, and die
just as the temporary beings of time are born, live, and die. Most human
beings die because, having failed to achieve the spirit level of Adjuster
fusion, the metamorphosis of death constitutes the only possible procedure
whereby they may escape the fetters of time and the bonds of material
creation, thereby being enabled to strike spiritual step with the progressive
procession of eternity. Having survived the trial life of time and material
existence, it becomes possible for you to continue on in touch with, even as a
part of, eternity, swinging on forever with the worlds of space around the
circle of the eternal ages.
32:5.5 The sectors of time are like the flashes of
personality in temporal form; they appear for a season, and then they are lost
to human sight, only to reappear as new actors and continuing factors in the
higher life of the endless swing around the eternal circle. Eternity can
hardly be conceived as a straightaway drive, in view of our belief in a
delimited universe moving over a vast, elongated circle around the central
dwelling place of the Universal Father.
32:5.6 Frankly, eternity is incomprehensible to the
finite mind of time. You simply cannot grasp it; you cannot comprehend it. I
do not completely visualize it, and even if I did, it would be impossible for
me to convey my concept to the human mind. Nevertheless, I have done my best
to portray something of our viewpoint, to tell you somewhat of our
understanding of things eternal. I am endeavoring to aid you in the
crystallization of your thoughts about these values which are of infinite
nature and eternal import.
32:5.7 There is in the mind of God a plan which
embraces every creature of all his vast domains, and this plan is an eternal
purpose of boundless opportunity, unlimited progress, and endless life. And
the infinite treasures of such a matchless career are yours for the
striving!
32:5.8 The goal of eternity is ahead! The adventure
of divinity attainment lies before you! The race for perfection is on!
whosoever will may enter, and certain victory will crown the efforts of every
human being who will run the race of faith and trust, depending every step of
the way on the leading of the indwelling Adjuster and on the guidance of that
good spirit of the Universe Son, which so freely has been poured out upon all
flesh.
32:5.9 Presented by
a Mighty Messenger temporarily attached to the Supreme Council of Nebadon and
assigned to this mission by Gabriel of Salvington.
