PAPER 44
THE CELESTIAL ARTISANS
44:0.1 AMONG the courtesy colonies of the various
divisional and universe headquarters worlds, may be found the unique order of
composite personalities denominated the celestial artisans. These beings are
the master artists and artisans of the morontia and lower spirit realms. They
are the spirits and semispirits who are engaged in morontia embellishment and
in spiritual beautification. Such artisans are distributed throughout the
grand universe -- on the headquarters worlds of the superuniverses, the local
universes, the constellations, and systems, as well as on all spheres settled
in light and life; but their chief realm of activity is in the constellations
and especially on the seven hundred seventy worlds surrounding each
headquarters sphere.
44:0.2 Though their work may be almost
incomprehensible to the material mind, it should be understood that the
morontia and spirit worlds are not without their high arts and supernal
cultures.
44:0.3 The celestial artisans are not created as
such; they are a selected and recruited corps of beings composed of certain
teacher personalities native to the central universe and their volunteer
pupils drawn from the ascending mortals and numerous other celestial groups.
The original teaching corps of these artisans was sometime assigned by the
Infinite Spirit in collaboration with the Seven Master Spirits and consisted
of seven thousand Havona instructors, one thousand to each of the seven
divisions of artisans. With such a nucleus to start with, there has developed
through the ages this brilliant body of skillful workers in spirit and
morontia affairs.
44:0.4 Any morontia personality or spirit entity is
eligible for admission to the corps of the celestial artisans; that is, any
being below the rank of inherent divine sonship. Ascending sons of God from
the evolutionary spheres may, after their arrival on the morontia worlds,
apply for admission to the artisan corps and, if sufficiently gifted, may
choose such a career for a longer or shorter period. But no one may enlist
with the celestial artisans for less than one millennium, one thousand years
of superuniverse time.
44:0.5 All celestial artisans are registered on the
superuniverse headquarters but are directed by morontia supervisors on the
local universe capitals. They are commissioned in the following seven major
divisions of activity by the central corps of morontia supervisors functioning
on the headquarters world of each local universe:
1. Celestial Musicians.
2. Heavenly Reproducers.
3. Divine Builders.
4. Thought Recorders.
5. Energy Manipulators.
6. Designers and Embellishers.
7. Harmony Workers.
44:0.6 The original teachers of these seven groups
all hailed from the perfect worlds of Havona, and Havona contains the
patterns, the pattern studies, for all phases and forms of spirit artistry.
While it is a gigantic task to undertake to transfer these arts of Havona to
the worlds of space, the celestial artisans have improved in technique and
execution from age to age. As in all other phases of the ascending career
those who are most advanced in any line of endeavor are required constantly to
impart their superior knowledge and skill to their less favored
fellows.
44:0.7 You will first begin to glimpse these
transplanted arts of Havona on the mansion worlds, and their beauty and your
appreciation of their beauty will heighten and brighten until you stand in the
spirit halls of Salvington and behold the inspiring masterpieces of the
supernal artists of the spirit realms.
44:0.8 All these activities of the morontia and
spirit worlds are real. To spirit beings the spirit world is a reality. To us
the material world is the more unreal. The higher forms of spirits freely pass
through ordinary matter. High spirits are reactive to nothing material
excepting certain of the basic energies. To material beings the spirit world
is more or less unreal; to spirit beings the material world is almost entirely
unreal, being merely a shadow of the substance of spirit realities.
44:0.9 I cannot, with exclusive spirit vision,
perceive the building in which this narrative is being translated and
recorded. A Divine Counselor from Uversa who chances to stand by my side
perceives still less of these purely material creations. We discern how these
material structures appear to you by viewing a spirit counterpart presented to
our minds by one of our attending energy transformers. This material building
is not exactly real to me, a spirit being, but it is, of course, very real and
very serviceable to material mortals.
44:0.10 There are certain types of beings who are
capable of discerning the reality of the creatures of both the spirit and the
material worlds. Belonging to this class are the so-called fourth creatures of
the Havona Servitals and the fourth creatures of the conciliators. The angels
of time and space are endowed with the ability to discern both spirit and
material beings as also are the ascending mortals subsequent to deliverance
from the life in the flesh. After attainment of the higher spirit levels the
ascenders are able to recognize material, morontia, and spirit
realities.
44:0.11 There is also here with me a Mighty
Messenger from Uversa, an ascendant Adjuster-fused, onetime mortal being, and
he perceives you as you are, and at the same time he visualizes the Solitary
Messenger, the supernaphim, and other celestial beings present. Never in your
long ascendancy will you lose the power to recognize your associates of former
existences. Always, as you ascend inward in the scale of life, will you retain
the ability to recognize and fraternize with the fellow beings of your
previous and lower levels of experience. Each new translation or resurrection
will add one more group of spirit beings to your vision range without in the
least depriving you of the ability to recognize your friends and fellows of
former estates.
44:0.12 All this is made possible in the experience
of ascending mortals by the action of the indwelling Thought Adjusters.
Through their retention of the duplicates of your entire life's experiences,
you are assured of never losing any true attribute you once had; and these
Adjusters are going through with you, as a part of you, in reality, as
you.
44:0.13 But I almost despair of being able to convey
to the material mind the nature of the work of the celestial artisans. I am
under the necessity of constantly perverting thought and distorting language
in an effort to unfold to the mortal mind the reality of these morontia
transactions and near-spirit phenomena. Your comprehension is incapable of
grasping, and your language is inadequate for conveying, the meaning, value,
and relationship of these semispirit activities. And I proceed with this
effort to enlighten the human mind concerning these realities with the full
understanding of the utter impossibility of my being very successful in such
an undertaking.
44:0.14 I can do no more than attempt to sketch a
crude parallelism between mortal material activities and the manifold
functions of the celestial artisans. If the Urantia races were more advanced
in art and other cultural accomplishments, then could I go that much farther
in an effort to project the human mind from the things of matter to those of
morontia. About all I can hope to accomplish is to make emphatic the fact of
the reality of these transactions of the morontia and the spirit worlds.
1. THE CELESTIAL MUSICIANS
44:1.1 With the limited range of mortal hearing, you
can hardly conceive of morontia melodies. There is even a material range of
beautiful sound unrecognized by the human sense of hearing, not to mention the
inconceivable scope of morontia and spirit harmony. Spirit melodies are not
material sound waves but spirit pulsations received by the spirits of
celestial personalities. There is a vastness of range and a soul of
expression, as well as a grandeur of execution, associated with the melody of
the spheres, that are wholly beyond human comprehension. I have seen millions
of enraptured beings held in sublime ecstasy while the melody of the realm
rolled in upon the spirit energy of the celestial circuits. These marvelous
melodies can be broadcast to the uttermost parts of a universe.
44:1.2 The celestial musicians are occupied with the
production of celestial harmony by the manipulation of the following spirit
forces:
1. Spiritual sound -- spirit current
interruptions.
2. Spiritual light -- the control and
intensification of the light of the morontia and spiritual realms.
3. Energy impingements -- melody produced
by the skillful management of the morontia and spirit energies.
4. Color symphonies -- melody of morontia
color tones; this ranks among the highest accomplishments of the celestial
musicians.
5. Harmony of associated spirits -- the
very arrangement and association of different orders of morontia and spirit
beings produce majestic melodies.
6. Melody of thought -- the thinking of
spiritual thoughts can be so perfected as to burst forth in the melodies of
Havona.
7. The music of space -- by proper
attunement the melodies of other spheres can be picked up on the universe
broadcast circuits.
44:1.3 There are over one hundred thousand different
modes of sound, color, and energy manipulation, techniques analogous to the
human employment of musical instruments. Your ensembles of dancing undoubtedly
represent a crude and grotesque attempt of material creatures to approach the
celestial harmony of being placement and personality arrangement. The other
five forms of morontia melody are unrecognized by the sensory mechanism of
material bodies.
44:1.4 Harmony, the music of the seven levels of
melodious association, is the one universal code of spirit communication.
Music, such as Urantia mortals understand, attains its highest expression in
the schools of Jerusem, the system headquarters, where semimaterial beings are
taught the harmonies of sound. Mortals do not react to the other forms of
morontia melody and celestial harmony.
44:1.5 Appreciation of music on Urantia is both
physical and spiritual; and your human musicians have done much to elevate
musical taste from the barbarous monotony of your early ancestors to the
higher levels of sound appreciation. The majority of Urantia mortals react to
music so largely with the material muscles and so slightly with the mind and
spirit; but there has been a steady improvement in musical appreciation for
more than thirty-five thousand years.
44:1.6 Tuneful syncopation represents a transition
from the musical monotony of primitive man to the expressionful harmony and
meaningful melodies of your later-day musicians. These earlier types of rhythm
stimulate the reaction of the music-loving sense without entailing the
exertion of the higher intellectual powers of harmony appreciation and thus
more generally appeal to immature or spiritually indolent individuals.
44:1.7 The best music of Urantia is just a fleeting
echo of the magnificent strains heard by the celestial associates of your
musicians, who left but snatches of these harmonies of morontia forces on
record as the musical melodies of sound harmonics. Spirit-morontia music not
infrequently employs all seven modes of expression and reproduction, so that
the human mind is tremendously handicapped in any attempt to reduce these
melodies of the higher spheres to mere notes of musical sound. Such an effort
would be something like endeavoring to reproduce the strains of a great
orchestra by means of a single musical instrument.
44:1.8 While you have assembled some beautiful
melodies on Urantia, you have not progressed musically nearly so far as many
of your neighboring planets in Satania. If Adam and Eve had only survived,
then would you have had music in reality; but the gift of harmony, so large in
their natures, has been so diluted by strains of unmusical tendencies that
only once in a thousand mortal lives is there any great appreciation of
harmonics. But be not discouraged; some day a real musician may appear on
Urantia, and whole peoples will be enthralled by the magnificent strains of
his melodies. One such human being could forever change the course of a whole
nation, even the entire civilized world. It is literally true, "melody has
power a whole world to transform." Forever, music will remain the universal
language of men, angels, and spirits. Harmony is the speech of Havona.
2. THE HEAVENLY REPRODUCERS
44:2.1 Mortal man can hardly hope for more than a
meager and distorted concept of the functions of the heavenly reproducers,
which I must attempt to illustrate through the gross and limited symbolism of
your material language. The spirit-morontia world has a thousand and one
things of supreme value, things worthy of reproduction but unknown on Urantia,
experiences that belong in the category of the activities which have hardly
"entered into the mind of man," those realities which God has in waiting for
those who survive the life in the flesh.
44:2.2 There are seven groups of the heavenly
reproducers, and I will attempt to illustrate their work by the following
classification:
44:2.3 1. The singers -- harmonists who
reiterate the specific harmonies of the past and interpret the melodies of the
present. But all of this is effected on the morontia level.
44:2.4 2. The color workers -- those artists
of light and shade you might call sketchers and painters, artists who preserve
passing scenes and transient episodes for future morontia
enjoyment.
44:2.5 3. The light picturizers -- the makers
of the real semispirit-phenomena preservations of which motion pictures would
be a very crude illustration.
44:2.6 4. The historic pageanteers -- those
who dramatically reproduce the crucial events of universe records and
history.
44:2.7 5. The prophetic artists -- those who
project the meanings of history into the future.
44:2.8 6. The life-story tellers -- those who
perpetuate the meaning and significance of life experience. The projection of
present personal experiences into future attainment values.
44:2.9 7. The administrative enactors --
those who depict the significance of governmental philosophy and
administrative technique, the celestial dramatists of sovereignty.
44:2.10 Very often and effectively the heavenly
reproducers collaborate with the reversion directors in combining memory
recapitulation with certain forms of mind rest and personality diversion.
Before the morontia conclaves and spirit assemblies these reproducers
sometimes associate themselves in tremendous dramatic spectacles
representative of the purpose of such gatherings. I recently witnessed such a
stupendous presentation in which more than one million actors produced a
succession of one thousand scenes.
44:2.11 The higher intellectual teachers and the
transition ministers freely and effectively utilize these various groups of
reproducers in their morontia educational activities. But not all of their
efforts are devoted to transient illustration; much, very much, of their work
is of a permanent nature and will forever remain as a legacy to all future
time. So versatile are these artisans that, when they function en masse, they
are able to re-enact an age, and in collaboration with the seraphic ministers
they can actually portray the eternal values of the spirit world to the mortal
seers of time.
3. THE DIVINE BUILDERS
44:3.1 There are cities "whose builder and maker is
God." In spirit counterpart we have all that you mortals are familiar with and
inexpressibly more. We have homes, spirit comforts, and morontia necessities.
For every material satisfaction which humans are capable of enjoying, we have
thousands of spiritual realities that serve to enrich and enlarge our
existence. The divine builders function in seven groups:
44:3.2 1. The home designers and builders --
those who construct and remodel the abodes assigned to individuals and working
groups. These morontia and spirit domiciles are real. They would be invisible
to your short-range vision, but they are very real and beautiful to us. To a
certain extent, all spirit beings may share with the builders certain details
of the planning and creation of their morontia or spirit abodes. These homes
are fitted up and embellished in accordance with the needs of the morontia or
of the spirit creatures who are to inhabit them. There is abundant variety and
ample opportunity for individual expression in all these constructions.
44:3.3 2. The vocation builders -- those who
function in designing and assembling the abodes of the regular and routine
workers of the spirit and morontia realms. These builders are comparable to
those who construct the Urantia workshops and other industrial plants. The
transition worlds have a necessary economy of mutual ministry and specialized
division of labor. We do not all do everything; there is diversity of function
among morontia beings and evolving spirits, and these vocation builders not
only build better workshops but also contribute to the vocational enhancement
of the worker.
44:3.4 3. The play builders. Enormous
edifices are utilized during the seasons of rest, what mortals would call
recreation and, in a certain sense, play. Provision is made for a suitable
setting for the reversion directors, the humorists of the morontia worlds,
those transition spheres whereon takes place the training of ascendant beings
but recently removed from the evolutionary planets. Even the higher spirits
engage in a certain form of reminiscent humor during their periods of
spiritual recharging.
44:3.5 4. The worship builders -- the
experienced architects of the spirit and the morontia temples. All the worlds
of mortal ascent have temples of worship, and they are the most exquisite
creations of the morontia realms and the spirit spheres.
44:3.6 5. The education builders -- those who
build the headquarters of morontia training and advanced spirit learning.
Always is the way open to acquire more knowledge, to gain additional
information respecting one's present and future work as well as universal
cultural knowledge, information designed to make ascending mortals more
intelligent and effective citizens of the morontia and spirit worlds.
44:3.7 6. Morontia planners -- those who
build for the co-ordinate association of all the personalities of all realms
as they are at any one time present on any one sphere. These planners
collaborate with the Morontia Power Supervisors to enrich the co-ordination of
the progressive morontia life.
44:3.8 7. The public builders -- the artisans
who plan and construct the designated places of assembly other than those of
worship. Great and magnificent are the places of common assembly.
44:3.9 While neither these structures nor their
embellishment would be exactly real to the sensory comprehension of material
mortals, they are very real to us. You would be unable to see these temples
could you be there in the flesh; nevertheless, all of these supermaterial
creations are actually there, and we clearly discern them and just as fully
enjoy them.
4. THE THOUGHT RECORDERS
44:4.1 These artisans are devoted to the
preservation and reproduction of the superior thought of the realms, and they
function in seven groups:
44:4.2 1. Thought preservers. These are the
artisans dedicated to the preservation of the higher thought of the realms. On
the morontia worlds they truly treasure the gems of mentation. Before first
coming to Urantia, I saw records and heard broadcasts of the ideation of some
of the great minds of this planet. Thought recorders preserve such noble ideas
in the tongue of Uversa.
44:4.3 Each superuniverse has its own language, a
tongue spoken by its personalities and prevailing throughout its sectors. This
is known as the tongue of Uversa in our superuniverse. Each local universe
also has its own language. All of the higher orders of Nebadon are bilingual,
speaking both the language of Nebadon and the tongue of Uversa. When two
individuals from different local universes meet, they communicate in the
tongue of Uversa; if, however, one of them hails from another superuniverse,
they must have recourse to a translator. In the central universe there is
little need of a language; there exists perfect and well-nigh complete
understanding; there, only the Gods are not fully comprehended. We are taught
that a chance meeting on Paradise reveals more of mutual understanding than
could be communicated by a mortal language in a thousand years. Even on
Salvington we "know as we are known."
44:4.4 The ability to translate thought into
language in the morontia and spirit spheres is beyond mortal comprehension.
Our rate of reducing thought to a permanent record can be so speeded up by the
expert recorders that the equivalent of over half a million words, or thought
symbols, can be registered in one minute of Urantia time. These universe
languages are far more replete than the speech of the evolving worlds. The
concept symbols of Uversa embrace more than a billion characters, although the
basic alphabet contains only seventy symbols. The language of Nebadon is not
quite so elaborate, the basic symbols, or alphabet, being forty-eight in
number.
44:4.5 2. Concept recorders. This second
group of recorders are concerned with the preservation of concept pictures,
idea patterns. This is a form of permanent recording unknown on the material
realms, and by this method I could gain more knowledge in one hour of your
time than you could gain in one hundred years of perusing ordinary written
language.
44:4.6 3. Ideograph recorders. We have the
equivalent of both your written and spoken word, but in preserving thought, we
usually employ concept picturization and ideograph techniques. Those who
preserve ideographs are able to improve one thousandfold upon the work of the
concept recorders.
44:4.7 4. Promoters of oratory. This group of
recorders are occupied with the task of preserving thought for reproduction by
oratory. But in the language of Nebadon we could, in a half hour's address,
cover the subject matter of the entire lifetime of a Urantia mortal. Your only
hope of comprehending these transactions is to pause and consider the
technique of your disordered and garbled dream life -- how you can in a few
seconds traverse years of experience in these fantasies of the night
season.
44:4.8 The oratory of the spirit world is one of the
rare treats which await you who have heard only the crude and stumbling
orations of Urantia. There is harmony of music and euphony of expression in
the orations of Salvington and Edentia which are inspiring beyond description.
These burning concepts are like gems of beauty in diadems of glory. But I
cannot do it! I cannot convey to the human mind the breadth and depth of these
realities of another world!
44:4.9 5. The broadcast directors. The
broadcasts of Paradise, the superuniverses, and the local universes are under
the general supervision of this group of thought conservers. They serve as
censors and editors as well as co-ordinators of the broadcast material, making
a superuniverse adaptation of all Paradise broadcasts and adapting and
translating the broadcasts of the Ancients of Days into the individual tongues
of the local universes.
44:4.10 The local universe broadcasts must also be
modified for reception by the systems and the individual planets. The
transmittal of these space reports is carefully supervised, and there is
always a back registry to insure the proper reception of every report on every
world in a given circuit. These broadcast directors are technically expert in
the utilization of the currents of space for all purposes of intelligence
communication.
44:4.11 6. The rhythm recorders. Urantians
would undoubtedly denominate these artisans poets, although their work is very
different from, and almost infinitely transcends, your poetic productions.
Rhythm is less exhausting to both morontia and spirit beings, and so an effort
is frequently made to increase efficiency, as well as to augment pleasure, by
executing numerous functions in rhythmic form. I only wish you might be
privileged to hear some of the poetic broadcasts of the Edentia assemblies and
to enjoy the richness of the color and tone of the constellation geniuses who
are masters of this exquisite form of self-expression and social
harmonization.
44:4.12 7. The morontia recorders. I am at a
loss to know how to depict to the material mind the function of this important
group of thought recorders assigned to the work of preserving the ensemble
pictures of the various groupings of morontia affairs and spirit transactions;
crudely illustrated, they are the group photographers of the transition
worlds. They save for the future the vital scenes and associations of these
progressive epochs, preserving them in the archives of the morontia halls of
records.
5. THE ENERGY MANIPULATORS
44:5.1 These interesting and effective artisans are
concerned with every kind of energy: physical, mindal, and
spiritual.
44:5.2 1. Physical-energy manipulators. The
physical-energy manipulators serve for long periods with the power directors
and are experts in the manipulation and control of many phases of physical
energy. They are conversant with the three basic currents and the thirty
subsidiary energy segregations of the superuniverses. These beings are of
inestimable assistance to the Morontia Power Supervisors of the transition
worlds. They are the persistent students of the cosmic projections of
Paradise.
44:5.3 2. Mind-energy manipulators. These are
the experts of intercommunication between morontia and other types of
intelligent beings. This form of communication between mortals is practically
nonexistent on Urantia. These are the specialists who promote the ability of
the ascending morontia beings to communicate with one another, and their work
embraces numerous unique adventures in intellect liaison which are far beyond
my power to portray to the material mind. These artisans are the keen students
of the mind circuits of the Infinite Spirit.
44:5.4 3. Spiritual-energy manipulators. The
manipulators of spiritual energy are an intriguing group. Spiritual energy
acts in accordance with established laws, just as does physical energy. That
is, spirit force, when studied, yields dependable deductions and can be
precisely dealt with, even as can the physical energies. There are just as
certain and reliable laws in the spirit world as obtain in the material
realms. During the last few millions of years many improved techniques for the
intake of spiritual energy have been effected by these students of the
fundamental laws of the Eternal Son governing spirit energy as applied to the
morontia and other orders of celestial beings throughout the universes.
44:5.5 4. The compound manipulators. This is
the adventurous group of well-trained beings who are dedicated to the
functional association of the three original phases of divine energy
manifested throughout the universes as physical, mindal, and spiritual
energies. These are the keen personalities who are in reality seeking to
discover the universe presence of God the Supreme, for in this Deity
personality there must occur the experiential unification of all grand
universe divinity. And to a certain extent, these artisans have in recent
times met with some success.
44:5.6 5. The transport advisers. This corps
of technical advisers to the transport seraphim are most proficient in
collaborating with the star students in working out routings and in otherwise
assisting the chiefs of transport on the worlds of space. They are the traffic
supervisors of the spheres and are present on all inhabited planets. Urantia
is served by a corps of seventy transport advisers.
44:5.7 6. The experts of communication.
Urantia, likewise, is served by twelve technicians of interplanetary and
interuniverse communication. These long-experienced beings are expert in the
knowledge of the laws of transmittal and interference as applied to the
communications of the realms. This corps is concerned with all forms of space
messages except those of Gravity and Solitary Messengers. On Urantia much of
their work must be accomplished over the archangels' circuit.
44:5.8 7. The teachers of rest. Divine rest
is associated with the technique of spiritual-energy intake. Morontia and
spirit energy must be replenished just as certainly as physical energy, but
not for the same reasons. I am, perforce, compelled to employ crude
illustrations in my attempts to enlighten you; nevertheless, we of the spirit
world must stop our regular activities periodically and betake ourselves to
suitable places of rendezvous where we enter the divine rest and thus
recuperate our depleting energies.
44:5.9 You will receive your first lessons in these
matters when you reach the mansion worlds after you have become morontia
beings and have begun to experience the technique of spirit affairs. You know
of the innermost circle of Havona and that, after the pilgrims of space have
traversed the preceding circles, they must be inducted into the long and
revivifying rest of Paradise. This is not only a technical requirement of
transit from the career of time to the service of eternity, but it is also a
necessity, a form of rest required to replenish the energy losses incident to
the final steps of the ascendant experience and to store reserves of spirit
power for the next stage of the endless career.
44:5.10 These energy manipulators also function in
hundreds of other ways too numerous to catalogue, such as counseling with the
seraphim, cherubim, and sanobim regarding the most efficient modes of energy
intake and as to the maintenance of the most helpful balances of divergent
forces between active cherubim and passive sanobim. In many other ways do
these experts lend assistance to morontia and spirit creatures in their
efforts to understand the divine rest, which is so essential to the effective
utilization of the basic energies of space.
6. THE DESIGNERS AND EMBELLISHERS
44:6.1 How I wish I knew how to portray the
exquisite work of these unique artisans! Every attempt on my part to explain
the work of spirit embellishment would only recall to material minds your own
pitiful but worthy efforts to do these things on your world of mind and
matter.
44:6.2 This corps, while embracing over one thousand
subdivisions of activity, is grouped under the following seven major
heads:
44:6.3 1. The craftworkers of color. These
are they who make the ten thousand color tones of spirit reflection peal forth
their exquisite messages of harmonious beauty. Aside from color perception
there is nothing in human experience to which these activities may be
compared.
44:6.4 2. The sound designers. Spirit waves
of diverse identity and morontia appreciation are depicted by these designers
of what you would call sound. These impulses are in reality the superb
reflections of the naked and glorious spirit-souls of the celestial hosts.
44:6.5 3. The emotion designers. These
enhancers and conservators of feeling are those who preserve the sentiments of
morontia and the emotions of divinity for the study and edification of the
children of time and for the inspiration and beautification of morontia
progressors and advancing spirits.
44:6.6 4. The artists of odor. This
comparison of supernal spirit activities to the physical recognition of
chemical odors is, indeed, unfortunate, but Urantia mortals could hardly
recognize this ministry by any other name. These artisans create their varied
symphonies for the edification and delight of the advancing children of light.
You have nothing on earth to which this type of spiritual grandeur can be even
remotely compared.
44:6.7 5. The presence embellishers. These
artisans are not occupied with the arts of self-adornment or the technique of
creature beautification. They are devoted to the production of multitudinous
and joyous reactions in individual morontia and spirit creatures by
dramatizing the significance of relationship through the positional values
assigned to different morontia and spirit orders in the composite ensembles of
these diversified beings. These artists arrange supermaterial beings as you
would living musical notes, odors, sights, and then blend them into the
anthems of glory.
44:6.8 6. The taste designers. And how can
you be told of these artists! Faintly I might suggest that they are improvers
of morontia taste, and they also endeavor to increase the appreciation of
beauty through the sharpening of the evolving spirit senses.
44:6.9 7. The morontia synthesizers. These
are the master craftsmen who, when all others have made their respective
contributions, then add the culminating and finishing touches to the morontia
ensemble, thus achieving an inspiring portrayal of the divinely beautiful, an
enduring inspiration to spirit beings and their morontia associates. But you
must await your deliverance from the animal body before you can begin to
conceive of the artistic glories and aesthetic beauties of the morontia and
spirit worlds.
7. THE HARMONY WORKERS
44:7.1 These artists are not concerned with music,
painting, or anything similar, as you might be led to surmise. They are
occupied with the manipulation and organization of specialized forces and
energies which are present in the spirit world, but which are not recognized
by mortals. If I had the least possible basis for comparison, I would attempt
to portray this unique field of spirit achievement, but I despair -- there is
no hope of conveying to mortal minds this sphere of celestial artistry.
Nevertheless, that which cannot be described may still be implied:
44:7.2 Beauty, rhythm, and harmony are
intellectually associated and spiritually akin. Truth, fact, and relationship
are intellectually inseparable and associated with the philosophic concepts of
beauty. Goodness, righteousness, and justice are philosophically interrelated
and spiritually bound up together with living truth and divine
beauty.
44:7.3 Cosmic concepts of true philosophy, the
portrayal of celestial artistry, or the mortal attempt to depict the human
recognition of divine beauty can never be truly satisfying if such attempted
creature progression is ununified. These expressions of the divine urge within
the evolving creature may be intellectually true, emotionally beautiful, and
spiritually good; but the real soul of expression is absent unless these
realities of truth, meanings of beauty, and values of goodness are unified in
the life experience of the artisan, the scientist, or the
philosopher.
44:7.4 These divine qualities are perfectly and
absolutely unified in God. And every God-knowing man or angel possesses the
potential of unlimited self-expression on ever-progressive levels of unified
self-realization by the technique of the never-ending achievement of
Godlikeness -- the experiential blending in the evolutionary experience of
eternal truth, universal beauty, and divine goodness.
8. MORTAL ASPIRATIONS AND MORONTIA ACHIEVEMENTS
44:8.1 Although celestial artisans do not personally
work on material planets, such as Urantia, they do come, from time to time,
from the headquarters of the system to proffer help to the naturally gifted
individuals of the mortal races. When thus assigned, these artisans
temporarily work under the supervision of the planetary angels of progress.
The seraphic hosts co-operate with these artisans in attempting to assist
those mortal artists who possess inherent endowments, and who also possess
Adjusters of special and previous experience.
44:8.2 There are three possible sources of special
human ability: At the bottom always there exists the natural or inherent
aptitude. Special ability is never an arbitrary gift of the Gods; there is
always an ancestral foundation for every outstanding talent. In addition to
this natural ability, or rather supplemental thereto, there may be contributed
the leadings of the Thought Adjuster in those individuals whose indwelling
Adjusters may have had actual and bona fide experiences along such lines on
other worlds and in other mortal creatures. In those cases where both the
human mind and the indwelling Adjuster are unusually skillful, the spirit
artisans may be delegated to act as harmonizers of these talents and otherwise
to assist and inspire these mortals to seek for ever-perfecting ideals and to
attempt their enhanced portrayal for the edification of the realm.
44:8.3 There is no caste in the ranks of spirit
artisans. No matter how lowly your origin, if you have ability and the gift of
expression, you will gain adequate recognition and receive due appreciation as
you ascend upward in the scale of morontia experience and spiritual
attainment. There can be no handicap of human heredity or deprivation of
mortal environment which the morontia career will not fully compensate and
wholly remove. And all such satisfactions of artistic achievement and
expressionful self-realization will be effected by your own personal efforts
in progressive advancement. At last the aspirations of evolutionary mediocrity
may be realized. While the Gods do not arbitrarily bestow talents and ability
upon the children of time, they do provide for the attainment of the
satisfaction of all their noble longings and for the gratification of all
human hunger for supernal self-expression.
44:8.4 But every human being should remember: Many
ambitions to excel which tantalize mortals in the flesh will not persist with
these same mortals in the morontia and spirit careers. The ascending
morontians learn to socialize their former purely selfish longings and
egoistic ambitions. Nevertheless, those things which you so earnestly longed
to do on earth and which circumstances so persistently denied you, if, after
acquiring true mota insight in the morontia career, you still desire to do,
then will you most certainly be granted every opportunity fully to satisfy
your long-cherished desires.
44:8.5 Before ascending mortals leave the local
universe to embark upon their spirit careers, they will be satiated respecting
every intellectual, artistic, and social longing or true ambition which ever
characterized their mortal or morontia planes of existence. This is the
achievement of equality of the satisfaction of self-expression and
self-realization but not the attainment of identical experiential status nor
the complete obliteration of characteristic individuality in skill, technique,
and expression. But the new spirit differential of personal experiential
attainment will not become thus leveled off and equalized until after you have
finished the last circle of the Havona career. And then will the Paradise
residents be confronted with the necessity of adjusting to that absonite
differential of personal experience which can be leveled off only by the group
attainment of the ultimate of creature status -- the seventh-stage-spirit
destiny of the mortal finaliters.
44:8.6 And this is the story of the celestial
artisans, that cosmopolitan body of exquisite workers who do so much to
glorify the architectural spheres with the artistic portrayals of the divine
beauty of the Paradise Creators.
44:8.7 Indited by
an Archangel of Nebadon.
