© 2014 Carmelo Martínez
© 2014 Urantia Association of Spain
To put this discourse into context, we should consider that Michael of Nebadon’s bestowal on Urantia had three objectives:
1. To live the life of a flesh and blood mortal. This objective was accomplished in August/September of the year 25 on Mount Hermon. Although it did not become official until the baptism a few months later (January of the year 26). He knew then without a doubt who he was (although the belief had grown since he was almost a child), he became aware of his two minds, and he regained the memories of his former life, including on Paradise and Havona.
Baptism was the equivalent of Adjuster fusion and was followed by the 40 days that all humans do after fusion (usually, at this time in history, at morontia). During the baptism, the Adjuster of Jesus left his mind and was personalized.
In each bestowal, Michael of Nebadon lived subject to the will of one of the 7 Deity combinations. In the seventh, it was the will of the Father. In each of the 7 bestowals, he revealed the corresponding will. Each of them thus had a double purpose: to live the life of one of the personalities of his creatures and to reveal the will of one of the Deity combinations.
After baptism, and to complete a human life, he only needed to go through death. The will of the Father was that he should go through death, but not through the horrible death on the cross. That was a human thing. You already know that the Father respects above all human free will. The sufferings of the Master, the humiliations, the lashes and finally the ignominious death on the cross were the consequence not of the will of the Father, but of his absolute respect for human free will.
2. Reveal the will of the Father, which he did in particular during the so-called “public life”.
3. Put “technically an end to the Lucifer rebellion in the Satania system, and that you do all this as the Son of Man” (UB 120:2.2).
We are not given many details of what this means, but he did it on Mount Hermon in September of the year 25 when, without the help of his personal guardian and as the Son of Man, he faced the rebels (UB 134:8.9 ).
The public work really began in January of the year 27. Throughout the year 26, Jesus chose his apostles and was training them.
¶ The Message of Jesus
In this public work, Jesus dedicated himself to transmitting his great message, to fulfilling his second objective: revealing the will of the Father. And that message was the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of men.
It was a message addressed to all humanity and to all the humanities of their local universe, present and future. And it was a message ignored by the majority, gleefully accepted by some, and violently opposed by the leaders of their own people, the Jewish people.
¶ A bit of historical-religious context
As we are told in the book, Machiventa incarnated as an adult for an emergency mission on Urantia because “revealed truth was threatened with extinction.” Machiventa’s teachings spread to a part of the world, but they remained mainly among the Hebrews through Abraham and his descendants. For 20 centuries, the idea of the Father brought by Machiventa caught on and evolved among the Hebrews. It began with Abraham, passed through Moses and reached the time of Jesus. This made the Jewish people the chosen people; chosen because he was in charge of transmitting this idea of a unique God.
But the Jewish people were deforming this message to the point of thinking that they were a people superior to the rest, to the Gentile idolaters; spiritually blinded them. And now, what began with Abraham was going to end because their spiritual blindness was going to make them reject the continuation of Machiventa’s message.
Jesus laments about that in this speech; It pains him that his people, who have brought the Father’s message from Abraham up to this moment, are going to stop transmitting it and it is going to pass on to other peoples. The perversion of the ruling class had reached such a point that it was going to lead them to reject this continuation and renewal of the message, and to lose their status as a chosen people; it was going to lead them to pass over to the side of evil.
¶ The hardships of the Jews
In those days, the Jews had the idea of a messiah who would lead a great change on the planet. He would upset the world order by establishing the kingdom of God. That kingdom would be directed and governed by the Jews, although its nature was not very clear. Would it be divine and heavenly or human and earthly?
However, this idea of the kingdom, more than an advantage to understand the message of Jesus, was a real drawback for the Jews. Remember the Capernaum crisis of April 29, the enthusiasm for the feeding of the five thousand and for other miracles, and the intention to proclaim him king. And the loss of popular support that followed. Remember also the difficulties of the apostles themselves, who lived so close to him for more than three years, to understand the message.
¶ The final speech
The speech occurs on Tuesday, April 4, 30. And remember that the last supper and subsequent arrest of Jesus occur on Thursday, April 6, and that his crucifixion and death are on Friday, April 7. Remember also that it was on Sunday, April 2, when he entered Jerusalem “triumphantly” on the back of a small donkey. (Sunday was not a holiday for the Jews.)
Contrary to the rest of Jesu s’ teachings, this speech, although also dedicated to his entire local universe, is specifically addressed to the Jews, to his people. And he does it in a tone that is unusual for him, in a tone of reproach and warning. He is especially hard on the leaders of the Jews, who not only “refuse to see the light” but also “do all you can to keep everyone else out at the same time.” Approximately half of the speech is dedicated to denouncing, with unusual harshness in the speeches of Jesus, the hypocrisy and falsehood of the scribes and Pharisees. But that doesn’t stop him from closing the door of the kingdom on them.
Apart from analyzing the content of the discourse itself, we can ask ourselves questions such as: Why this discourse? Why in that tone? Why directed specifically at Jews? Why the harsh denunciations against the leaders?
¶ Feedback from attendees about this speech
- There is no worse blind than the one who does not want to see, nor deaf who does not want to hear. And the leaders did not listen to Jesus because they saw him as a threat to their power. They did not understand his message.
- Jesus uses qualifiers that he had not used before. The harshness expressed by Jesus in this speech was because he wanted the Jewish leaders to reconsider their attitude, but it had no effect. On the contrary, it made them even more angry.
- Mercy has a limit, and this had been consummated due to the refusal of the religious leaders.
- If Jesus lived now in flesh and blood, would we recognize him? To what extent would we accept it better than the Jews of that time?
- Jesus did not want a rebellion against the Jewish leaders. He harbors no animosity towards them. He does not judge them: he simply tells the truth.
¶ References
- Light and Life Magazine (all old issues): https://aue.urantia-association.org/numeros-antiguos-del-lyv/