© 2012 Chris Ragetly
© 2012 Association Francophone des Lecteurs du Livre d'Urantia
Free will is a characteristic which is common to deities, superhuman personalities, and evolutionary mortals. No other being, force, creator, or agent in the vast universe of universes can interfere in any degree with the absolute sovereignty of human free will operating in the realms of option concerning the eternal destiny of the personality of the choosing mortal. 71.3. This observation is valid for all existing personalities of the central and superuniverses, and it is probable that it will be the same for creatures of the future ultimate and coabsolute levels. It is also probable that certain creatures who function more or less automatically on the finite levels do not possess this attribute. Certain Master Physical Controllers, such as the Frandalanks and the Chronoldeks, do not appear to have free will; they are intelligent beings, but more or less like living machines.
The relative free will which characterizes the self-consciousness of human personality is involved in:
1. Moral decision, highest wisdom.
2. Spiritual choice, truth discernment.
3. Unselfish love, brotherhood service.
4. Purposeful co-operation, group loyalty.
5. Cosmic insight, the grasp of universe meanings.
6. Personality dedication, wholehearted devotion to doing the Father’s will.
7. Worship, the sincere pursuit of divine values and the wholehearted love of the divine Value-Giver. (UB 16:8.7-14)
This engagement of relative free will is thus activated in 7 specific cases. It must first be noted that the free will of the human personality is relative. This means that it can only exercise its choice within a very specific framework. The scene where the life of a human creature takes place is this relative framework. A human personality does not have the possibility of exercising its choice outside of its earthly life, with the exception of its choice to do the will of the Father, or not to follow this choice. A human personality therefore has the choice of exercising its free will in space only on Urantia, (we can consider that the fact of having walked on the moon and having sent probes to Mars as well as to other planets of our solar system is a kind of enlargement of this choice in space). As for the free will that is exercised in time, the choices of an Urantian have personal consequences of capital importance for this particular Urantian. He can transcend time into the past, by recalling memories, and use these memories to plan future actions. This human creature thus projects himself into the future, transcending time in this way. In effect, he can thus decide his eternal future. By his moral, spiritual decisions, selfless love, group loyalty, cosmic insight, devotion to doing the Father’s will, and worship, this Urantian secures for himself an eternal destiny.
Let us develop the seven cases cited in The Urantia Book where human free will is involved:
The Supreme is influenced by the choices and decisions of evolutionary creatures because: The spirit presence of divinity is neither capricious nor arbitrary; its experiential variance is inherent in the free will with which personal creatures are endowed.
That which determines the differential of spirit presence exists in your own heart and mind, and consists in your own choosing, in the decisions of your mind, and in the determination of your own will. This differential is inherent in the free-will reactions of intelligent personal beings, the Universal Father having ordained that such beings should exercise freedom of choice. And the Deities ever faithfully heed the ebb and flow of their spirits in meeting the conditions and fulfilling the demands of this differential in creature choice. Sometimes they bestow more of their presence in response to those who earnestly desire it, sometimes they withdraw from the scene when their creatures make adverse decisions in the exercise of their divinely bestowed freedom of choice. Thus does the spirit of divinity humbly obey the choices of the creatures of the realms. (UB 13:4.4)
Chris Ragetly