© 2024 Claude Flibotte
© 2024 Urantia Association of Quebec
Claude Flibotte
Sainte-Julie
Hello dear readers!
The following text is a continuation of the article published in the previous issue of Reflectivity. For those who would like to consult the original text in English, you will find it at this Web address.
I wish you a good read!
¶ VI. Energy and the model
There is a circuit, called the personality circuit, which runs through all the universes and is centered in the Father. All personalities are in this circuit. This is how one can tell if a being has a personality. If he is in the Father’s personality circuit, then he has a personality. If he is not in this circuit, then he does not have the type of personality that comes from the Father. Similarly, we can use other circuits to distinguish between spirit, mind, and matter. If something responds to the spirit circuit of the Eternal Son, we know that it is spiritual in nature. If something responds to the mind circuit of the Infinite Spirit, we know that particular thing is intellect. If something responds to gravity, we know that it is matter. All gravity circuits are ultimately connected to the great gravity center at the bottom of the Isle of Paradise. If something responds to any material gravity, we know it is something that once came from Paradise Island. It is material matter or energy of some kind.
ENERGY. The word “energy” does not only mean material energy. We speak of spiritual energy, mental energy, and material energy. We use the word “force” in the same way: spiritual force, mental force, or cosmic (material) force. We use the word “power” in two ways: material energy goes through different stages of development. The first forms of energy would hardly register on the instruments that man has developed. This first form of energy also does not respond to the gravity that man knows. But later, this first form of energy comes to a stage where it does respond to gravity (as you know it). When it gets to this stage, we call it power. This stage is the electronics stage; atoms begin to form. But we also use the word “power” in another sense: we use it to mean sovereignty as “sovereign power.” We need to give a special meaning to these three words—force, energy, and power. There simply aren’t enough words in the English language to cover the situation. So we need to take some of your usual words and give them a special meaning. Let’s talk about these three words as they relate to the material aspect of creation.
Physical energy. We use the term “physical energy” in several ways: If something moves, it is physical energy in action. If something acts in some way, it is physical energy in action.
Finally, if something does not act, but could act, it still has physical energy. For example, a storage battery may do nothing, but it could start your car; even if it does nothing, it still contains physical energy, but this energy is potential (not real) until you press the starter and set it into action. So we use the term “physical energy” when we mean material motion, action, or potential.
When we want to be more specific about physical energy and what it does, we break it down into three more terms. We use the terms “cosmic force,” “emergent energy,” and “power of the universe”:
- The Cosmic Force. If you remember, we told you that all material universes originated from the Isle of Paradise. But new universes do not come out of Paradise in a piecemeal fashion. The whole of material creation flowed out of Paradise into eternity. Havona, the central universe, immediately became real. But there was nothing outside Havona then, nothing but space to build the superuniverses (and, later, the outer universes). Where did the rest of the “material” of creation go? It seems to have flowed out of the Isle of Paradise into the grasp of the Unqualified Absolute. (You will remember that the Unqualified Absolute is that part of infinity from which the I AM has departed.) Since then, the Unqualified Absolute has been gradually freeing itself, giving up what it had obtained from Paradise. As the Unqualified Absolute releases the “matter” of material creation, new universes are born in time and space. But when the Unqualified Absolute first releases this “matter” of material creation, it does not, at this stage, respond to the gravity of Paradise. At this very early stage, we call the “matter” of material creation “cosmic force.”
- Emergent energy. Later in the development of the “matter” of material creation, it becomes responsive to the gravity of Paradise. When it responds to the gravity of Paradise, we call it “emergent energy”: it has “emerged” from the grasp of the Unqualified Absolute. But this emergent energy still does not respond to gravity, as human beings know it. It would not respond to the gravitational pull of your world—only to the center of gravity of lower Paradise. This emergent energy is the “matter” of material creation just before you got matter—atoms and electrons.
- The Power of the Universe. We are now at the point where you understand material energy. The energy of the universe responds to gravity as you know it. It always responds (generally speaking) to the center of gravity of Heaven, but it also responds directly to the gravitational pull of planets and suns. This is the stage of electrons, protons, atoms, and motion—all as human beings understand it.
The Mind. Wherever the mind appears, you can know that a living being has done something to place it there. First, you must have a living energy system and then the mind can be placed within that energy system. This is true no matter what altitude one is at. Humans have a mind added to a material energy system (the body). Seraphim have a mind added to a spiritual energy system (the seraphic form). If the energy system has also been given a personality (by the Father), the mind acts as a cushion between spirit and matter. It extends and connects spirit and matter. This is why we recognize three types of “light”: material light, intellectual insight, and spiritual luminosity.
Light. When we speak of spiritual luminosity, we are using a figure of speech. You do the same thing when you speak of “illumination” in the sense of making something understandable. But there is something in spiritual beings that can only be described as “luminosity.” But this spiritual luminosity has nothing to do with intellectual insight or physical light.
ARCHETYPE. Here’s another word we should talk about. Matter, spirit, or soul can have an archetype. Any combination of these energies can have an archetype. A personal being (a personality) has an archetype; an identity has an archetype; entities and even nonliving matter have archetypes… All of these things have an archetype, a form, a configuration of some kind or another. But the archetype never reproduces itself. It is not creative. If an archetype repeats itself, it is because someone has made a copy of an earlier, original archetype.
The archetype determines the form that energy takes. An atom has a specific pattern, with a nucleus and electrons swinging around the central nucleus. But that archetype or shape does not explain what holds the atom together. The archetype does not control the atom. Gravity controls the atom. The archetype does not control energy; gravity does. The archetype itself does not respond to gravity. Space does not respond to gravity either. But that does not mean that there is a connection between the archetype and space, simply because neither responds to gravity. Space has nothing to do with the archetype; it is something entirely different… The reason the archetype does not respond to gravity is that there is nothing in the archetype that can respond to gravity. If we go back to the atom, we have the nucleus and the electrons swinging around it. The material mass of the nucleus and electrons responds to gravity; the archetype has no mass. In the human being, we have a body that just has a certain mass; the body just weighs a certain number of pounds; that weight in pounds is a measure of the pull of gravity on that human body. That human being may have a body schema (an appearance) that we might call beautiful. “Beauty” does not respond to gravity, the body does. The same comparison applies at the level of the soul and spirit. The reality of any archetype (form) is determined by the stuff it is made of.
The archetype, however, is very significant. Archetypes differ, and it is this very difference that makes life so interesting. People are not alike. There is a general similarity among the human races, but the pattern (appearance) makes each human being different. The form or pattern of a thing distinguishes it from the rest of things. It can be recognized and identified as something individual. This is especially true of the form of a personal creature. All personal forms tend to individualize, that is, to become different from all other similar forms. This is the case with material beings, morontia beings, and spirit beings. They remodel their forms. Even the character of a human being tends to be imprinted in the expression of his face. Why does this happen? Why do appearances tend to individualize? It is not due to anything inherent in energy (material, mental, or spiritual). It goes back to the beginning of things. It goes back to the personality of God and the mechanism of Paradise. God created Paradise, the archetype of archetypes; he gave it the “form” that it has. And since then, the personality has expressed itself in determining the “form” of things, in creating new and individual patterns.
The archetype is something that is copied; a master drawing from which copies can be made. The eternal Paradise is the absolute of archetypes; it is the first “form” produced by God. The Eternal Son is the archetypal personality. The Universal Father is the direct ancestral source of the Son and Paradise. It is interesting to note that Paradise does not confer an archetype and the Son cannot confer a personality. Both have limitations. The Father escaped these limitations by becoming the Cause of Paradise and the parent of the Son.
¶ VII. The Supreme Being
Let us return to the previous parts of this foreword and take up the history of Deity. We want to talk about Deity from a somewhat different angle. If we look at Deity from the standpoint of eternity (especially past eternity), we can see new relationships. From this standpoint we can see that all Deity is not eternally existent. Deity falls into two groups: First, there is the Deity that is eternally existent. Second, there is the Deity that is not eternally existent. God the Father, God the Son, and God the Spirit are eternally existent; therefore we call them “existential”; they have always been. But God the Supreme, God the Ultimate, and God the Absolute are not. These three Deities are becoming; they are being born. They are actualizing, developing, and expanding. They did not exist in the days when there was only the central universe, before the seven superuniverses were created. They have been coming into being since that remote time. We speak of modern times as the “post-Havona epochs.” By this we mean the times since the beginning of the seven superuniverses; the times since Havona is no longer alone—the only creation.
It is in these post-Havona epochs that God the Supreme, God the Ultimate, and God the Absolute make their appearance. They appear at different levels as the master universe grows and expands. They appear in time and space, but they also appear in other forms: The Supreme appears as a growth in time-space. But the Ultimate is above time and space. The Ultimate transcends time and space. These three Deities who are now appearing or developing are not past eternals (they have not always been). But they are future eternals (they always will be). They are born out of cooperation with the three original Paradise Deities—the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. They develop as they become powerful in the universes. They become powerful by gathering together all the creative work that is going on in the growing universes. In doing so, they gain experience. That is why we call God the Supreme, God the Ultimate, and God the Absolute “experiential Deities.”
We therefore understand that, from this point of view, there are two types of Deities:
- Existential. These are beings with eternal existence. They belong to the eternal past and exist in the eternal future. God the Father, God the Son and God the Spirit are existential.
- Experiential. These are beings who are not from an eternal past. They come into existence in the post-Havona present. They will continue to exist throughout all future eternity. These Deities are not eternal in the past, they are eternal in the future. God the Supreme, God the Ultimate, and God the Absolute are experiential Deities.
The Father, the Son, and the Spirit are existential. As far as their real being is concerned, they are truly existential. Presumably, if they could express themselves in a new way, they too could have experiences. The Supreme and the Ultimate are entirely experiential. But when we come to God the Absolute, we must be careful: God the Absolute and Deity Absolute are terms expressing different aspects of the same reality. The Deity Absolute is that part of the Infinite into which the I AM has moved. But in this sense, the Deity Absolute is a potential, a void that can be filled by the acts of deity. As pure potential, Deity Absolute is of eternity past; it is existential. But when we use the term “God the Absolute,” we mean that this pure potential, this original void, has been filled by experience. In this sense, God the Absolute is also experiential. Basically, all Deity is eternal. But only the Father, Son, and Spirit are completely eternal. All other Deity personalities have an origin, but their destiny is eternal.
Far into eternity, the Father expressed Himself in the Son and in the Spirit. But the Father did not stop there. Since then, He has continued to express Himself in new ways. He has expressed Himself by personalizing certain levels of Deity that were not originally personal. He expresses Himself on the finite, absonite, absolute levels of experience. He therefore expresses Himself as God the Supreme, God the Ultimate, and God the Absolute. These three experiential deities do not yet fully exist. They are being born, they are growing.
God the Supreme. The Supreme is present in the central universe of Havona. This presence is the reflection of the three Paradise deities — the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. The Paradise Deities and the Supreme are at work in time and space in the seven superuniverses. They work as God the Sevenfold in time and space. However, this work which they do in time and space builds up the power of the Supreme Being. When we think of this growing power of the Supreme Being, we use a special word, “Almighty.” When we think of the Supreme working as a mighty Deity in the grand universe, we speak of him as the Almighty Supreme. Thus the three Paradise Deities produce the spirit person of God the Supreme in Havona and build up his power as the Almighty Supreme in the grand universe. These two phases of growth, the spiritual person and omnipotence, go hand in hand. They unite in one Lord, the Supreme Being.
This whole process is a continuation of the Father’s escape from the limitations of the Infinite and the Absolute. First, he escapes the Infinite. Then, through the Son and the Spirit, he escaped the limitations of Total Deity. Now, in the Supreme Being, the Father escapes eternity. Now, in the Supreme Being, the Father can realize what it is to be Deity while working in time and space, to know what it is to grow and experience.
The Supreme Being created no one directly—with one exception. He created Majeston, the chief of Paradise reflectivity. He functions as the coordinator of all that occurs in the Grand Universe. He links together all the activities of creators and creatures in the Grand Universe. There are the three Deities on Paradise; there are also numerous subordinate Creators who work in time and space; the Supreme Being coordinates the work of all. When the Supreme Being has completed his growth, his basic nature will combine the finite and the infinite. His nature will combine the type of power which is acquired through experience with the type of spiritual personality which comes from Paradise Deity.
The Supreme Being is not only growing. He is also acting as the director of what is happening in time and space as it applies to finite beings. What is he directing? Well, it is a kind of mobilization. He is encouraging the union of time-space experience with the spirit personality. He is trying to make this kind of pooling of power and personality more and more frequent. He is trying to promote the union of experiential power with the spirit personality. Why is he doing this? He is trying to cross the barrier between the finite level of creation and the absonite level of creation. He is trying to build a bridge over which finite creatures can one day cross over to the absonite level. He is trying to help finite creatures become more than finite creatures. He is trying to help them become supercreatures.
¶ VIII. God the Sevenfold
Human beings and similar finite creatures are simply so far removed from Paradise Deity that they need a ladder to reach Him. It is for this reason that the Universal Father has provided such a ladder. He has made it possible for creatures to approach Him in seven steps. These steps are:
- The Creator Sons of Paradise
- The Ancients of Days
- The Seven Master Spirits
- The Supreme Being
- God the Spirit
- God the Son
- God the Father
Thus does God work in time and space. Thus does he work in the seven superuniverses. It is through these seven stages that human beings can eventually attain to the presence of God, who is spirit. This sevenfold Deity is the Deity as man contacts Deity on the Paradise path. The work done by this sevenfold Deity is added to the growing potency of the Supreme Being. When human beings contact God the Sevenfold, they first discern and recognize the divinity of the Creator Son of their local universe. Later they attain the Ancients of Days of their superuniverse. Then they meet one of the Seven Master Spirits, the one who supervises the superuniverse from which the ascender comes. Finally, the ascender attains the Universal Father on Paradise.
You will remember that the grand universe is composed of Havona and the seven superuniverses. Well, Deity works in the grand universe in three different ways and all at the same time. First, the Paradise Trinity works in the grand universe. Here the Trinity works on the finite level in relationship to the Supreme; this is what we call the work of the Trinity of Supremacy. The Trinity of Supremacy is the Paradise Trinity, the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, working on the finite level. The Supreme Being is also at work in the grand universe; this is the second way in which Deity is in action on the finite level. Finally, God the Sevenfold is at work in the grand universe. We say, then, that the grand universe is a threefold domain of Deity. Three Deities are at work here: the Trinity of Supremacy, God the Sevenfold, and the Supreme Being. The Supreme Being is especially involved in all this work. First, he receives his personality and spirit attributes from the Paradise Trinity; he is the spirit person of God the Supreme at Havona. But from another place does he derive his growing power as the Almighty Ruler of the superuniverses. This almighty power is built up through the work of three groups who belong to God the Sevenfold — the Creator Sons, the Ancients of Days, and the Seven Master Spirits. The Supreme Being is the immediate God of the evolving creatures. He evolves concurrently with these creatures. His power of almighty power grows concurrently with that of the creatures of the seven superuniverses. This almighty power of the Supreme and the spirit person of the Supreme become one and the same reality. The two come together in complete and final union—as the Supreme Being.
We have already explained to you how human beings are helped to ascend to God through the ladder of God the Sevenfold. The Creator Sons begin by helping human beings in this long journey from death to immortality. It is in this way that a finite creature can finally attain the embrace of the Infinite—find God the Father on Paradise. The Supreme Being is also concerned with the continued growth of finite beings. He is trying to bring together all that is finite so as to build a bridge between the finite and the absonite. He is trying to help finite creatures to attain absonite levels of existence at times. If they can attain these absonite levels, then perhaps they can try to learn something about God the Ultimate. We believe that this will take place a very long time from now—this ascent from the finite to the absonite. When this occurs, we believe that the Creator Sons and their associated divine ministers will take part in it. They may not always remain in the local universes. But we believe that the Ancients of Days and the Seven Master Spirits will always remain where they are; they are the sovereigns of the seven superuniverses.
God the Sevenfold began his work when the seven superuniverses were created. We believe that the work of God the Sevenfold will someday extend to the now uninhabited universes of outer space. There are four great zones in outer space. They encircle the grand universe and become larger and larger as we go out. We call them the primary, secondary, tertiary, and quaternary space levels. Someday people will live in these now uninhabited space levels. A government will be established for them. Their inhabitants will flock to Paradise in search of Deity. But it will be a somewhat different search for Deity than that which is now going on in the grand universe. Creatures today approach Deity in a limited and evolutionary manner. Someday the space dwellers will attempt a more than finite approach to Deity. They will attempt a transcendent, absonite approach to Deity. They will seek the same Deity (the Universal Father), but they will seek Him on a new and higher level.
¶ IX. God the Ultimate
The Supreme Being grows by gathering together all that is happening in the grand universe. He gathers together divinity, energy, and personality activities. These activities take place in time and space. Today God the Ultimate grows in the same way. But he is expanding to a higher level and is expanding to embrace a wider range of universe activities. The Supreme grows in time and space; the Ultimate grows in transcended time and space. The Supreme expands in the arena of the grand universe, which embraces Havona and the seven superuniverses. The Ultimate expands in the arena of the entire master universe; this includes the grand universe and the four outer space levels. When the Supreme completes his growth, it signifies that Deity has completed his growth on the first level of creative self-realization; this is the level of finite time-space. When the Ultimate completes its growth, it means that Deity has completed its growth to the second level of creative realization; this is the absonite level of super-time and transcended space.
The completion of the growth of the Ultimate also means something else: it means that a new Trinity, an experiential Trinity, has come into being at the absonite level. The Paradise Trinity is existential; this new Trinity is called the “first experiential Trinity.” (We will tell you more about this first experiential Trinity in Section XII of this simplification.)
In any case, the completed growth of the Ultimate means that everything that could be expressed through experience at the absonite level has been expressed. It has been expressed as a new unified Deity, as the Ultimate Deity. The absonite-paradise realities have been expressed. They have been expressed at a certain level of value. This level of value can be described as follows: It is a level on which things and beings “come to pass,” it is a level on which time is transcended, and it is a level on which space is transcended. This development of the Ultimate has meaning for all of us and for all of you. You have the opportunity to participate in this growth of the Ultimate. By participating in this growth, you can elevate yourselves to absonite levels. You will be aided in this by God the Sevenfold and by the Supreme Being. By doing all this, you will have the opportunity to render ultimate service to the universes and achieve ultimate destiny for yourselves.
God the Ultimate is a term we use for personal Deity working at absonite levels of divinity. It also means working in supertime, or transcended time; it is something outside of time, but not yet in eternity. It also means working in transcended space; it is something above space, but still short of infinity. God the Supreme is a supreme evolution of Deity. God the Ultimate is a supreme event of Deity. When finite beings wish to understand the Paradise Trinity as a unified Deity, it is the Supreme that they will be able to understand. The Ultimate is the unification of the Paradise Trinity that can be understood by absonite beings.
What is the Universal Father doing in this whole business of the growth of God the Supreme, God the Ultimate, and God the Absolute? Well, remember the three levels: finite, absonite, and absolute. The Father has set this whole business of evolving Deity in motion. He is working on all three levels at the same time. He is putting in place a new personality experienced and a new power acquired at each of these levels. He is giving birth to three new Deities.
There are three deities in eternity past: the Universal Father, the Eternal Son, and the Infinite Spirit. In eternity past, they were alone in Paradise. In eternity future, they will be joined by three associated evolutionary Deities. These three evolutionary deities are God the Supreme, God the Ultimate, and (perhaps) God the Absolute.
God the Supreme and God the Ultimate are currently evolving in the experiential universes. They are not existential; they have not existed since eternity past. They are future eternals. The Supreme is future eternal, working within the limits of time and space; the Ultimate is future eternal, working within the limits of super-time and transcended space. When we think of the attributes and powers of these evolving Deities, we do not think of them as infinite (like the Paradise Deities). We think of these evolving Deities as having supreme attributes and ultimate attributes.
It is possible that they have supreme-ultimate attributes—the attributes of one multiplied by the attributes of the other. But both were born a finite number of years ago; they had historical universe origins. They will never have an end. They have personality beginnings and are born from eternal and infinite deity potentials. But neither the Supreme nor the Ultimate is eternal or infinite—in the full sense of those words.
¶ X. God the Absolute
The Deity Absolute and God the Absolute are related, but they are not the same. Let us return to our discussion of reality. Do you remember that we talked about how the I AM moved out of one part of Infinity and into another part of Infinity? Well, the part into which it moved we call the Qualified Absolute—“qualified” because it moved there. More often still we call this qualified absolute the Deity Absolute. The two terms are not quite the same, but they are close. This deity absolute is the area or domain in which all deity operates—the Father, the Son, the Spirit, and the Trinity. The relationship between the Deity Absolute and God the Absolute can be viewed in this way: The Deity Absolute is a foundation upon which the Deity Absolute rests: The Deity Absolute is a foundation upon which God the Absolute is erected. The foundation is eternal and existential—it never had a beginning. The structure that is erected upon that foundation is experiential. It certainly has a beginning. So here is the picture: We have an existential foundation, the Deity Absolute. Upon that foundation is erected an experiential structure; that structure is God the Absolute. The Deity Absolute, the foundation, is before and after all experience. God the Absolute would be experienceable, would be knowable, in some way, by experiencing beings. If and when God the Absolute comes into existence, it will be because a second experiential Trinity has become reality. You will recall that we spoke of a “first experiential trinity” in connection with God the Ultimate; we now speak of a “second experiential trinity” in connection with God the Absolute. We will tell you about these two experiential trinities in Section XII of this Simplification. It is sufficient for now to note that they are different from the Paradise Trinity of Father, Son, and Spirit.
If this second experiential trinity, the Trinity Absolute, were ever to function fully, it would really mean something. What would it mean? It would mean that divinity is no longer revealed to the universes in a partial or relative sense—in a diluted way. It would mean that divinity (truth, beauty, and goodness) would be revealed in an absolute sense—in an undiluted way. It would mean something more. It would also indicate that the meanings are completely unified. How would the meanings be unified? Well, for example, the love of God and the justice of the Trinity are necessarily different to a human being. The law of Deity and the love of God do not always look the same in time and space. Material gravity and spiritual love seem to obey different laws. If the meanings were completely unified, all of these things would be seen to operate according to a unified fundamental law. So we have the picture of a revealed divinity in an absolute (undiluted) sense and of unified meanings in a final sense. But what about values? We are not sure that the values can all be related to each other. Why? Well, we come back to the fact that God the Absolute is erected on the foundation of the Absolute Deity. The Absolute Deity is the Qualified Absolute — that part of the Infinite into which the I AM has moved. We have never been informed that this Qualified Absolute is identical with the Infinite…
But we are sure of one thing. It is impossible to reach absolute values without going beyond ultimate destinies. This is the only way to reach absolute meanings and final spirituality. And until they are reached, there is no point in talking about absolute values.
You remember that we told you that God the Ultimate is comprehensible to absonite beings. Now, there are beings higher than the absonite. We call them superabsonites. God the Absolute is comprehensible to these superabsonite beings. But we cannot even talk about God the Absolute without talking about the Absolute Deity. We then enter into something that is far beyond our capacity to understand. That is why we hesitate to get deeply involved in these matters that are far beyond the level of human understanding.
¶ XI. The three Absolutes
Let us go back and talk a little more about how it all began. We have told you the story one way: we have told you the story beginning with the three Absolutes. We could just as well tell the story ending with the three Absolutes. Suppose we were to tell you the story of creation this other way: this time we would begin with the Universal Father and the Eternal Son. When they had their first joint plan of action, that act gave birth to the God of action. The God of action, of course, is the Infinite Spirit. When the Infinite Spirit began to function, the central universe of Havona was born. When Havona came into being, the Father did several things: he sent forth his creative thought in the expression or word of his Son. He also worked with the Son in the act of their Joint Executive, the Infinite Spirit. And then he did something else. He continued to be actually present in Havona. But he ceased to be present in the same way outside of Havona. He separated his presence in Havona from his presence everywhere else. This is because Havona is a complete and finished creation and everything else was incomplete—in fact, at that distant time, there was nothing outside of Havona except space. In Havona, the Father is an actual presence. Elsewhere, he is rather a potential presence—a void that can be filled. This void that can be filled, this potential infinity, hides the presence of the Father outside of Havona. He is revealed in Havona, he is hidden elsewhere. He is hidden in the space of the Unqualified Absolute. His divinity is hidden in the Deity Absolute. And there is yet a third Absolute. This is the coordinating absolute, the Universal Absolute. It is in the Universal Absolute that the Father hides his nature of immutable Infinity. This Universal Absolute acts in such a way that the two other Absolutes seem to form only one.
Today God finally has space to work. He has a base of operations in Havona and he has space to create. He can begin to express himself in a new way. He can give birth to something new. This newness is experience. Creations and creatures no longer appear by “divine fiat.” He can now begin to create slowly, step by step. He now works, not in eternity, but in time, through evolution and through experience. This applies to new physical creations. It also applies to new spiritual creations. This work in time causes new activity on the part of the Universal Absolute. The Universal Absolute now begins to correlate the things of time and experience with the existential things of eternity. How does this work? Consider what happens when God places imperfection in the same universe as perfection. A certain tension results. The two are antagonistic. Infinite perfection can hardly be expected to tolerate the presence of finite imperfection. Here again the Universal Absolute acts as a balance between these tensions. The natural antagonism between infinite perfection and finite imperfection is exactly counterbalanced by this activity of the Universal Absolute. Now the First Source and Center can know what it is to see sovereign power slowly expanding in the growing superuniverses. Now he can be the father, not only of the Eternal Son, but also of mortal man. Now God can even plan the existence of Deities who will also grow through experience. These experiential Deities are God the Supreme, God the Ultimate, and God the Absolute.
There are three absolutes: The Deity, the Unqualified, and the Universal. Sometimes it is not possible to separate the acts of the Deity Absolute and the Unqualified Absolute. Sometimes they are said to work closely together. Sometimes they are even said to constitute a single, combined, or coordinated presence. In these situations we call this combined presence and combined action the work of the Universal Absolute.
- The Deity Absolute. The Deity Absolute is all the time initiating things, setting them in motion, stirring up activity. The Unqualified Absolute mechanizes things. What things are involved in these actions? The whole vast cosmos is involved. It is the universes that now exist. It is all the universes that are being born. It is all the universes that could ever exist. And this whole cosmos of past, present, and future is not developing at random; it is supremely unified and ultimately co-ordinated—it is entirely planned.
The Absolute Deity functions in a way that is difficult to understand. Perhaps we can suggest this mode of operation by saying that it is all-encompassing. You know that a person can take care of himself. He can also want to take care of his family. He can become mayor of a city and strive to do what is good for a great metropolis. Let us continue to broaden this horizon of responsibility. The chief executive of a great nation would try to do what is good for the whole nation. A Creator Son works for the good of his local universe as a whole. The Supreme Being works for the good of the whole grand universe. The Absolute Deity works at all times for the greater good of everything—everywhere. And not only everywhere, but also at every moment. What the Deity Absolute does today is not only for the benefit of all the people of today, but also for the people of tomorrow—and for the universes of all tomorrows. The Deity Absolute is just as concerned today with a person, a planet, or a universe that may not exist for a million or a billion years. A picture has meaning because it has a frame. You cannot put a frame around the work of the Deity Absolute because the real frame is Infinity and Eternity.
In another sense, you should regard the Deity Absolute as a vast room which the Father has set aside. The Father and his divine associates work in this room. This is the Father’s “Deity workshop.” In this workshop the Father and his associates can work in the manner of eternity and also in the manner of time—in fact, in any manner they may choose. But they are always working here as Deity, and their work is always known by the savor of divinity. This is not the only workshop which the Father has set up. There is another. This other workshop is the presence of the Unqualified Absolute. This other workshop has come into being by contrast—by contrast with the workshop of the Deity Absolute. The Father, in effect, said that he would work in a workshop as Deity; this is a qualification or a limitation of what the Father would do. So we have the workshop of the Deity Absolute, the Qualified Absolute. So the Father has not limited or qualified His activities in the other workshop. So we call it the Unqualified Absolute. But remember: there is still a third workshop. It is the workshop of the Universal Absolute. When you think of the three workshops or halls, you think of the immense space of Infinity. The three workshops extend over the entire expanse of Infinity. These three workshops contain all the potential “matter” from which all that exists is made—matter, spirit, and soul.
- The Unqualified Absolute. This workshop has nothing to do with the activities of Deity, divinity, or personality. Here the Father works in a way that is neither personal, nor Deity, nor divinity. This means that the Unqualified Absolute is not a person. The Unqualified Absolute is not Deity. The Unqualified Absolute is not a creator. You see what we are up against: we keep telling you what this Absolute “is not.” We have difficulty in telling you what this Absolute “is.” This mystery will accompany you even when you have passed beyond the human level. No fact, no truth can penetrate this problem. No experience, no revelation can clear up this mystery. Even the highest philosophy is powerless. Even the philosophy of the absonitarians collapses when it attempts to elucidate the nature and character of this Unqualified Absolute.
But we can make some positive statements about the Absolute without qualification: this Absolute is a positive reality, a real presence. This presence is omnipresent in the grand universe, just as it is in the space outside, the space outside the grand universe where so much physical creation is going on. This presence is also a spatial presence, a presence in space. (It is possible, of course, to have a presence which is not a presence in space—present, but not occupying space. The Absolute Deity, for example, is everywhere present, but is not in space. The Unqualified Absolute is also everywhere present and is in space.) This presence of the Unqualified Absolute is something entirely different from some of the speculations of your metaphysical and philosophical thinkers. Some of them tend to think that the universe is more or less self-contained. Things happen a certain way because that’s the way they happen. But that’s simply not the case. There is nothing haphazard or random. The Unqualified Absolute is at work—always and everywhere.
The work that is being done is not about controlling things, but rather about exercising overcontrol. Overcontrol of what? Well, it is mostly on the physical side. It is about force and energy. It is about things in space—material things. In this type of work, the Unqualified Absolute seems to work unlimitedly. But that is not the case when it comes to life, mind, spirit, and personality. In that area, the work of the Unqualified Absolute is limited and restricted. And then, of course, the Paradise Trinity of Father, Son, and Spirit actually controls the work of the Unqualified Absolute. This absolute does what the Paradise Trinity wants done.
Some human theologians focus so much on the omnipresence of God that they dilute the Deity so much that it evaporates. This is pantheism. The Unqualified Absolute is something entirely different. Your scientists once had the idea that there was something in space itself that could transmit energy. They called this thing “ether.” The Unqualified Absolute has nothing to do with this idea of “ether.” This absolute seems to have an infinite amount of force and energy that can be extracted from its grasp and used to build new physical universes. We know that this Absolute does what the Paradise Trinity says it must be done. We know that this Absolute does what the Paradise Trinity says it must do. However, we do not see how this Absolute relates to the spiritual realities in the universes.
- The Universal Absolute. Let us return to the moment when the I AM moved out of one part of the Infinite into another part of the Infinite. The Infinite then divided itself into two parts. There was the part into which the I AM moved—the qualified part, the part which commands Deity, the Deity Absolute, the Qualified Absolute. There is also the part from which the I AM moved out—the part which is not Deity, the Unqualified Absolute, the “follower of orders.” But that is not all; there is also the relationship between these two parts of the Infinite. So here we have the two parts plus a relationship. That makes three realities in all. This third reality, this reality of relationship, is the Universal Absolute. The Universal Absolute is the binder that holds together these two divided parts of the Infinite and keeps the Infinite united. This is what the Universal Absolute did when the Infinite was divided by the I AM. This is what the Universal Absolute still does and always will do.
You see, this division of the Infinite into two parts separates free will from non-free will. It separates the action of divinity from the reactions of non-divinity. It separates dynamics from statics, change from uniformity. This separation produces tension. Think of a piece of wood: split this piece of wood along part of its length. Pull on the split ends to separate them. You get tension. It is like the tension created by the separation of the Infinite. The Universal Absolute acts to release this tension. The split ends remain separate and are still held together at the base.
Always remember: You can know nothing of the Infinite in time. You must reach eternity before you can hope to understand anything of the Infinite. When we speak of the Infinite in the language of time, we can speak only of a small part of the Infinite, not of the whole of it. Nor can we speak of the infinite personality of God in a way that would make sense to human beings. The infinite personality of God is a part of the infinite Deity of God. And you do not know, you do not understand much about either. When the I AM split the Infinite and left it together (like a piece of wood, split at one end and still together at the other), he did something. He produced a real tension, the tension between the Deity Absolute and the Unqualified Absolute. The Universal Absolute immediately stepped in to relieve that tension. It is because of all this that we can have material universes in space. It is because of this that we can have finite personalities in time. The Infinite and the Absolute have been placed under the control of the Father; the Infinite and the Absolute have been prevented from ousting from existence realities that are not infinite and absolute - human beings, for example.
If Infinity, Eternity and the Absolute were not mastered, they would crowd out everything else in existence. If you take an empty bucket, it is really not empty. It is filled with air. If you fill it with water, the water displaces the air. The same is true of creation. The bucket is like the universe, the air is like finite things and people, the water is like the Absolute. If the Absolute filled everything, it would move you all and move us all, because none of us are Absolute. What prevents the “water” from filling the cosmic bucket? The Universal Absolute does that. It prevents eternity from crowding out time. Finite things are protected from crowding out by the infinite. The cosmic bucket remains open for future growth and development. The Paradise Island cannot fill all space. The personality of God makes room in the universe for other personalities, even for the modest personality of man. If you could measure the amount of work that the Universal Absolute does to prevent water from entering the cosmic bucket, you would know something. You would know how much “air” is protected from displacement. If you knew this, then you would know how incomplete, imperfect, and unfinished the present creation is. This would apply not only to finite things and persons, but also to absent things and persons. Since creation is increasing, this work of the Universal Absolute is also increasing. We believe that this “protective work” of the Universal Absolute will continue to increase indefinitely. The Universal Absolute is the third workshop of the Father. Here the Father sees what can be worked out in a new way with the fraction of Infinity. Remember the wooden stick we talked about—split at one end and still united at the other? Well, another way of looking at it is to say that the Universal Absolute is back at the unsplit end. In this third workshop, the Father sees what can be done to link time and eternity. Here he works out a union of finite and absolute values. He sees what can be done with a united experiential approach to Deity. This third workshop, the Universal Absolute, is not at all comprehensible. The Universal Absolute, however, is a part of Deity. Do you remember the seven levels we talked about, the seven levels on which total Deity operated? Well, the Universal Absolute operates on the first three levels—static, potential, and associative. But not on the next two levels, the creative level and the evolutionary level. At least that is true of the intelligent personalities who live in the master universe.
The Absolute. The two absolutes—qualified and unqualified—seem very different. At least that is the impression they give to intelligent creatures. These two Absolutes are perfectly and completely unified by the third Absolute, the Universal Absolute. In the final analysis, there is only one Absolute. From the human and finite point of view, there are three. From the point of view of the Infinite, there is only one. Let us return to the piece of wood to make this point clear. We split the piece of wood in two. We separate the two ends. We now have a piece of wood shaped like a Y. It consists of three parts: the stem, the right part, and the left part. It has three parts: the trunk, the right arm, and the left arm. But it is still one piece of wood.
¶ XII. The trinities
The original Trinity is the Paradise Trinity of Father, Son, and Spirit. It is eternal, it always has been. It was truly inevitable, it had to be. Why did it have to be this way? Let us go back to the beginning of things. Do you remember that God first expressed Himself in Paradise and as the Eternal Son? That means that He separated the nonpersonal from the personal. Paradise is the absolute machine; the Son is the absolute personality. What did the Father do then? He brought forth the spirit. The spirit can build a bridge of relationship between the spirit person and the nonspirit machine. The God of the spirit is the Infinite Spirit, the coequal Deity of the Father and the Son. It was inevitable that these three coequal Deities should unite. This union is the Paradise Trinity.
The Paradise Trinity. It is the eternal union of the Deity of the Universal Father, the Eternal Son, and the Infinite Spirit. It always has been, is, and will be; it is an eternal fact of existence; it is existential. But when the Trinity begins to work on the two new levels of existence, experience comes into play. It is the only Trinity that takes into account all of Infinity. But since this Trinity can experience, then Deity can experience. Therefore we can have experiential Deity. That is why the increasing appearance of God the Supreme, God the Ultimate, and God the Absolute.
The other two trinities are called the “first experiential trinity” and the “second experiential trinity.” We also call them the post-Havona trinities. Neither of these trinities can be infinite. Why? Because they are composed of derivative deities—derivative deities in contrast to the original deities (the Father, the Son, and the Spirit). These derivative deities are produced by the Paradise Trinity. In this way, God enriches the infinity of the godhead. He can hardly expand the infinity of the godhead, but he can enrich it. He enriches it through experience. Whose experience? The experience of creatures and Creators who work at the finite level of existence and others who work at the absonite level of existence.
The Trinity is a fundamental relationship. It is a fundamental fact of Deity — that Deity unites in Trinity. The work of a Trinity fills the field of Deity action from one side to the other. When all this work of the Trinity is added together, there is a total. This total is a new personality of Deity. There are three new totals of experience which are added to the three levels of finite, absonite, and absolute growth. These three totals are God the Supreme, God the Ultimate, and God the Absolute. These are the three experiential Deities, the Deities who grow through experience. They originate in the Paradise Trinity, the original Trinity. Their continued growth depends upon three things: First, they must work it out themselves. Second, they depend upon the doing of the post-Havona Creators; they depend upon the Creator Sons, for example. And thirdly, they depend in part on what the post-Havona Trinities do; they depend on the successes of the first and second experiential Trinities. We call these two post-Havona Trinities the Ultimate experiential Trinity and the Absolute experiential Trinity. Neither of them is fully operational at the moment; something about them:
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The Ultimate Trinity. This trinity is in the process of evolution. When it has completed its evolution, it will consist of the following beings: The Supreme Being, the Supreme Creative Personalities, and the Architects of the Master Universe. You know the Supreme Being. The Supreme Creative Personalities are creators who constitute the first three levels of God the Sevenfold—the Master Spirits, the Ancients of Days, and the Creator Sons. The Architects of the Master Universe are not finite beings; they are absonite beings. They are neither creatures nor creators. They are special planners of the universe. They might be considered the intelligent, purposeful, living plans of the master universe. What will happen when this Ultimate Trinity actually goes into action? It will have much to do with the completion of the growth of God the Ultimate. This Trinity and God the Ultimate will work throughout the master universe. It is a very big place to work.
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The Absolute Trinity. This is the second experiential trinity. When it has completed its growth, it will consist of the following beings: God the Supreme, God the Ultimate, and the Unrevealed Consummator of Universe Destiny, of whom we will tell you nothing. This Absolute Trinity works on the personal and superpersonal levels. (Remember that absonitarians are superpersonal.) It also works to the boundaries of the nonpersonal. If it could ever complete its growth, then we would have God the Absolute building experientially upon the foundations of the Absolute Deity.
We see how the Ultimate Trinity can complete its growth. We do not see how the Absolute Trinity could complete its growth. How can one reach the end of infinity? If this Absolute Trinity can never complete its growth, then how can God the Absolute ever be born? But perhaps there is another way besides growth. In eternity past, the Father and the Son gave birth to the original Trinity by trinitization. This trinitization gave birth to the Infinite Spirit, on the one hand, and to a special union between the Father and the Son, on the other. We venture to speculate that God the Supreme and God the Ultimate could also trinitize in the distant future. If so, this act could trinitize God the Absolute on the one hand, while bringing about a special union between the Supreme and the Ultimate on the other.
Universe philosophers sometimes speak of a Trinity of Trinities. This would be a trinity composed of the three trinities: the Paradise Trinity, the Ultimate Trinity, and the Absolute Trinity. It would be both existential and experiential. It would be an infinite Trinity. If Trinities always result in new personalizations of Deity, then how would the Trinity of Trinities personalize itself? It is possible that the function of this Trinity reveals the personality of the Universal Father in an Infinite way—as I AM. But, regardless of all this speculation, the Paradise Trinity is potentially infinite because the Universal Father is in fact Infinite.
¶ Acknowledgement
The articles which follow this foreword will tell you about the character of the Universal Father and the nature of his Paradise associates. We will also attempt to describe the perfect central universe and the seven superuniverses which surround it. In telling you this story, we must follow the instructions which have been given to us by our superiors, the rulers of our superuniverse. These instructions lay down certain rules which we must follow in revealing new truths to you and in clarifying what you know. These rules tell us to use human concepts and ideas whenever we can. We must use the best ideas that human beings have had. When we simply cannot find a human concept to use, we can explain to you how we view these things. Then we will give you our own ideas.
This is not the first revelation of the truth about your world. Each revelation must take into account and use the best of what is known at the time. Each revelation begins with the old and then continues to give new truths and to better sort and clarify what you know. We have now arrived at this work of telling you about God and his associates in the universe. But even before we began to tell you this story, we carefully studied the ideas that human beings have had on these matters. We studied the ideas that human beings have had, not only in the present but also in the past. We studied the ideas that mortals who know God have had. As a result of this study, we selected more than a thousand concepts. We have adopted these human concepts as the basis of our story. When these human concepts are not sufficient to tell the truth as it has been entrusted to us, we supplement them. We will supplement them by drawing upon our own higher ideas and knowledge. We know the reality and divinity of the Paradise Deities. We also know the universe in which they live—the perfect universe of Havona.
We are aware of the difficulties of our task. We know that we cannot put our language into yours, too much is lost in translation. We are going to talk about the concepts of divinity and eternity. We are going to use a language that has only a limited number of words that human minds can understand. But we know that we will have help. We do not depend on the spirit alone. We know that a fragment of God Himself lives in every human mind. We also know that the Spirit of Truth lives with every human soul. We also know that these spiritual forces are going to help human beings understand what we are talking about. They are going to help you understand what spiritual values are. They are going to help you understand the meanings of the universe. But most of all, they are going to do something else, something much more important. These spirits of the Divine Presence are truly capable of helping you to understand spiritually a certain type of truth. It is the truth that helps you to grow, to progress in personal religious experience. It is the truth that allows you to become aware of the presence and reality of God.