© 2008 Antonio Moya, Carmelo Martínez, Santiago Rodríguez, Andrés Pérez
© 2008 Urantia Association of Spain
| Jesus and the Samaritan woman | Luz y Vida — No. 15 — December 2008 — Index | The Urantia Book and its dissemination |
By various authors
Participants:
- Antonio Moya
- Carmelo Martínez
- Santiago Rodríguez
- Andrés Pérez
Andrés: I would like to ask you: how is it possible that if God is almighty and has deposited a fragment of himself in each one of us, that Adjuster that dwells in us does not have experiences? So what can you give us? or what do you want them for? And if so, why does he need them, if he is a fragment of God? I fail to understand why he accumulates experiences from beings who are beginning to have them. In UB 16:9.3 it is said “if mortal man fails to survive natural death, the real spiritual values of his human experience survive as a part of the continuing experience of the Thought Adjuster”. And I say why do you want it, if I have to assume that this fragment of God should be “almighty” (in this I include all the values that I know that God has)
I would like you to tell me your opinion, the one that each one of you has about it, because it is not that I do not intuit some concepts of that Adjuster, but these sections are strange to me, since there are several of this subject that I expose, and to my understanding I do not get to “catch” how these celestial beings do not have experiences coming from God, as in another paragraph UB 110:2.3 says: “the Adjusters are dedicated to improving, modifying, adjusting, and co-ordinating your thinking processes” etc.
And I say, if they don’t have experience, how can they help us in this complicated world in which almost everyone who has come has failed, if not totally, then partially.
Carmelo: Andrés asks some very, very interesting questions. It’s not that I’m clear about it, but I’m going to drop my ideas.
It is clear what the Adjuster brings: divinity, and consequently eternal life. Without him (or some other spirit of divinity) it is not possible. The experience is provided by us, although it will not be fully ours until we merge with it. If we survive by one of the other two modes, the experience will also be ours, but it will also belong to the Adjuster who indwelled us. I mean it by repeating what the book says, but I’m not quite sure I understand all that it means.
It’s a bit of a mystery what happens before we’re born. UB says that the Adjuster who is going to reside in us, studies our conditions and prepares our life to ensure that we survive. All of this is a priori, since our (relative) free will is respected at all times. Then he lives with us guiding us (according to the plan he previously prepared), and finally it is us (with the fusion) or he goes on to reside in another mortal taking our experience with him.
For what and why all this? Why does the Adjuster, being a fragment of the Father, acquire experience and not wear it (sometimes yes, those of the previous mortals in which he resided)? go to know Deity is existential and experiential at the same time, in eternity. It encompasses all that is and all that is experienced (as a consequence of all potentials becoming actuals), in eternity. But in time the experience does not yet exist in its entirety; it exists as we live. This is the plan. Dont ask me why; I don’t know. But I have total trust in the Father; that is undoubtedly the best for everyone; that undoubtedly means happiness for all, in eternity.
In this difference between time and eternity, for me is the key. Deity already has/is EVERYTHING, in eternity. But he has decided that time exists, and in time he will progressively acquire experience; and what is more important, gradually acquiring it through its creatures that ARE (will be) part of the Deity, in eternity.
Why has the Deity planned not to have experiences in time, and to get them through his creatures? Don’t know; but that is the Father’s Plan. We must not forget that things ARE in eternity, while they ARE BEING in time. In eternity Deity is existential and experiential; in time the Supreme Being is acquiring all the possible finite experience; and in the transcended time, the Ultimate is doing the same with respect to the absonite experience.
Because? IT IS the Plan. The Deity is all-powerful, but He has decided that things should be so. He could have done it differently, but he did it this way. Something tells me it’s very well done.
Santiago: Andrés, you don’t have experience, you acquire it, which means that the Adjuster, even being a “complete” fragment of the Father, by itself cannot have the experiences that living together will bring with you, since you are an individual with free will, and you will go through your life based on your sovereign decisions, and the experience of living your life can only be provided by you. The values that come from the experience of living life can only be acquired by living life, and since no two individuals are the same, no two lives are the same, and therefore no two life experiences are the same.
I tend to think that in future eternity the Father’s mandate will have been achieved: to be perfect as He is, and by this I mean that, once perfection has been achieved, what is existential will be indistinguishable from what has been achieved as experiential. , they will be equivalent, and once again we will have to take our hats off to the Father, because he will have achieved perfection in two ways: the fast way: he creates it perfect. And the devious one: it creates it as imperfect as possible (barely the Adjuster is capable of residing within it (us), and it gives it the possibility to perfect itself as much as possible).
And we have the privilege of having been created imperfect, and with our will (and huge amounts of external help) we can achieve a perfect-perfected universe, helping to make the potential actualize itself!
What more can we ask for?
Antonio: In the universe, the Book tells us, there is NOTHING that can replace experience. “There is simply nothing in all universal existence which can take the place of actual personal experience” (UB 22:9.7). “Nothing in the entire universe can substitute for the fact of experience on nonexistential levels” (UB 108:0.2)
God is existential, not experiential. He is the alpha and the omega, he knows the end from the beginning, therefore “God does not acquire experience” (UB 1:5.14) “God, as he is eternal, universal, absolute and infinite, does not grow in knowledge nor increases in wisdom” (same page and paragraph) “God is eternally and infinitely perfect, he cannot personally know imperfection as his own experience” (UB 2:2.6), but he really participates in the experience with immaturity and imperfection… to through the Thought Adjusters.
Adjusters are prepersonal, that is, they come from the God level on which personality has not yet appeared. They are, so to speak, prior to the Eternal Son. They are pre-personal. And they come out “virgins” from that level of God, that is, without experience (remember that at those levels experience -the finite level- does not exist, nor does God need it)
What can they give us? Divinity and eternal life. Among other things. Does it seem little to you, Andrés?
What do they want or need the experience for? God has decreed that the finite level be perfected through experience. We bring personality and experience. The Adjuster brings divinity and eternal life. Together, fused, we encompass all four.
God has projected two types of beings: the perfect ones from Havona and the imperfect ones from the superuniverses. The latter have to reach perfection by experience. But not without help. God provides us with the Adjuster to guide us in all our decisions, to serve as a model (represents God’s will), and by merging with it, make us eternal. An Adjuster-fused mortal is NO LONGER a mere human being as we know it. It is something else. He is a human-divine being.
And through this technique of living in man, God experiences what experience is.
The Adjuster helps us make decisions that are in line with God’s will. The Adjuster helps us to tune our will with God’s. The Adjuster helps us to act AS GOD WOULD if he were in our shoes. As Carmelo said very well the other day, God is us down here. And we must act as He would if He were here (He cannot be because He is infinite and absolute). The experiences are lived together, the Adjuster and us. But there is only one will, ours (the Adjuster is pre-personal). Therefore, we are the ones who make the decisions, and the Adjuster endures, or rejoices, depending on what we do.
If we survive, the Adjuster will return and fuse with us. If we do not survive, the Adjuster will end up in another mortal from another world, and if he fuses with him, he will bring him the experiences he had with us.
¶ References
- Light and Life Magazine (all old issues): https://aue.urantia-association.org/numeros-antiguos-del-lyv/
| Jesus and the Samaritan woman | Luz y Vida — No. 15 — December 2008 — Index | The Urantia Book and its dissemination |