© 1990 Marilynn Kulieke
© 1990 The Urantia Book Fellowship (formerly Urantia Brotherhood)
| Avoidance of Selfishness | Winter/Spring 1991 Issue. Special Conference Issue II (1990 General Conference. Walking with God. Snowmass, Aspen, Colorado) — Index | C.H.A.N.G.E.S.—Practice Makes Perfect |
by Marilynn Kulieke
Author’s note: This presentation was an exploration of the conflict between egoism and altruism. What follows is a series of quotations from The Urantia Book which provided the basis for the discussion that took place within the workshop. In the first appendix (A), there is a copy of the worksheet that wans passed out as the organizer for the workshop. Appendix B contains two visual represertations which attempted to integrate the content presentul in the workshop.
Moral choosing is usually accompanied by more or less moral conflict. And this very first conflict in the child mind is between the urges of egoism and the impulses of altruism. The Thought Adjuster does not disregard the personality values of the egoistic motive but does operate to place a slight preference upon the altruistic impulse as leading to the goal of human happiness and to the joys of the kingdom of heaven. (UB 103:2.7)
What Are the Components of the Self?
It would be helpful in the study of selfhood to remember:
Parts of the self may function in numerous waysthinking, feeling, wishing — but only the co-ordinated attributes of the whole personality are focused in intelligent action; and all of these powers are associated with the spiritual endowment of the mortal mind when a human being sincerely and unselfishly loves another being, human or divine. (UB 112:2.7)
In the human organism the summation of its parts constitutes selfhood-individuality — but such a process has nothing whatever to do with personality, which is the unifier of all these factors as related to cosmic realities. (UB 112:1.18)
The purpose of cosmic evolution is to achieve unity of personality through increasing spirit dominance, volitional response to the teaching and leading of the Thought Adjuster. Personality, both human and superhuman, is characterized by an inherent cosmic quality which may be called “the evolution of dominance,” the expansion of the control of both itself and its environment. (UB 112:2.15)
The material self, the ego-entity of human identity, is dependent during the physical life on the continuing function of the material life vehicle, on the continued existence of the unbalanced equilibrium of energies and intellect which, on Urantia, has been given the name life. But selfhood of survival value, selfhood that can transcend the experience of death, is only evolved by establishing a potential transfer of the seat of the identity of the evolving personality from the transient life vehicle- the material body — to the more enduring and immortal nature of the morontia soul and on beyond to those levels whereon the soul becomes infused with, and eventually attains the status of, spirit reality. This actual transfer from material association to morontia identification is effected by the sincerity, persistence, and steadfastness of the Cod-seeking decisions of the human creature. (UB 112:2.20)
Material mind is the arena in which human personalities live, are self-conscious, make decisions, choose God or forsake him, eternalize or destroy themselves. (UB 111:1.3)
[But] intelligence alone cannot explain the moral nature. Morality, virtue, is indigenous to human personality. Moral intuition, the realization of duty, is a component of human mind endowment…Man’s mentality far transcends that of his animal cousins, but it is his moral and religious natures that especially distinguish him from the animal world. (UB 16:7.1)
The human mind does not create real values; human experience does not yield universe insight. Concerning insight, the recognition of moral values and the discernment of spiritual meanings, all that the human mind can do is to discover, recognize, interpret, and choose.
The moral values of the universe become intellectual possessions by the exercise of three basic judgments, or choices, of the mortal mind:
- Self-judgment—moral choice.
- Social-judgment—ethical choice.
- God-judgment—religious choice. (UB 196:3.10-14)
When man fails to discriminate the ends of his mortal striving, he finds himself functioning on the animal level of existence. He has failed to avail himself of the superior advantages of that material acumen, moral discrimination, and spiritual insight which are an integral part of his cosmic-mind endowment as a personal being. (UB 16:7.5)
Virtue is righteousness-conformity with the cosmos. To name virtues is not to define them, but to live them is to know them. Virtue is not mere knowledge nor yet wisdom but rather the reality of progressive experience in the attainment of ascending levels of cosmic achievement. In the day-by-day life of mortal man, virtue is realized by the consistent choosing of good rather than evil, and such choosing ability is evidence of the possession of a moral nature. (UB 16:7.6)
Man’s choosing between good and evil is influenced, not only by the keenness of his moral nature, but also by such influences as ignorance, immaturity, and delusion. A sense of proportion is also concerned in the exercise of virtue because evil may be perpetrated when the lesser is chosen in the place of the greater as a result of distortion or deception. The art of relative estimation or comparative measurement enters into the practice of the virtues of the moral realm. (UB 16:7.7)
Man’s moral nature would be impotent without the art of measurement, the discrimination embodied in his ability to scrutinize meanings. Likewise would moral choosing be futile without that cosmic insight which yields the consciousness of spiritual values. From the standpoint of intelligence, man ascends to the level of a moral being because he is endowed with personality. (UB 16:7.8)
Moral acts are those human performances which are characterized by the highest intelligence, directed by selective discrimination in the choice of superior ends as well as in the selection of moral means to attain these ends. Such conduct is virtuous. Supreme virtue, then, is wholeheartedly to choose to do the will of the Father in heaven. (UB 16:7.10)
When a moral being chooses to be unselfish when confronted by the urge to be selfish, that is primitive religious experience. No animal can make such a choice; such a decision is both human and religious. It embraces the fact of Cod-consciousness and exhibits the impulse of social service, the basis of the brotherhood of man. When mind chooses a right moral judgment by an act of the free will, such a decision constitutes a religious experience. (UB 103:2.8)
Morality can never be advanced by law or by force. It is a personal and freewill matter and must be disseminated by the contagion of the contact of morally fragrant persons with those who are less morally responsive, but who are also in some measure desirous of the doing the Father’s will. (UB 16:7.9)
…The ability to choose between the emerging values of good and evil-moral choice. (UB 108:2.2)
The highest moral choice is the choice of the highest possible value, and always — in any sphere, in all of them — this is to choose to do the will of God. (UB 39:4.14)
Many of the temporal troubles of mortal man grow out of his twofold relation to the cosmos. Man is a part of nature — he exists in nature — and yet he is able to transcend nature. Man is finite, but he is indwelt by a spark of infinity. Such a dual situation not only provides the potential for evil but also engenders many social and moral situations fraught with much uncertainty and not a little anxiety. (UB 111:6.1)
The courage required to effect the conquest of nature and to transcend one’s self is a courage that might succumb to the temptations of self-pride. The mortal who can transcend self might yield to the temptation to deify his own self-consciousness. The mortal dilemma consists in the double fact that man is in bondage to nature while at the same time he possesses a unique libertyfreedom of spiritual choice and action. On material levels man finds himself subservient to nature, while on spiritual levels he is triumphant over nature and over all things temporal and finite. Such a paradox is inseparable from temptation, potential evil, decisional errors, and when self becomes proud and arrogant, sin may evolve. (UB 111:6.2)
Self has surrendered to the intriguing drive of an all-encompassing motivation which imposes heightened self-discipline, lessens emotional conflict, and makes mortal life truly worth living. The morbid recognition of human limitations is changed to the natural consciousness of mortal shortcomings, associated with moral determination and spiritual aspiration to attain the highest universe and superuniverse goals. (UB 100:6.4)
The Adjuster bestowed upon man is, in the last analysis, impervious to evil and incapable of sin, but mortal mind can actually be twisted, distorted, and rendered evil and ugly by the sinful machinations of a perverse and self-seeking human will. Likewise can this mind be made noble, beautiful, true, and good — actually great-in accordance with the spirit-illuminated will of a God-knowing human being. (UB 111:1.6)
…Before a child has developed sufficiently to acquire moral capacity and therefore to be able to choose altruistic service, he has already developed a strong and, wellunited egoistic nature. And it is this factual situation that gives rise to the theory of the struggle between the “higher” and the “lower” natures, between the “old man of sin” and the “new nature” of grace. Very early in life the normal child begins to learn that it is “more blessed to give than to receive.” (UB 103:2.9)
Man tends to identify the urge to be self-serving with his ego-himself. In contrast he is inclined to identify the will to be altruistic with some influence outside himself-God. And indeed is such a judgment right, for all such nonself desires do actually have their origin in the leadings of the indwelling Thought Adjuster, and this Adjuster is a fragment of God. The impulse of the spirit Monitor is realized in human consciousness as the urge to be altruistic, fellow-creature minded. At least this is the early and fundamental experience of the child mind. When the growing child fails of personality unification, the altruistic drive may become so overdeveloped as to work serious injury to the welfare of the self. Amisguided conscience can become responsible for much conflict, worry, sorrow, and no end of human unhappiness. (UB 103:2.10)
Moral acts are those human performances which are characterized by the highest intelligence, directed by selective discrimination in the choice of superior ends as well as in the selection of moral means to attain these ends. Such conduct is virtuous. Supreme virtue, then, is wholeheartedly to choose to do the will of the Father in heaven. (193)
The early evolutionary mind gives origin to a feeling of social duty and moral obligation derived chiefly from emotional fear. The more positive urge of social obligation derived from the direct impulse of the divine spirit indwelling the human mind. (UB 103:5.1)
The idea-ideal of doing good to others — the impulse to deny the ego something for the benefit of one’s neighbor-is very circumscribed at first. Primitive man regards as neighbor only those very close to him, those who treat him neighborly; as religious civilization advances, one’s neighbor expands in concept to embrace the clan, the tribe, the nation. And then Jesus enlarged the neighbor scope to embrace the whole of humanity, even that we should love our enemies. And there is something inside of every normal human being that tells him this teaching is moral-right. Even those who practice this ideal least, admit that it is right in theory. (UB 103:5.2)
All men recognize the morality of this universal human urge to be unselfish and altruistic. The humanist ascribes the origin of this urge to the natural working of the material mind; the religionist more correctly recognizes that the truly unselfish drive of mortal mind is in response to the inner spirit, leadings of the Thought Adjuster. (UB 103:5.3)
But man’s interpretation of these early conflicts between the ego-will and the other-than-self-will is not always dependable. Only a fairly well unified personality can arbitrate the multiform contentions of the ego cravings and the budding social consciousness. The self has rights as well as one’s neighbors. Neither has exclusive claims upon the attention and service of the individual. Failure to resolve this problem gives origin to the earliest type of human guilt feelings. (UB 103:5.4)
Human happiness is achieved only when the ego desire of the self and the altruistic urge of the higher self (divine spirit) are co-ordinated and reconciled by the unified will of the integrating and supervising personality. The mind of evolutionary man is ever confronted with the intricate problem of refereing the contest between the natural expansion of emotional impulses and the moral growth of unselfish urges predicated on spiritual insight-genuine religious reflection. (UB 103:5.5)
It is fatal to man’s idealism when he is taught that all of his altruistic impulses are merely the development of his natural herd instincts. But he is ennobled and mightily energized when he learns that these higher urges of his soul emanate from the spiritual forces that indwell his mortal mind. (UB 103:5.8)
…And so it is that a living faith in the superhuman origin of our ideals validates our belief that we are the sons of God and makes real our altruistic convictions, the feelings of the brotherhood of man. (UB 103:5.9)
Unbridled self-will and unregulated self-expression equal unmitigated selfishness, the acme of ungodliness. Liberty without the associated and ever-increasing conquest of self is a figment of egoistic mortal imagination. (UB 54:1.5)
Self-control leads to altruistic service; self-admiration tends towards the exploitation of others for the selfish aggrandizement of such a mistaken individual as is willing to sacrifice righteous attainment for the sake of possessing unjust power over his fellow beings. (UB 54:1.6)
The urge to be altruistic is to be fellow-creature minded. (UB 103:2.10)
The atmosphere of the communion provides a refreshing and comforting period of truce in the conflict of the self-seeking ego with the altruistic urge of the indwelling spirit Monitor. And this is the prelude to true worship-the practice of the presence of God which eventuates in the emergence of the brotherhood of man. (UB 103:4.1)
Prayer is not designed as a technique for aggrandizing self or for gaining unfair advantage over one’s fellows. A thoroughly selfish soul cannot pray in the true sense of the word. (UB 146:2.9)
Prejudice blinds the soul to the recognition of truth, and prejudice can be removed only by the sincere devotion of the soul to the adoration of a cause that is allembracing and all-inclusive of one’s fellow men. Prejudice is inseparably linked to selfishness. Prejudice can be eliminated only by the abandonment of self-seeking and by substituting therefore the quest of the satisfaction of the service of a cause that is not only greater than self, but one that is even greater than all humanity — the search for God, the attainment of divinity. The evidence of maturity of personality consists in the transformation of human desire so that it constantly seeks for the realization of those values which are highest and most divinely real. (UB 160:1.13)
[In reference to Jesus’ decision as to what to do with his creator prerogatives as he resumed his work] This great decision of Jesus portrays dramatically the truth that selfish satisfaction and sensuous gratification, alone and of themselves, are not able to confer happiness upon evolving human beings. There are higher values in mortal existence-intellectual mastery and spiritual achievement-which far transcend the necessary gratification of man’s purely physical appetites and urges. Man’s natural endowment of talent and ability should be chiefly devoted to the development and ennoblement of his higher powers of mind and spirit. (UB 136:6.10)
Spirituality becomes at once the indicator of one’s nearness to God and the measure of one’s usefulness to fellow beings. Spirituality enhances the ability to discover beauty in things, recognize truth in meanings, and discover goodness in values. Spiritual development is determined by capacity therefor and is directly proportional to the elimination of the selfish qualities of love. (UB 100:2.4)
God is not only the determiner of destiny; he is man’s eternal destination. All nonreligious human activities seek to bend the universe to the distorting service of self; the truly religious individual seeks to identify the self with the universe and then to dedicate the activities of this unified self to the service of the universe family of fellow beings, human and superhuman. (UB 5:4.3)
…You will learn that you increase your burdens and decrease the likelihood of success by taking yourself too seriously. Nothing can take precedence over the work of your status sphere-this world or the next. Very important is the work of preparation for the next higher sphere, but nothing equals the importance of the work of the world in which you are actually living. But though the work is important, the self is not. When you feel important, you lose energy to the wear and tear of ego dignity so that there is little energy left to do the work. Self-importance, not work-importance, exhausts immature creatures; it is the self element that exhausts, not the effort to achieve. You can do important work if you leave yourself out. (UB 48:6.37)
Moral choosing is usually accompanied by more or less moral conflict. And this very first conflict in the child mind is between the urges of egoism and the impulses of altruism. The Thought Adjuster does not disregard the personality values of the egoistic motive but does operate to place a slight preference upon the altruistic impulse as leading to the goal of human happiness and to the joys of the kingdom of heaven. (UB 103:2.7)
Generate a list of values which might influence a decision to act in an egoistic and altruistic way.
In the story of Jesus cleansing the temple (Paper 173, Section 1), what were the moral conflicts or tensions for Jesus in this portrayal?
What do you personally need to do to achieve a balance between ego and altruism in each of your own lives?
EVOLUTIONARY MIND: Physical system
Ego Desire
Self-will
TO ONESELF
Family - Neighbors
Clan — Tribe — Nation
DOING GOOD TO OTHERS
Doing Good to the God in Others
| Avoidance of Selfishness | Winter/Spring 1991 Issue. Special Conference Issue II (1990 General Conference. Walking with God. Snowmass, Aspen, Colorado) — Index | C.H.A.N.G.E.S.—Practice Makes Perfect |