© 1994 Richard Preiss
by Mark Kulieke
Delivered June 28, 1992 at Lake Forest College in Lake Forest, Illinois
The subject for the day concerns the origin of personal religion and will involve a focus on Papers 158 through 167. This means starting with “The Mount of Transfiguration” and going through “The Visit to Philadelphia,” which takes us up to just prior to the resurrection of Lazarus. You could actually use a great many papers in The Urantia Book in support of this topic, but I have limited myself to examples from these papers to illustrate my main points in keeping with the plan of this workshop.
First of all, let’s deal with what is meant by personal. I will regard personal as referring to two things which are closely related and yet different:
- First, personal in the sense of individual — the individual nature of one’s religion, that which renders it utterly unique, and as distinct from group beliefs and practices.
- Second, personal in the sense of relationships with persons — the individual’s relationship with his or her Universal Father and the consequent relationship of the brotherhood of man and cosmic citizenship — the relationship of the individual to all other creators and creatures.
I think the first thing that I see is that the personal element of religion, the concept of the value of the individual human will creature and the establishment of that creature’s relationship with his or her creator, seems to be a product almost entirely of revelatory religion — not of evolutionary, meaning man-made religion. Now, of course, revelatory and evolutionary religion are heavily admixed and have been for a long time. But to me, the indications are that primitive evolutionary religion is almost exclusively concerned with the good of the whole. Evolutionary religion seems to embrace and foster group beliefs and practices. Propitiation of the gods is a group matter. Taboos and fetishistic practices, development of mores and morals were all group matters. After all, since social and political units were small, embracing only the clan or the tribe, good luck or bad luck often affected the whole group, so doing something about it was a group matter. And acting in this manner was also a means of control. It was the main form of social regulation. The individual is sacrificed for the good of the many. It is evolutionary religion that develops shamans and priesthoods — the middlemen between men and God. Variation from the norm seems to result in either the rise to shaman or to ostracism or death. It is highly dangerous to be different. You aren’t supposed to do too much thinking for yourself in coping with the matters of the group.
When you are told you are to be a human sacrifice due to the miserable weather or bad luck in hunting or war, you do not say, “I object, this does not conform to my personal religious beliefs.” It would not hardly enter the primitive mind to think such a thing. While not relishing the idea, the victim probably believed oftentimes in the efficacy of the sacrifice.
On the other hand, revelatory religion, referring specifically to epochal revelatory religion, begins to distinguish the individual soul from the herd. We can see in The Urantia Book that the process has taken 500,000 years and is still far from completed. We don’t have too much evidence regarding the teachings from the days of the Planetary Prince and Adam and Eve, other than the indication that the morality of seven commandments was taught. These commandments seem to concern personal human conduct and thus begin the process of personalization of religious experience.
We have some greater implication of a personal element in the teachings of Melchizedek in that salvation by faith is taught and faith seems to us an individual matter. However, the various cultures didn’t get the point entirely. In those days, faith itself seems to have been often viewed as a group matter. Consider the many Old Testament writings where God punished the entire race or people, usually the Hebrew people, because of the reversion to heathen practices on the part of only some, because certain ones broke the covenant. In those days, the whole group still stands or falls together much of the time, with a few exceptions. In any event, Melchizedek’s real focus was on monotheism — preparing the way for Jesus. So it is not until the fourth and fifth epochal revelations that the theme of the personal nature of religion really comes to the fore, really becomes prominent. Think of it: Mortals have been around for 994,000 years and we’re just beginning to get the picture about personal religion in the last 2000 . It is said on UB 196:2.6 that “Jesus founded the religion of personal experience in doing the will of God and serving the human brotherhood…” We see Jesus teaching sonship with God and that he many times told his followers that “the kingdom of God is within you.” And on UB 195:10.4, it is said: “The kingdom of God is within you’ was probably the greatest pronouncement Jesus ever made…”
On UB 170:3.10 of The Urantia Book, it says that:
“The religion of the kingdom is personal, individual; the fruits, the results are familiar, social. Jesus never failed to exalt the sacredness of the individual as contrasted with the community. But he also recognized that man develops his character by unselfish service; that he unfolds his moral nature in loving relationshin with his fellows.”
“By teaching that the kingdom is within, by exalting the individual, Jesus struck the deathblow of the old society in that he ushered in the new dispensation of true social righteousness. This new order of society the world has little known because it has refused to practice the principles of the gospel of the kingdom of heaven. And when this kingdom of spiritual pre-eminence does come upon the earth, it will not be manifested in mere improved social and material conditions, but rather in the glories of those enhanced and enriched spiritual values which are characteristic of the approaching age of improved human relations and advancing spiritual attainments.” UB 170:3.10-11
Let’s take a brief look at some of the personal elements of Jesus, his religion and his teachings in Papers 158-168 as I think they may relate to the subject. As we do this, let’s bear in mind a very important underlying truth: Jesus was both fully human and fully divine. What does that mean to the subject at hand? It means that on the one hand, Jesus lived and taught a personal religious perspective as a man among men. But being divine, we are also getting a very thorough glimpse of the personal response of God and all his dominion — the superhuman family of ministers to the mortals of time and space. Jesus, as he responds to various individuals, groups and situations, mirrors God himself. In Jesus, we are seeing God in action. I will talk about this further as we go on.
I want to focus on a handful of the experiences which occur in Papers 158-168. They are illustrations and there are many others in the book. But even in these ten papers, there are many remarkable things, sufficient to provide a good study of God and man.
Jesus routinely personalized his teachings to the individual or group before him. He also helps to provide a diversity of personal experiences. In “The Mount of Transfiguration,” he chooses certain apostles to share in the experience of the transfiguration, while others remain behind. Later, because the apostles comprehend his status as a son of God, Jesus frankly tells them what will befall him in the days to come-again the message is personalized to his audience and is given when they are reasonably prepared to hear it.
In Paper 159, “The Decapolis Tour,” Jesus has a significant meeting with Nathaniel where he imported much of the truth about the Scriptures to this apostle alone. It was not infrequently that Jesus shared more with Nathaniel than others of the apostles. In Paper 167, “The Visit to Philadelphia,” Jesus reveals much about angels to Nathaniel. In each case, it appears to be because Nathaniel was interested and had the capacity to appreciate the answer. It is an illustration of the parable: “To him who has much, more is given.”
This makes it a little more difficult to comprehend why in Paper 160, “Rodan of Alexandria,” a very different outcome results. Jesus declined to enter into a conference with Rodan and turned the matter over to two apostles. And yet Rodan was such an advanced and accomplished individual, to all appearances the equal of Nathaniel, and someone who could and did become a leader in the years to follow. What was different here? Perhaps the difference is that Rodan had the capacity to work out the intellectual/spiritual problems which he had identified without recourse to specialized instruction from Jesus. He did not really require Jesus’ assistance. Perhaps he had already attained some sort of maximum limit beyond which Jesus would not go. Or it could be that his own discovery of some truths would be more rewarding than being handed them. And Nathaniel and Thomas no doubt benefitted much from attempting to match wits with Rodan. The bottom line is that Jesus had another unique response to a unique individual.
Rodan himself stands as a superlative example of how far an individual mortal can develop essentially on his own. He had a philosophy and art of living which would be advanced in our own time, and he appears to have developed it largely unaided by Jesus teaching.
In the Paper, “At the Feast of Tabernacles,” when the woman taken in adultery is presented to Jesus, he resorts to another unusual approach. It is an attempt to entrap him by the Sanhedrin and Jesus writes in the sand three times for the benefit of three different individuals or groups and they all disperse without a word, leaving the woman standing alone with Jesus. Actually this is an amazing story. What could he have scribbled in the sand in a few seconds which would cause a fair number of diverse and not very spiritually inclined people to depart without a word? But they don’t tell us.
Jesus has a facility for making use of the situation at hand. At “The Feast of Tabernacles,” when the scene is illuminated by candelabras and torches, he says, “I am the light of the world.” When he is a breakfast with the Pharisees at Philadelphia in Paper 167, he employs a parable about a great supper as well as a teaching about not seeking the place of preferment at a feast.
Jesus is consistent, but not predictable. Josiah is healed in Paper 164, “At the Feast of Dedication.” But we are told the man did not ask for healing. This was entirely planned in a premeditated manner by Jesus as a faith challenge to the Sanhedrin. What is of interest at the moment is that Jesus makes an odd ceremonial experience out of this healing. He makes use of clay and spittle and directs Josiah to wash in the pool of Siloam. It is revealed that one of the reasons for resorting to this approach was to make use of the man’s superstition to induce him to act.
One last episode to focus on is found in Paper 167, “The Visit to Philadelphia.” On UB 167:4.5, Jesus announces his plan to go into Judea, to Bethany, to heal, actually to resurrect, Lazarus. In stating his intentions, Jesus said: “I would do one more mighty work for these Jews; I would give them one more chance to believe, even on their own terms — conditions of outward glory and the visible manifestation of the power of the Father and the love of the Son.” Imagine that. Jesus will give these people a chance to believe on their terms, not following his own plans, but accepting their terms.
The aforementioned episodes are just a sampling of some very diverse experiences of Jesus’ public career. Let’s briefly summarize aspects of these various episodes:
- Jesus provides a differential of experience to his immediate followers as well as to all other individuals and groups with which he comes in contact in consonance with their own stages of personal religious development.
- Certain of his revelations to Nathaniel go well beyond any information imparted to other men or women. At the same time, for Rodan of Alexandria, he has little to impart.
- He is so effective that scribbling in the sand gets evil and mistaught men to depart in silence even though they mean him harm.
- He deliberately employs the superstition of a man to heal him.
- He frankly admits that he will appeal to people on their terms to win them to the kingdom, meaning their mistaken or distorted notions of reality.
Now all of these episodes and circumstances are essentially adding up to the same thing: that Jesus adapts his action and response to fit every individual and group of individuals which he encounters in such a way as to maximize the situation for all those involved. Everyone stands to gain in accordance with their receptivity. These are, in a sense, all human adaptations to life’s situations that Jesus made. But we must also consider that they are something more. Bear in mind once again that Jesus is divine. He who has seen him has seen the Father. Jesus mirrors God. It is like secing God in action among men. And look what he does. His response is always so versatile, so uniquely adapted to the situation and the person or persons involved and is always so remarkably effective. He will make use of olden teachings, even superstitions to further his aims and he will even appeal to us on our terms if necessary. Is this amazing or what? If Jesus does these things, we know that God will do them. We know that superhumans high and low will do them within their ability to do so. There is some amazing versatility in God and all his host. Not only is the mortal upreach personal and unique, but so also is the divine downreach personal and unique. Both are personal and unique, because both are in a relationship that is personal and unique.
“Religion is ever and always rooted and grounded in personal experience. And your highest religion, the life of Jesus, was just such a personal experience: man, mortal man, seeking God and finding him to the fullness during one short life in the flesh, while in the same human experience there appeared God seeking man and finding him to the full satisfaction of the perfect soul of infinite supremacy. And that is religion, even the highest yet revealed in the universe of Nebadonthe earth life of Jesus of Nazareth.” (UB 102:8.7)
Yes, Jesus taught about the individual nature of the religion of the kingdom. But Jesus was often thwarted in teaching as he truly desired to teach. He could only give the bare elements of the concept of a universal family of God, sonship with God, and the corollary brotherhood of man. In his own day, his followers unwittingly resisted his teachings and subsequent generations submerged them by focusing on a religion about Jesus. We only know about much of the life and teachings of Jesus, the fourth epochal revelation, due to their restatement in the fifth epochal revelation. Jesus lived a life which was a demonstration of the individual nature of religion and the individual response of God unified in a single personality. And the completion of Jesus’ bestowal released the Spirit of Truth to our planet and signaled the universal outpouring of Adjusters to all normal-minded will creatures. Perhaps that was the setting of the stage.
Now in our own century, the fifth epochal revelation of truth comes to us, relating once again the real life and teachings of Jesus with the personal element in tact and carrying the theme much further. The Urantia Book is able to greatly amplify the concepts that Jesus could in some cases only briefly introduce. The printed word can give some teachings of Jesus a much larger audience than heard him in his day. Perhaps it is only in the last few thousand years that we had the capacity to grasp a concept of personal religion. Maybe it requires hundreds of thousands of years to prepare for this point and it is simply an idea whose time has come. Perhaps the Spirit of Truth and universal bestowal of Adjusters is the essential stepping off point for a personal concept of religion. Perhaps personal religious liberty can only follow in the wake of true social and political liberty which are only recently at hand.
Photo by Carol Herren
Back in the 1950’s, Dr. Sadler prepared a paper wherein he enumerated seventy-two major concepts which appear for the first time ever, so far as we know, in The Urantia Book-seventy-two unique major concepts. Someone else doing the same kind of study might isolate more or less concepts. The point is that there is a great deal of material never before taught. And of all the concepts in this fifth epochal revelation, none seem more important, whether they be new or restated, than those having to do with the importance of the individual in the eyes of God, the value of the individual, the sovereignty of the human will, the vast extent to which human will is respected, how the celestial overseers go very much out of their way that human will never be tampered with, and the fact that we are all individually indwelt by God. We have a direct and continuous connection to the Universal Father himself. A spirit fragment, the Thought Adjuster, is sent to indwell each one of us.
These concepts, and all they imply are, I believe, the most essential new teachings of this revelation. To some extent they’ve been taught before, but almost completely lost to sight. Over the millennia, we keep obscuring the personal nature of religion. I conjecture that we do this out of fear. As a people, we keep meddling in the personal religion of others. At the same time, we keep foisting what should be our personal experience only out upon all humanity.
Jesus could only hint at the Thought Adjuster. In the Urantia Papers, we have five papers devoted to this being and concept alone, about fifty pages of material. We have papers about God’s relation to the individual, papers which outline the ministry of various angelic orders to individual progressing mortals, the scheme of ascendent progression from mortal to finaliter, teachings on the real nature of religion, as well as the lengthy recitation of the personal religion of one who was both fully human and fully divine-Jesus of Nazareth, who ultimately poured out his spirit upon all flesh. More than just a melody, the value of the individual and the personal nature of religion is the very measure, the drumbeat of the entire fifth epochal revelation beneath the themes and variations. And beyond all else, it is this truth which sets us free, that “faith liberty of those civilized mortals who are superbly conscious of sonship with the eternal God.” “Old things are passing away; behold all things are becoming new.”
We know from Jesus’ teachings and The Urantia Book that our connection with God is close and direct. God is in us and we are in him. “The kingdom of God is within you.” So one of the most important lessons in the book is that we need not yield to any guiding authority, whether it be a priest, an ordinary layman, a selfproclaimed prophet, or some sacred writings. We can yield to authority if we want. That’s our free will choice and, for some of us, it is a hard habit to break. But if we are thinking straight, we know we don’t need to, and that it is our choice if we do. It will always be nice to have teachers and teachings accessible to us and we can pick and choose what we like from among them. When we get to the mansion worlds and beyond, we will probably accept them pretty regularly. But we well know that we need no middlemen, no shamans or priests, no authority to interpret God to us. Our guiding authority is within. This guiding authority is the presence of God via the Thought Adjuster and is personal in a sense.
“The spirit of God that dwells in man is not personal — the Adjuster is prepersonal-but this monitor presents a value, exudes a flavor of divinity, which is personal in the highest and infinite sense.” (UB 103:1.6)
“Belief fixates, faith liberates.” “Beliefs may become group possessions, but faith must be personal. Theologic beliefs can be suggested to a group, but faith can rise up only in the heart of the individual religionist.” (UB 101:8.2)
Now while we are focusing on the personal aspect of religion, we can’t forget that there are important social aspects. We are constantly taught balance in all things. On UB 99:5.1, it says:
“While religion is exclusively a personal spiritual experience- knowing God as a Fatherthe corollary of this experience-knowing man as a brother-entails the adjustment of the self to other selves, and that involves the social or group aspect of religious life.” (UB 99:5.1)
Also:
“There is no danger in religion’s becoming more and more of a private matter-a personal experience-provided it does not lose its motivation for unselfish and loving social service.” (UB 99:4.7)
“While your religion is a matter of personal experience, it is most important that you should be exposed to the knowledge of a vast number of other religious experiences (the diverse interpretation of other and diverse mortals) to the end that you may prevent your religious life from becoming egocentric-circumscribed, selfish, and unsocial.” (UB 103:1.3)
Since each one of us is indwelt by a Paradise Thought Adjuster, this means that personal revelation, literally the wisdom of the universe, is available to us at any time that we are open and have the capacity to receive it. We may often garble the message, but we slowly learn to clean up and fine ture the communication process. And there are two corollary basics which result from the knowledge of being thus indwelt: (1) We don’t have any business judging or evaluating the personal religious experience of another individual and vice versa; and (2) That individual does not have any business in trying to pass his religious experience off on us in an attempt to make it our experience and vice versa.
The concept of the Adjuster involves the mutual respect of all individuals for each other and implies religious equality. It is this conocpt which may most change the world in the centuries to come. And it has been almost a million years in coming. We have it now and we mustn’t lose the focus. This is an essential element in the Gospel of Jesus.
If the message of the Urantia Papers succeeds, it will be to emblazon the truth that religion consists of the individual’s relationship with his or her spirit Father, that we are all unique in this relationship and all entitled to our uniqueness, and because we are all unique, there is an implication of equality in this total diversity. If all paths to God are unique, it is hard to draw comparisons.
We’ve had a lot of trouble down through the ages minding our own religious business. The world in some places is still stoning sinners and burning witches and a large part of the world is regularly determining who are the faithful and who are not. So it is important that we held effect this final freedom of man’s soul. This could well be our most important mission. And then, as they say on UB 194:3.6, “At last, true religion is delivered from the custody of priests and all sacred classes and finds its real manifestation in the individual souls of men.”
From UB 99:5.7: “Since true religion is a matter of personal spiritual experience, it is inevitable that each individual religionist must have his own and personal interpretation of the realization of that spiritual experience. Let the term ‘faith’ stand for the individual’s relation to God rather than for the creedal formulation of what some group of mortals have been able to agree upon as a common religious attitude. ‘Have you faith? Then have it to yourself.’”
The intimate personal nature of religion is an important fact and truth which must be spread to all the world. This beyond all else is the good news we bear: the personal relation of the individual will creature with his or her spirit Father and the consequent relations with all other created beings in the universe. This is the message which must go to the uttermost parts of the world. In the last twenty years, I have talked with hundreds upon hundreds of people regarding their religious journey and how they came to The Urantia Book. The single most unvarying factor which impressed them was how the book seemed to speak so directly to them, so personally and uniquely. This is the draw of this epochal revelation. People want the freedom to build their own personal religion. Rather than living in fear of the odd reception the book may sometimes have, we should celebrate the diversity of response. This diversity reaffirms that man is a “liberated volitional son of the Universal Father.” He is not an automaton in a “mathematical cosmos,” but a Son of God and forever a unique part of a vast configuration, a universe organism which stretches into infinity and grows into the eternal future. We need not fear for God loves each one of us personally. His spirit speaks to us saying: “I am here now. I am always with you. I will never desert you nor forsake you. You are loved now and forever. Heal your soul in this knowledge and this truth. Help others to know this truth and be free.”