First Book of God
Chapter XVII
1. THE next morning, at sunrise, Jehovih came again, speaking through Brahma, saying:
2. As I prepared a way for My voice, be ye wise in laboring to show this light unto all peoples. Neither take ye sorrow to your souls for the latest born, even Hog; for he is also in My keeping, and his wisdom shall be the glory of the earth.
3. For is not all fact interpreted by each and every man from the light of his own standing place? Wherein error cometh into the world by the darkness of men, in not perceiving rightly the things I have created. Behold, one man seeth the forest with reference to its value in logs; another for splints for mats; another for shade to lie in; another for its solitude; and they all alike see by what dwelleth in them, but they see through their own several windows.
4. Consider, then, the injustice of man that saith: Ye shall see as I see; hear as I hear; or who saith: This I have proven for a truth, and that for an untruth; or who saith: Behold, we are many witnesses, and we attest.
5. Whilst Jehovih was thus speaking, His angel appeared and stood in the doorway of the hut, and all save Hog looked and saw the angel, and witnessed the color of the angel's hair and eyes, and the clothes he wore. And they pointed, saying in a whisper: Behold, an angel of heaven.
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6. Then spake Jehovih, illustrating, saying: Whilst yet no one hath spoken, let one at a time privily describe to Hog the appearance of My angel in the doorway.
7. Accordingly, they all, save Brahma, told Hog all that pertained to the angel, and they accorded one with another. And Jehovih said: Speak thou, My Son, Hog. Hog said:
8. To whom shall I speak? For, be Thou my very father, or, of a truth, the Creator, I know not. God said: Who sayest thou the Creator is? Hog said: Even as the wind; the great void; without person, or shape, or sense.
9. God said unto him: For which reason I say unto thee, because of the unbelief of thy father and thy mother, whilst thou wert in thy mother's womb, thou art as thou art. This have they attested unto thee thousands of times since thou wert weaned. And they have also attested to thee as often, that during the bringing forth of thy brothers, they were in the fullness of faith in Jehovih (Ormazd).
10. Thou wert born of the earth, and can only see with earthly eyes, and hear with earthly ears, and can reason only with earthly reason. Hog said: Then of a truth I shall go down to earth and there shall be no more of me; but these, my sweet brothers, and this Goddess and this God, my very father and mother, shall inherit everlasting life?
11. God said: I would place two eggs before thee, with the birds within them nearly hatched; now with one thou shalt open the shell a little, and the young bird seeth out, but the other thou leavest closed. Sayest thou one bird will have much advantage over the other when they are hatched? Or that one shall not live, because, forsooth, it saw not through the shell? Such, then, is thy way to everlasting life. Of thy darkness will I make light that will reach unto millions. Thy sacrifice is the sacrifice of a very God amongst Gods.
12. Hog said: Because of Thy great wisdom, I fear to speak in thy presence. But thy words come out of his mouth who is the sweetest and holiest of created beings. Therefore I take courage in mine argument.
13. Now, behold, they have all described the angel in the door; alike and like have they described it in all particulars. And the wisdom of thy
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words goeth to the bottom of things, not like the words of man, but faultlessly. Thou hast made me to behold I am bound as with iron hoops, and must go my way all my days. Against this I complain not; for I perceive it is not within my judgment to know even myself, as to what is good for me or not good for me. This, however, thou hast shown me. I was molded as I am; I am as I am. If I have faults, they are not my faults. Neither are they of my father or my mother; for the cause of their unbelief at that time lay not with themselves, but with thee.
14. God said: Thy words shall Vede also write down; the glory and the wisdom of the earth shall come out of thy mouth. The manner of my edifice shall be shown unto the inhabitants of the earth. Thou hast seen the king's temple and how he buildeth it. For the fine posts he sendeth his best hewers into the forest, and they choose the straightest and strongest trees, and fall them and hew them, and polish and engrave them, and the posts are set up in the front as strength and ornament. But as to the walls of the temple, the king calleth not the best hewers, but the choppers, and they also go into the forest to fetch logs, not the straightest and handsomest, but whatsoever their axes come upon. And their timbers are put in the walls with mortar and withes. And the temple is completed to the king's will.
15. Jehovih said: Of such like is My heavenly edifice; I send not winter to please one man, nor summer; nor the rain. I consider in what way I shall induce men to raise up one another and to be considerate. Through Me, thy father and thy mother and thy brethren, and all Faithists that come after these, My doctrines, learn to consider the unbelief of mortals, and the impossibility of one man seeing through another man's eyes.
16. For as I have raised you up a house in love, one to another, so will I show the wisdom of disbelief, and its necessity on the earth.
17. The foremost of all lessons is that all men shall have liberty; and no man's judgment be binding on another's; for all do not see alike, nor can they understand alike.
18. That ye shall be alike considerate to them that see not My light, or My Person, even as to them who are born
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in su'is; for they are of the same flesh and blood, and their spirits have they even from the same Creator.
19. For in the evidence of the past and of the present it is before you, that men endeavor to enforce their doctrines by saying: BEHOLD THE WORD OF ORMAZD! THUS HATH HE SPOKEN! AND I AM HIS PRIEST! BOW DOWN YOUR HEADS!
20. Whereas, man shall not bow down, but hold up his head and rejoice. They that seek to enforce Me are My enemies.
21. Nor have I said of this man or that: Hear ye him, for he is Truth. Shall the Creator make one greater than Himself, and thus cut Himself off? And yet the kings and the priests of this day assume this in Ihua's name. And the mothers and fathers of many have become discouraged because of their great hardships; and they bring forth heirs that have eyes but see not, ears but hear not.
22. God said: In the days of Zarathustra, I came to deliver them that had faith but were in bondage; to-day I am come to prove three worlds unto men, and to teach them how they shall bring forth heirs with eyes to see, and with ears to hear spiritual things, with liberty unto all men.
23. First, of the earth and its fullness; second, the intermediate world of spirits, where all shall sojourn for a season; and, third, the Nirvanian worlds beyond Chinvat, where lieth unending paradise for the pure and wise.
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Urantia Book, 44:0.11 - The Celestial Artisans
Never in your long ascendancy will you lose the power to recognize your associates of former existences. Always, as you ascend inward in the scale of life, will you retain the ability to recognize and fraternize with the fellow beings of your previous and lower levels of experience. Each new translation or resurrection will add one more group of spirit beings to your vision range without in the least depriving you of the ability to recognize your friends and fellows of former estates.
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Princess Bride 1987 Wallace Shawn (Vizzini) and Mandy Patinkin (Inigo Montoya)
Vizzini: HE DIDN'T FALL? INCONCEIVABLE.
Inigo Montoya: You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. -
Urantia Book, 117:4.14 - The Finite God
And here is mystery: The more closely man approaches God through love, the greater the reality -- actuality -- of that man. The more man withdraws from God, the more nearly he approaches nonreality -- cessation of existence. When man consecrates his will to the doing of the Father's will, when man gives God all that he has, then does God make that man more than he is.
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Urantia Book, 167:7.4 - The Talk About Angels
"And do you not remember that I said to you once before that, if you had your spiritual eyes anointed, you would then see the heavens opened and behold the angels of God ascending and descending? It is by the ministry of the angels that one world may be kept in touch with other worlds, for have I not repeatedly told you that I have other sheep not of this fold?"
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Urantia Book, Foreword - 0:12.12 - The Trinities
But we know that there dwells within the human mind a fragment of God, and that there sojourns with the human soul the Spirit of Truth; and we further know that these spirit forces conspire to enable material man to grasp the reality of spiritual values and to comprehend the philosophy of universe meanings. But even more certainly we know that these spirits of the Divine Presence are able to assist man in the spiritual appropriation of all truth contributory to the enhancement of the ever-progressing reality of personal religious experience—God-consciousness.
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Urantia Book, 1:4.3 - The Mystery Of God
When you are through down here, when your course has been run in temporary form on earth, when your trial trip in the flesh is finished, when the dust that composes the mortal tabernacle "returns to the earth whence it came"; then, it is revealed, the indwelling "Spirit shall return to God who gave it." There sojourns within each moral being of this planet a fragment of God, a part and parcel of divinity. It is not yet yours by right of possession, but it is designedly intended to be one with you if you survive the mortal existence.
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Urantia Book, 1:4.1 - The Mystery Of God
And the greatest of all the unfathomable mysteries of God is the phenomenon of the divine indwelling of mortal minds. The manner in which the Universal Father sojourns with the creatures of time is the most profound of all universe mysteries; the divine presence in the mind of man is the mystery of mysteries.
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Urantia Book, 1:4.6 - The Mystery Of God
To every spirit being and to every mortal creature in every sphere and on every world of the universe of universes, the Universal Father reveals all of his gracious and divine self that can be discerned or comprehended by such spirit beings and by such mortal creatures. God is no respecter of persons, either spiritual or material. The divine presence which any child of the universe enjoys at any given moment is limited only by the capacity of such a creature to receive and to discern the spirit actualities of the supermaterial world.
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Urantia Book, 11:0.1 - The Eternal Isle Of Paradise
Paradise is the eternal center of the universe of universes and the abiding place of the Universal Father, the Eternal Son, the Infinite Spirit, and their divine co-ordinates and associates. This central Isle is the most gigantic organized body of cosmic reality in all the master universe. Paradise is a material sphere as well as a spiritual abode. All of the intelligent creation of the Universal Father is domiciled on material abodes; hence must the absolute controlling center also be material, literal. And again it should be reiterated that spirit things and spiritual beings are real.
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Urantia Book, 50:6.4 - Planetary Culture
Culture presupposes quality of mind; culture cannot be enhanced unless mind is elevated. Superior intellect will seek a noble culture and find some way to attain such a goal. Inferior minds will spurn the highest culture even when presented to them ready-made.
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Urantia Book, 54:1.6 - True And False Liberty
True liberty is the associate of genuine self-respect; false liberty is the consort of self-admiration. True liberty is the fruit of self-control; false liberty, the assumption of self-assertion. 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.
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Urantia Book, 54:1.9 - True And False Liberty
How dare the self-willed creature encroach upon the rights of his fellows in the name of personal liberty when the Supreme Rulers of the universe stand back in merciful respect for these prerogatives of will and potentials of personality! No being, in the exercise of his supposed personal liberty, has a right to deprive any other being of those privileges of existence conferred by the Creators and duly respected by all their loyal associates, subordinates, and subjects.
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Urantia Book, 54:1.8 - True And False Liberty
There is no error greater than that species of self-deception which leads intelligent beings to crave the exercise of power over other beings for the purpose of depriving these persons of their natural liberties. The golden rule of human fairness cries out against all such fraud, unfairness, selfishness, and unrighteousness.