Symmetry of Soul

Jesus of Nazareth—Transition and Adolescence (Part 9)

By the age of sixteen Jesus had acquired the full growth of his human intellect, not the full experience of human thinking but the fullness of capacity for such intellectual development. He possessed a keen and analytical mind, a kind and sympathetic disposition, a somewhat fluctuating but aggressive temperament, all of which were becoming organized into a strong, striking, and attractive personality.

Jesus of Nazareth—Transition and Adolescence (Part 8)

With the close of this fifteenth year Jesus completed the traversal of that dangerous and difficult period in human existence, that time of transition between the more complacent years of childhood and the consciousness of approaching manhood with its increased responsibilities and opportunities for the acquirement of advanced experience in the development of a noble character. 

Jesus of Nazareth—Transition and Adolescence (Part 7)

The adolescent Jesus’ profound periods of meditation, his frequent journeys to the hilltop for prayer, and the many strange ideas which he advanced from time to time, thoroughly alarmed his mother.  Sometimes she thought the lad was beside himself, and then she would steady her fears, remembering that he was, after all, a child of promise and in some manner different from other youths.

Jesus of Nazareth—Transition and Adolescence (Part 6)

It was during the calendar year of his fifteenth birthday that Jesus first formulated the prayer which he subsequently taught to his apostles, and which to many has become known as “The Lord’s Prayer.”  Also during that year, Jesus found a passage in the so-called Book of Enoch which influenced him in the later adoption of the term “Son of Man” as a designation for his bestowal mission on Urantia.
We begin the reading in Paper 126, Section 2, Paragraph 2.

Jesus of Nazareth—Transition and Adolescence (Part 5)

Of all Jesus’ earth-life experiences, the fourteenth and fifteenth years were the most crucial.  These two years, after he began to be self-conscious of divinity and destiny, and before he achieved a large measure of communication with his indwelling Adjuster, were the most trying of his eventful life on Urantia.  It is this period of two years which should be called the great test, the real temptation.
We begin the reading in Paper 126.

Jesus of Nazareth—Transition and Adolescence (Part 4)

Jesus, leaving Jerusalem with his parents, paused on the brow of Olivet; he raised his staff aloft and, quivering from head to foot under the surging of intense emotion, said: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, and the people thereof, what slaves you are—subservient to the Roman yoke and victims of your own traditions—but I will return to cleanse yonder temple and deliver my people from this bondage!”
We begin the reading in Paper 125, Section 6.

Jesus of Nazareth—Transition and Adolescence (Part 3)

In a very amazing way Jesus participated in the temple discussions but always in a manner consistent with his youth.  Sometimes his pointed questions were somewhat embarrassing to the learned teachers of the Jewish law, but he evinced such a spirit of candid fairness, coupled with an evident hunger for knowledge, that the majority of the temple teachers were disposed to treat him with every consideration.
We begin the reading in Paper 125, Section 4.

Jesus of Nazareth—Transition and Adolescence (Part 2)

Again and again, during the Passover week, his parents would find Jesus sitting off by himself with his youthful head in his hands, profoundly thinking.  They had never seen him behave like this, and not knowing how much he was confused in mind and troubled in spirit by the experience through which he was passing, they were sorely perplexed; they did not know what to do and longed to be back in Nazareth.
We begin the reading in Paper 125, Section 2

Jesus of Nazareth—Transition and Adolescence (Part 1)

Jesus remonstrated with his father: “The heavenly Father cannot love his children less than you love me.  And I well know, no matter what unwise thing I might do, you would never pour out wrath upon me nor vent anger against me.  If you, my earthly father, possess such human reflections of the Divine, how much more must the heavenly Father be filled with goodness and overflowing with mercy.”
We begin the reading in Paper 125.

Jesus of Nazareth—Childhood Career (Part 8)

At no time in his life did Jesus ever experience such a purely human thrill as that which at this time so completely enthralled him as he stood there on this April afternoon on the Mount of Olives, drinking in his first view of Jerusalem.  And in after years, on this same spot he stood and wept over the city which was about to reject another prophet, the last and the greatest of her heavenly teachers.
We begin the reading in Paper 124, Section 6.

Jesus of Nazareth—Childhood Career (Part 7)

Jesus never shirked the responsibility of making the necessary daily adjustments between the realms of loyalty to one’s personal convictions and duty toward one’s family, and he achieved the satisfaction of effecting an increasingly harmonious blending of personal convictions and family obligations into a masterful concept of group solidarity based upon loyalty, fairness, tolerance, and love. We begin the reading in Paper 124, Section 4.

Jesus of Nazareth—Childhood Career (Part 6)

During the tenth year of his life, Jesus began to show a marked preference for the company of older persons.  He delighted in talking over things cultural, educational, social, economic, political, and religious with older minds, and his depth of reasoning and keenness of observation so charmed his adult associates that they were always more than willing to visit with him.
We begin the reading in Paper 124, Section 2, Paragraph 4.

Jesus of Nazareth—Childhood Career (Part 5)

As regards graven images, Joseph felt impelled to rule that the rabbinical interpretation of the second commandment should prevail.  And so Jesus no more drew or modeled the likeness of anything from that day as long as he lived in his father’s house.  But he was unconvinced of the wrong of what he had done, and to give up such a favorite pastime constituted one of the great trials of his young life.
We begin the reading in Paper 124.

Jesus of Nazareth—Childhood Career (Part 4)

During Jesus’ eighth year of life, while he continued to make enviable progress at school, all did not run smoothly for either parents or teachers.  He persisted in asking many embarrassing questions concerning both science and religion, particularly regarding geography and astronomy.  He was especially insistent on finding out why there was a dry season and a rainy season in Palestine.
We begin the reading in Paper 123, Section 5, Paragraph 9.

Jesus of Nazareth—Childhood Career (Part 3)

Material accidents, commonplace occurrences of a physical nature, are not arbitrarily interfered with by celestial personalities.  Under ordinary circumstances only midway creatures can intervene in material conditions to safeguard the persons of men and women of destiny, and even in special situations these beings can so act only in obedience to the specific mandates of their superiors.
We begin the reading in Paper 123, Section 4.

Jesus of Nazareth—Childhood Career (Part 2)

The first great shock of Jesus’ young life occurred when he was not quite six years old.  It had seemed to the lad that his father—at least his father and mother together—knew everything.  Imagine, therefore, the surprise and disillusionment of this inquiring child, when he asked his father the cause of a mild earthquake which had just occurred, to hear Joseph say, “My son, I really do not know.”
We begin the reading in Paper 123, Section 2, Paragraph 3.

Jesus of Nazareth—Childhood Career (Part 1)

Joseph and Mary finally took leave of Alexandria in August, 4 B.C.; and Jesus was about three years and two months old at the time of their return to Nazareth.  He had stood all these travels very well and was in excellent health and full of childish glee and excitement at having premises of his own to run about in and to enjoy.  But he greatly missed the association of his Alexandrian playmates.
We begin the reading in Paper 123.

Our Local System of Inhabited Worlds—Evolutionary Planets (Part 5)

With the arrival of the first Adjuster on an inhabited world the guardian seraphim also make their appearance; they are indispensable to terrestrial escape.  Throughout the life-lapse period of the sleeping survivors of a nonindividual order of survival, the spiritual values and eternal realities of their newly evolved and immortal souls are held as a sacred trust by the group guardian angels.
We begin the reading in Paper 49, Section 6.

Our Local System of Inhabited Worlds—Evolutionary Planets (Part 4)

The one physical uniformity of mortals is the brain and nervous system; nevertheless, there are three basic organizations of the brain mechanism: the one-, the two-, and the three-brained types.  Urantians are of the two-brained type, somewhat more imaginative, adventurous, and philosophical than the one-brained mortals but somewhat less spiritual, ethical, and worshipful than the three-brained orders.
We begin the reading in Paper 49, Section 5, Item 13.

Our Local System of Inhabited Worlds—Evolutionary Planets (Part 3)

Mortal mind without immortal spirit cannot survive.  The mind of man is mortal; only the bestowed spirit is immortal.  Survival is dependent on spiritualization by the ministry of the Adjuster—on the birth and evolution of the immortal soul; at least, there must not have developed an antagonism towards the Adjuster’s mission of effecting the spiritual transformation of the material mind.
We begin the reading in Paper 49, Section 4.

Our Local System of Inhabited Worlds—Evolutionary Planets (Part 2)

The majority of inhabited planets are peopled with the breathing type of intelligent beings.  But there are also radically modified orders of mortals who are able to live on worlds with little or no air.  Of the Orvonton inhabited worlds this type amounts to less than seven per cent.  In Nebadon this percentage is less than three.  In all Satania there are only nine such worlds of the nonbreathers.
We begin the reading in Paper 49, Section 2, Item 15.

Our Local System of Inhabited Worlds—Evolutionary Planets (Part 1)

All mortal-inhabited worlds are evolutionary in origin and nature.  These spheres are the spawning ground, the evolutionary cradle, of the mortal races of time and space.  Each unit of the ascendant life is a veritable training school for the stage of existence just ahead; and this is true of every stage of man’s progressive Paradise ascent, including the initial mortal experience in the flesh.
We begin the reading in Paper 49.

Our Local System of Inhabited Worlds—Headquarters (Part 4)

Sagia are the only creatures in all the universe of Nebadon who experience any sort of reincarnation.  They are only reactive to the first five of the adjutant mind-spirits; they are not responsive to the spirits of worship and wisdom.  But the five-adjutant mind equivalates to a totality or sixth reality level, and it is this factor which persists as an experiential identity.
We begin the reading in Paper 46, Section 5, Item 27.

Our Local System of Inhabited Worlds—Headquarters (Part 3)

Each of the Jerusem nonnative residential reservations consists of seven concentric and successively elevated circles.  They are all constructed along the same lines but are of different sizes and are fashioned of differing materials.  They are all surrounded by far-reaching enclosures, which mount up to form extensive promenades entirely encompassing every group of seven concentric circles.
We begin the reading in Paper 46, Section 5.

Our Local System of Inhabited Worlds—Headquarters (Part 2)

Jerusem is indeed a foretaste of paradisiacal glory and grandeur.  However, this first world of detention in the Paradise journey is far more material than spiritual.  Relative to higher architectural worlds, the system capitals are unique in that they are the only worlds which exhibit well-nigh perfectly all three phases of universe existence: the material, the morontial, and the spiritual.
We begin the reading in Paper 46, Section 2, Paragraph 5.

Our Local System of Inhabited Worlds—Headquarters (Part 1)

Jerusem, the headquarters of Satania, is an average capital of a local system.  Two hundred thousand years after the rebellion, Satania is being administered most efficiently; and as the ages pass, the results of disharmony are being slowly but surely eradicated.  Order and good will are being restored, and the conditions on Jerusem are more and more approaching the heavenly status of our traditions.
We begin the reading in Paper 46.

Our Local System of Inhabited Worlds—Administration (Part 5)

This probation nursery of Satania is maintained by certain morontia personalities on the finaliters’ world, one half of the planet being devoted to this work of child rearing.  Here are received and reassembled certain children of surviving mortals, such as those offspring who perished on the evolutionary worlds before the acquirement of individual status on the universe records.
We begin the reading in Paper 45, Section 6, Paragraph 7.

Our Local System of Inhabited Worlds—Administration (Part 4)

The Material Sons and Daughters, together with their children, present an engaging spectacle which never fails to arouse the curiosity and intrigue the attention of all ascending mortals.  After finally attaining Jerusem citizenship, mortal survivors spend much of their leisure on the system capital observing and studying the life habits and conduct of these superior semiphysical sex creatures.
We begin the reading in Paper 45, Section 5.

Our Local System of Inhabited Worlds—Administration (Part 3)

The four and twenty counselors are Christ Michael’s personal agents on Jerusem, and they have authority to represent the Master Son in all matters concerning the roll calls of Satania and in many other phases of the scheme of mortal ascension on the isolated worlds of the system.  They are the designated agents for executing the special requests of Gabriel and the unusual mandates of Michael.
We begin the reading in Paper 45, Section 4.

Our Local System of Inhabited Worlds—Administration (Part 2)

The chief executive of a local system of inhabited worlds is a primary Lanonandek Son, the System Sovereign.  In our local universe these sovereigns are intrusted with large executive responsibilities, unusually wide powers of personal discretion in the direction of system affairs.  But in all the history of Nebadon these untrammeled executives have exhibited disloyalty only three times.
We begin the reading in Paper 45, Section 2