Episode:Religion in Depth—Reality of Experience (Part 1)

From Symmetry of Soul


The religious tendencies of the human races are innate; they are universally manifested and have an apparently natural origin. The unity of religious experience among a social or racial group derives from the identical nature of the God fragment indwelling the individual.

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Keywords: Urantia, Religion, Values, Theology, God-Consciousness

Summary by Kermit

Commentary on Review

We considered two terms from the previous week’s reading in greater extent. The final paragraph of [102:8.7] states that the personal experience of Jesus, seeking God and finding him to the full satisfaction of the perfect soul of infinite supremacy represents the highest religion yet revealed on our world. What is meant by “the perfect soul of infinite supremacy?” As was explained, this refers to God in parallel form to the mortal experience as a “perfecting soul of Supremacy.” Listen to the archive to capture the intricacies of this explanation.

The second term we explored is the word “prophet.” While the revelators’ use of the word can be interpreted as validation of the direct engagement of an individual by celestials as described in Old Testament writings, it is more likely that in the context of usage in [102:8.6] where we read, “The prophets have usually led the people in religious development; the theologians have usually held them back”, that “prophet” distinguishes the religionist who has a full conscious faith-certainty, from one whose religion consists in the superconscious encircuitment in the Holy Spirit, and is not functional on the conscious level. As has been noted previously, the revelators use words truthfully and do not necessarily stress the factual or literal meanings. Words are suggestions of the truth they want us to recognize.

Finally, we emphasized the point that there is no room for magic in true religion. Neither the “magic man” (God of the gaps criticized by the materialists), nor the “magic matter” denounced by creationists has a logical place in man’s quest for truth.

103. The Reality of Religious Experience

We here begin our final series in our SoS arc on Religion in Depth. Paragraph one of the preface spans the spectrum of man’s religious experience from its origin in the sixth adjutant mind spirit of worship to the faith-glimpse of the certainties and divinities of limitless Deity enabled by the Thought Adjuster.

The religious impulse of the sixth adjutant begins as the energy of zeal. The philosophic impulse of the seventh adjutant has the function of tempering and imposing governance on this zeal, and energetically works to establish symmetry among the other six adjutants. Note that these adjutants are not wielded consciously, but function according to their nature without conscious control by you. Therefore you can see why mind activity includes so much that is beyond consciousness. The adjutants are encircuited IN you. And YOU are thence encircuited in the Holy Spirit and her three cosmic intuitions, the first supermind endowment of the mortal, enabling engagement of personality with objective reality. Upon this foundational nature come the additional spirit ministries of the Creator Son’s Spirit of Truth to enlarge man’s capacity for perceiving religious truths, and the Thought Adjusters to catalyze the development of higher religious insight.

Today, most of man’s conscious religious possession and history consists of his response to the religious impulse (sixth adjutant), with some unconscious oversight of the seventh adjutant and insight facilitated by the Holy Spirit (HS) encircuitment. This is admittedly a limited awareness. The 5th ER is encouraging us to view our religious history in a new context. Remember, the SoT and TA aren’t required to get the ball rolling. Their influence and benefits accrue as evolution advances. With the foundational adjutants and HS encircuitment we can consciously cultivate our engagement with the cosmos, a conscious reality of religious experience, moving up from a religion of the mind to a religion of the spirit, anchored in eternity.

We entertained an interesting play on the terms natural and artificial respecting the religious input from Mother and Father Deity. We summarized, that which we call natural is Mother Deity’s artificial activity. That which we call unnatural is Father Deity’s artificial activity. Technically the universe, being mind made and personality managed is entirely artificial.

As an introduction to section one of this paper, Philosophy of Religion, we are given a list of four kinds of religion. Philosophy of religion here can be interpreted to mean theology. Listen to the archive for specifics concerning these four kinds of religion: Natural/Evolutionary, Supernatural/revelatory, Current religion an admixture of the first two, and man-made philosophic religions.

103:1. Philosophy of Religion

Philosophy of religion herein presented is indicative of a personal phenomenon a theology, not a collective one, a doctrine. The unity quality related to religious experience among a social or racial group is derived from the identical nature of the TA. Regarding the spirit ministries of the HS, SoT, and TA; they can be thought of as the spirits of fact, truth, and goodness respectively. This spirit of goodness, in connection with the personality produces a unique expression that is not uniform across group members. In part because of this, exposure to the knowledge of a vast number of other religious experiences is necessary to prevent one’s religious life from becoming egocentric.

Falseness of belief does not invalidate religion (founded on the recognition of values and validated by the faith-certainty of religious experience). Religion is based on both personal spiritual experience, and the reflective interpretation of that experience. Such an interpretation of this experience may be right or wrong, or a mixture of truth and error all of which carry implications for the development and continuity of civilization.

Notes by Brad

  • There's no such thing as magic. Don't fill in the gaps with magic.
  • First paragraph of [Paper 103] is another one of those that spans a lot: from early adjutant function up to limitless Deity.
  • The 7th adjutant is the spirit of wisdom, or the (mere) energy of symmetry.
  • In general, "philosophy of religion" refers to theology. There are a few places in the 5th ER where it's used in a different sense, but here in Paper 103 it just means theology.
  • Theology is an individual issue, not a collective phenomenon, at least not in the genuine sense of the word.
  • The "identical nature" of the Thought Adjusters is in the sense that they all are the "Spirit of Goodness." To be sure, they all begin to differ in experiential endowment as they hang out here in time and space.
  • An impulse is higher than an urge. The 6th adjutant as an urge is the energy of zeal. The 6th adjutant as an impulse is the spirit of worship.
    • See [160:1] for some great writing about the energy of zeal.
  • The adjutant mind spirits were named after a passage in Isaiah.
  • Their "spirit of" sense is a high sense. It is a goal.