Episode:Thought Adjusters—Relation to the Soul (Part 3)
During life the mortal will, the personality power of decision-choice, is resident in the material mind circuits. As terrestrial mortal growth proceeds, this self, with its priceless powers of choice, becomes increasingly identified with the soul. The entire mortal career, the soul’s evolution, is not so much a probation as an education.
Keywords: Urantia, Divine Spirit, Evolving Soul, Survival, Meaning
Summary by Kermit
Commentary on Previous Week
A point was made that oftentimes one is initially attracted to the revelation through the religious consciousness and the associated attraction to the fact of having a fragment of Deity, a Thought Adjuster (TA) resident in the mind. However, in addition to the domain of religion fostered by the indwelling spirit, is the domain of science, enabled through the endowment of mind. Thus, does the faith of religion in relation to the reason of science give rise to a superadditive consequence, the logic of philosophy. The full engagement of the 5th ER entails the threefold identification with these three faculties. The concept of superadditivity is illustrated in the revelation in the chemical combination of the two gasses hydrogen and oxygen to produce water. No simple additive assemblage of the characteristics of these two substances could lead one to predict the properties of the end product. Our default worldview is generally one of “additivity.” Cultivating a sensitivity to the existence of superadditive consequences of relationships leads to enhanced cosmic consciousness.
111:3. The Evolving Soul
We observed that much of the information given in this section has been given previously. The authors frequently present the same concepts in different ways to encourage different so-called entry points for reflection. This led to a discussion about whether a student engages the revelation for the purpose of mastering facts or grasping truth, by using a process of analysis or developing a faculty of synthesis. The truth of the revelation cannot be grasped by analysis. Encountering the same concept scattered throughout the book provides an opportunity for synthesizing the various facets of the same idea into a whole to obtain an awareness of the superadditive product of the concepts in question, a holistic approach to truth above the mere summation of facts. Such synthetic reflective thinking marks the growth of a child of God into an adult of God. This led to a philosophical discussion of the falseness of the Hegelian dialectic, whereupon you arrive at a synthesis of false opposites. The erroneous dualism of so-called “good” and “bad” is an example. In actuality, good and bad are not opposites. They represent the relative presence or absence of one thing, not two—that thing being goodness. This issue then becomes one of “appearance” versus “reality.” Badness therefore is only a form in the mind, having no basis in reality of cosmic values. Many a muddled doctrine has been spawned by the inability to discern appearance from reality.
Still discussing the first paragraph of the section, it was pointed out that actual fusion with the Adjuster is tied to the consecration of your will to the Father’s will. This represents the genuine and unreserved identification of the personality with eternity. It is made abundantly clear that mistakes of the human mind (evil), and the errors of human conduct can only delay soul evolution. Even though it’s very clear that mortals, using their creature will can reject survival, but only by exercising the absolute dimension of personality, not mere self-assertion.
The second paragraph of this section directly speaks to the three selves that make up a material mortal. The soul is a separate entity, not yet a being because personality is not identified with it. It is minded and makes decisions, but not final decisions until the material self has been left behind. The material self is the seat of the material mind circuits and therefore the seat of the personality power of decision-choice. As terrestrial mortal growth proceeds, this self becomes increasingly identified with the soul-entity. Following resurrection the human personality is completely identified with the morontia self (soul). And it is through collaboration with the spirit self, the TA that the material mind is linked to the soul.
The TA and the human mind each have some awareness of the soul, with the TA being like a conduit between the mind and the soul. The human mind’s awareness of the TA is manifested as genuine religious experience or the experience of true religion. The human mind’s awareness of the soul is evinced as a philosophic experience, a new sense of triune harmony. The TA in conjunction with the often unconscious, consecration of our will (grace) provides the initiating spark, bringing the soul into existence. Thenceforth, it is our consecration of mind to the universal harmony of the Mother that give rise to the forms that are actually copied into the morontia substance that is the soul.
We discussed the phenomenon of growth and how it is unconscious, but that periodically the reflective recognition of new and greater awareness suggests that growth has occurred. As mentioned, the TA is the intermediary providing the indirect link between mind and soul.
We are told that the mortal life, the soul’s evolution is more like an education than it is a probation. We do well to remember that on worlds without universal bestowal of TAs, the mortal life is in fact a probation, a test. If such an individual fails to meet one of the requirements for receiving a TA, they do not experience personality survival; “as for the personality of the nonsurvivor, it is absorbed into the oversoul of creation, becoming a part of the Deity of the Supreme.”
The last two paragraphs of this section begin a transition into the realm of meanings and values. Meanings are the superadditive consequence of the relationship of things and values. It is the faith grasp of supreme values and their survival that constitutes the core of true religion. And religious experience becomes the experience of unity in the context of the triunity of universal reality—things, meanings, and values.
The soul directly feels sensation forms relative to spirit substance in the external world. Values are qualities of spirit substance. That which feels is the soul. The TA literally makes real the soul, an objective fact in the external world.
The soul has a direct sensory input relationship to spirit substance, thus has a more direct connection than our mindal self to values. The soul therefore has a more definitive potential for a relationship between things and values and the superadditive consequence of that relationship, meanings. Survival values, are values that have been faith grasped by personality and are individuated relative to you, thus copied into your soul, giving your mortal existence meaning. Our duty is to the cosmos and the Supreme, even if we have not personalized these preexistent values. We then find ourselves in the predicament of living much of our lives giving meaning to the Supreme without personal meaning for ourselves.
