Geoff wrote:I understood that the Isle of Paradise is totally invisible to us.
Hi Geoff,
I am still processing this idea in my head. Let me quote the UB here. I will try to read between the lines. Bold text supports the notion IC 1101 being the Isle of Paradise. My amateurish thoughts are in parentheses.
Robert
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The Urantia Book
Paper 11
The Eternal Isle of Paradise
(118.1) 11:0.1 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. (IC 1101 is the biggest galaxy we have ever seen. A galaxy can be described as an organized body.) Paradise is a
material sphere as well as a spiritual abode. (here you have the answer to your dilemma, it is both morontial and material, the material portion of it can be seen by material eyes of humans, what we do not see is the morontial part of it) All of the intelligent creation of the Universal Father is domiciled on
material abodes (galaxies, globular clusters, suns, planets); hence must the absolute controlling center
also be material, literal. (IC 1101 is material and is literal.) And again it should be reiterated that spirit things and spiritual beings are real.
(118.2) 11:0.2 The
material beauty of Paradise consists in the magnificence of its
physical perfection;
(IC 1101 is indeed magnificent, you can tell just by looking at the picture) the grandeur of the Isle of God is exhibited in the superb intellectual accomplishments and mind development of its inhabitants; the glory of the central Isle is shown forth in the infinite endowment of divine spirit personality — the
light of life. (There is no other object in the universe that would be generating more light than IC 1101. It houses stars that would fill 2,000 Milky Ways). But the depths of the spiritual beauty and the wonders of this magnificent ensemble are utterly beyond the comprehension of the finite mind of material creatures. The glory and spiritual splendor of the divine abode are impossible of mortal comprehension. And Paradise is from eternity; there are neither records nor traditions respecting the origin of this nuclear Isle of Light and Life.
1. The Divine Residence
(118.3) 11:1.1 Paradise serves many purposes in the administration of the universal realms, but to creature beings it exists primarily as the dwelling place of Deity. The personal presence of the Universal Father is resident at the very center of the upper surface of this
well-nigh circular, but not spherical, abode of the Deities. This Paradise presence of the Universal Father is immediately surrounded by the personal presence of the Eternal Son, while they are both invested by the unspeakable glory of the Infinite Spirit.
(118.4) 11:1.2 God dwells, has dwelt, and everlastingly will dwell in this same central and eternal abode. We have always found him there and always will. The Universal Father is cosmically focalized, spiritually personalized, and geographically resident at this center of the universe of universes.
(118.5) 11:1.3 We all know the direct course to pursue to find the Universal Father. You are not able to comprehend much about the divine residence because of its
remoteness from you (IC 1101 is 1.07 billion light years from us) and the immensity of the intervening space, but those who are able to comprehend the meaning of these enormous distances know God’s location and residence just as certainly and literally as you know the location of New York, London, Rome, or Singapore, cities definitely and geographically located on Urantia. If you were an intelligent navigator, equipped with ship, maps, and compass, you could readily find these cities. Likewise, if you had the time and means of passage, were spiritually qualified, and had the necessary guidance, you could be piloted through universe upon universe and from circuit to circuit, ever journeying inward through the starry realms, until at last you would stand before the central shining of the spiritual glory of the Universal Father.
Provided with all the necessities for the journey, it is just as possible to find the personal presence of God at the center of all things as to find distant cities on your own planet. That you have not visited these places in no way disproves their reality or actual existence. That so few of the universe creatures have found God on Paradise in no way disproves either the reality of his existence or the actuality of his spiritual person at the center of all things.
(119.1) 11:1.4 The Father is always to be found at this central location. Did he move, universal pandemonium would be precipitated, for there converge in him at this residential center the universal lines of gravity from the ends of creation. Whether we trace the personality circuit back through the universes or follow the ascending personalities as they journey inward to the Father; whether we trace the lines of material gravity to nether Paradise or follow the insurging cycles of cosmic force; whether we trace the lines of spiritual gravity to the Eternal Son or follow the inward processional of the Paradise Sons of God; whether we trace out the mind circuits or follow the trillions upon trillions of celestial beings who spring from the Infinite Spirit — by any of these observations or by all of them we are led directly back to the Father’s presence, to his central abode. Here is God personally, literally, and actually present. And from his infinite being there flow the flood-streams of life, energy, and personality to all universes.
2. Nature of the Eternal Isle
(119.2) 11:2.1 Since you are beginning to glimpse the enormousness of the
material universe discernible even from your astronomical location, your space position in the starry systems, it should become evident to you that such a tremendous
material universe must have an adequate and worthy capital, a headquarters commensurate with the dignity and infinitude of the universal Ruler of all this vast and far-flung creation of material realms and living beings.
(119.3) 11:2.2
In form Paradise differs from the inhabited space bodies: it is not spherical. It is definitely ellipsoid, being one-sixth longer in the north-south diameter than in the east-west diameter. The central Isle is essentially flat, and the distance from the upper surface to the nether surface is one tenth that of the east-west diameter. (IC 1101 is a perfect match for this, once you realize we are looking at it from an angle and we do not see the morontial portion of it, only the material bodies - stars.)
(119.4) 11:2.3 These differences in dimensions, taken in connection with its stationary status and the greater out-pressure of force-energy at the north end of the Isle, make it possible to establish absolute direction in the master universe.
(119.5) 11:2.4 The central Isle is geographically divided into three domains of activity:
(119.6) 11:2.5 1. Upper Paradise.
(119.7) 11:2.6 2. Peripheral Paradise.
(119.8 ) 11:2.7 3. Nether Paradise.
(119.9) 11:2.8 We speak of that surface of Paradise which is occupied with personality activities as the upper side, and the opposite surface as the nether side. The periphery of Paradise provides for activities that are not strictly personal or nonpersonal. The Trinity seems to dominate the personal or upper plane, the Unqualified Absolute the nether or impersonal plane. We hardly conceive of the Unqualified Absolute as a person, but we do think of the functional space presence of this Absolute as focalized on nether Paradise.
(120.1) 11:2.9 The eternal Isle is composed of a
single form of materialization — stationary systems of reality. (These could be the stars forming star clusters that comprise IC 1101, which stars are energy-fed and never run out of fuel because they form a part of an architectural sphere.) This
literal substance of Paradise is a homogeneous organization of space potency not to be found elsewhere in all the wide universe of universes. It has received many names in different universes, and the Melchizedeks of Nebadon long since named it absolutum. This Paradise source material is neither dead nor alive; it is the original nonspiritual expression of the First Source and Center; it is Paradise, and Paradise is without duplicate.
(120.2) 11:2.10 It appears to us that the First Source and Center has concentrated all absolute potential for cosmic reality in Paradise as a part of his technique of self-liberation from infinity limitations, as a means of making possible subinfinite, even time-space, creation. But it does not follow that Paradise is time-space limited just because the universe of universes discloses these qualities.
Paradise exists without time and has no location in space. (???)
(120.3) 11:2.11 Roughly: space seemingly originates just below nether Paradise; time just above upper Paradise. Time, as you understand it, is not a feature of Paradise existence, though the citizens of the central Isle are fully conscious of nontime sequence of events. Motion is not inherent on Paradise; it is volitional.
But the concept of distance, even absolute distance, has very much meaning as it may be applied to relative locations on Paradise. Paradise is nonspatial; hence its areas are absolute and therefore serviceable in many ways beyond the concept of mortal mind. (I am lost here. First they tell us that "the distance from the upper surface to the nether surface is one tenth that of the east-west diameter" and now we hear that Paradise is nonspatial. This is truly beyond the comprehension of my human mind. They could be basically trying to say that whatever is positioned within the absolute [0,0,0] space coordinates at the center of IC 1101, where the space is infinitely bent and from which location it unbends outwards, does not experience any time or space. Like being at the center of the black hole where space and time do not make sense. Or something like that.)
