Discerners of Spirits

28:5.10You can just faintly com­pre­hend what all this means to those who are re­spon­si­ble for the con­duct of the super­uni­verse gov­ern­ments. The im­men­sity and the com­pre­hen­sive­ness of these trans­ac­tions are quite be­yond fi­nite con­cep­tion. When you stand, as I re­peat­edly have, in the spe­cial re­ceiv­ing cham­bers of the tem­ple of wis­dom on Uversa and see all this in ac­tual op­er­a­tion, you will be moved to ado­ra­tion by the per­fec­tion of the com­plex­ity, and by the surety of the work­ing, of the in­ter­plan­e­tary com­mu­ni­ca­tions of the uni­verses. You will pay homage to the di­vine wis­dom and good­ness of the Gods, who plan and ex­e­cute with such su­perb tech­nique. And these things ac­tu­ally hap­pen just as I have por­trayed them.

28:5.112. The Soul of Phi­los­o­phy. These won­der­ful teach­ers are also at­tached to the Per­fec­tors of Wis­dom and, when not oth­er­wise di­rec­tion­ized, re­main in fo­cal syn­chrony with the mas­ters of phi­los­o­phy on Par­a­dise. Think of step­ping up to a huge liv­ing mir­ror, as it were, but in­stead of be­hold­ing the like­ness of your fi­nite and ma­te­rial self, of per­ceiv­ing a re­flec­tion of the wis­dom of di­vin­ity and the phi­los­o­phy of Par­a­dise. And if it be­comes de­sir­able to “in­car­nate” this phi­los­o­phy of per­fec­tion, so to di­lute it as to make it prac­ti­cal of ap­pli­ca­tion to, and as­sim­i­la­tion by, the lowly peo­ples of the lower worlds, these liv­ing mir­rors have only to turn their faces down­ward to re­flect the stan­dards and needs of an­other world or uni­verse.

28:5.12By these very tech­niques do the Per­fec­tors of Wis­dom adapt de­ci­sions and rec­om­men­da­tions to the real needs and ac­tual sta­tus of the peo­ples and worlds un­der con­sid­er­a­tion, and al­ways do they act in con­cert with the Di­vine Coun­selors and the Uni­ver­sal Cen­sors. But the sub­lime re­plete­ness of these trans­ac­tions is be­yond even my abil­ity to com­pre­hend.

28:5.133. The Union of Souls. Com­plet­ing the tri­une staff of at­tach­ment to the Per­fec­tors of Wis­dom, are these re­flec­tors of the ide­als and sta­tus of eth­i­cal re­la­tion­ships. Of all the prob­lems in the uni­verse re­quir­ing an ex­er­cise of the con­sum­mate wis­dom of ex­pe­ri­ence and adapt­abil­ity, none are more im­por­tant than those aris­ing out of the re­la­tion­ships and as­so­ci­a­tions of in­tel­li­gent be­ings. Whether in hu­man as­so­ci­a­tions of com­merce and trade, friend­ship and mar­riage, or in the li­aisons of the an­gelic hosts, there con­tinue to arise petty fric­tions, mi­nor mis­un­der­stand­ings too triv­ial even to en­gage the at­ten­tion of con­cil­ia­tors but suf­fi­ciently ir­ri­tat­ing and dis­turb­ing to mar the smooth work­ing of the uni­verse if they were al­lowed to mul­ti­ply and con­tinue. There­fore do the Per­fec­tors of Wis­dom make avail­able the wise ex­pe­ri­ence of their or­der as the “oil of rec­on­cil­i­a­tion” for an en­tire super­uni­verse. In all this work these wise men of the super­uni­verses are ably sec­onded by their re­flec­tive as­so­ciates, the Unions of Souls, who make avail­able cur­rent in­for­ma­tion re­gard­ing the sta­tus of the uni­verse and con­cur­rently por­tray the Par­a­dise ideal of the best ad­just­ment of these per­plex­ing prob­lems. When not specif­i­cally di­rec­tion­ized else­where, these se­con­a­phim re­main in re­flec­tive li­ai­son with the in­ter­preters of ethics on Par­a­dise.

28:5.14These are the an­gels who fos­ter and pro­mote the team­work of all Or­von­ton. One of the most im­por­tant lessons to be learned dur­ing your mor­tal ca­reer is team­work. The spheres of per­fec­tion are manned by those who have mas­tered this art of work­ing with other be­ings. Few are the du­ties in the uni­verse for the lone ser­vant. The higher you as­cend, the more lonely you be­come when tem­porar­ily with­out the as­so­ci­a­tion of your fel­lows.

28:5.154. The Heart of Coun­sel. This is the first group of these re­flec­tive ge­niuses to be placed un­der the super­vi­sion of the Di­vine Coun­selors. Se­con­a­phim of this type are in pos­ses­sion of the facts of space, be­ing se­lec­tive for such data in the cir­cuits of time. Es­pe­cially are they re­flec­tive of the super­aphic in­tel­li­gence co-or­di­na­tors, but they are also se­lec­tively re­flec­tive of the coun­sel of all be­ings, whether of high or low es­tate. When­ever the Di­vine Coun­selors are called upon for im­por­tant ad­vice or de­ci­sions, they im­me­di­ately req­ui­si­tion an en­sem­ble of the Hearts of Coun­sel, and pres­ently there is handed down a rul­ing which ac­tu­ally in­cor­po­rates the co-or­di­nated wis­dom and ad­vice of the most com­pe­tent minds of the en­tire super­uni­verse, all of which has been cen­sored and re­vised in the light of the coun­sel of the high minds of Ha­vona and even of Par­a­dise.

28:5.165. The Joy of Ex­is­tence. By na­ture these be­ings are re­flec­tively at­tuned to the super­aphic har­mony super­vi­sors above and to cer­tain of the ser­a­phim be­low, but it is dif­fi­cult to ex­plain just what the mem­bers of this in­ter­est­ing group re­ally do. Their prin­ci­pal ac­tiv­i­ties are di­rected to­ward pro­mot­ing re­ac­tions of joy among the var­i­ous or­ders of the an­gelic hosts and the lower will crea­tures. The Di­vine Coun­selors, to whom they are at­tached, sel­dom use them for spe­cific joy find­ing. In a more gen­eral man­ner and in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the re­ver­sion di­rec­tors, they func­tion as joy clear­ing­houses, seek­ing to up­step the plea­sure re­ac­tions of the realms while try­ing to im­prove the hu­mor taste, to de­velop a super­hu­mor among mor­tals and an­gels. They en­deavor to demon­strate that there is in­her­ent joy in free­will ex­is­tence, in­de­pen­dent of all ex­tra­ne­ous in­flu­ences; and they are right, al­though they meet with great dif­fi­culty in in­cul­cat­ing this truth in the minds of prim­i­tive men. The higher spirit per­son­al­i­ties and the an­gels are more quickly re­spon­sive to these ed­u­ca­tional ef­forts.

28:5.176. The Sat­is­fac­tion of Ser­vice. These an­gels are highly re­flec­tive of the at­ti­tude of the di­rec­tors of con­duct on Par­a­dise, and func­tion­ing much as do the Joys of Ex­is­tence, they strive to en­hance the value of ser­vice and to aug­ment the sat­is­fac­tions to be de­rived there­from. They have done much to il­lu­mi­nate the de­ferred re­wards in­her­ent in un­selfish ser­vice, ser­vice for the ex­ten­sion of the king­dom of truth.

28:5.18The Di­vine Coun­selors, to whom this or­der is at­tached, uti­lize them to re­flect from one world to an­other the ben­e­fits to be de­rived from spir­i­tual ser­vice. And by us­ing the per­for­mances of the best to in­spire and en­cour­age the mediocre, these se­con­a­phim con­tribute im­mensely to the qual­ity of de­voted ser­vice in the super­uni­verses. Ef­fec­tive use is made of the fra­ter­nal com­pet­i­tive spirit by cir­cu­lat­ing to any one world in­for­ma­tion about what the oth­ers, par­tic­u­larly the best, are do­ing. A re­fresh­ing and whole­some ri­valry is pro­moted even among the se­raphic hosts.