divinity

• unifying and co-ordinating quality of Deity

0:1.2DE­ITY is per­son­al­iz­able as God, is preper­sonal and super­per­sonal in ways not al­to­gether com­pre­hen­si­ble by man. De­ity is char­ac­ter­ized by the qual­ity of unity—ac­tual or po­ten­tial—on all super­ma­te­rial lev­els of re­al­ity; and this uni­fy­ing qual­ity is best com­pre­hended by crea­tures as di­vin­ity.

• unifying and co-ordinating quality of Deity

0:1.16DI­VIN­ITY is the char­ac­ter­is­tic, uni­fy­ing, and co-or­di­nat­ing qual­ity of De­ity.

• comprehended as truth, beauty, goodness; love, mercy, ministry; justice, power, sovereignty

0:1.17Di­vin­ity is crea­ture com­pre­hen­si­ble as truth, beauty, and good­ness; cor­re­lated in per­son­al­ity as love, mercy, and min­istry; dis­closed on im­per­sonal lev­els as jus­tice, power, and sov­er­eignty.

• may be imperfect on creature levels

0:1.18Di­vin­ity may be per­fect—com­plete—as on ex­is­ten­tial and cre­ator lev­els of Par­a­dise per­fec­tion; it may be im­per­fect, as on ex­pe­ri­en­tial and crea­ture lev­els of time-space evo­lu­tion; or it may be rel­a­tive, nei­ther per­fect nor im­per­fect, as on cer­tain Ha­vona lev­els of ex­is­ten­tial-ex­pe­ri­en­tial re­la­tion­ships.

• enriched by creature and Creator experience

0:12.3The first and sec­ond ex­pe­ri­en­tial Trin­i­ties, the post-Ha­vona Trin­i­ties, can­not be in­fi­nite be­cause they em­brace de­rived De­i­ties, De­i­ties evolved by the ex­pe­ri­en­tial ac­tu­al­iza­tion of re­al­i­ties cre­ated or even­tu­ated by the ex­is­ten­tial Par­a­dise Trin­ity. In­fin­ity of di­vin­ity is be­ing ever en­riched, if not en­larged, by fin­ity and ab­sonity of crea­ture and Cre­ator ex­pe­ri­ence.

• not self-centered

10:1.3Di­vine per­son­al­ity is not self-cen­tered; self-dis­tri­bu­tion and shar­ing of per­son­al­ity char­ac­ter­ize di­vine free­will self­hood. Crea­tures crave as­so­ci­a­tion with other per­sonal crea­tures; Cre­ators are moved to share di­vin­ity with their uni­verse chil­dren; the per­son­al­ity of the In­fi­nite is dis­closed as the Uni­ver­sal Fa­ther, who shares re­al­ity of be­ing and equal­ity of self with two co-or­di­nate per­son­al­i­ties, the Eter­nal Son and the Con­joint Ac­tor.

• stability always proportional to

12:6.1The uni­verse is non­static. Sta­bil­ity is not the re­sult of in­er­tia but rather the prod­uct of bal­anced en­er­gies, co-op­er­a­tive minds, co-or­di­nated mor­ontias, spirit over­con­trol, and per­son­al­ity uni­fi­ca­tion. Sta­bil­ity is wholly and al­ways pro­por­tional to di­vin­ity.

• spirit gravity is qualitative measure of

12:8.5As the mind of any per­son­al­ity in the uni­verse be­comes more spir­i­tual—God­like—it be­comes less re­spon­sive to ma­te­rial grav­ity. Re­al­ity, mea­sured by phys­i­cal-grav­ity re­sponse, is the an­tithe­sis of re­al­ity as de­ter­mined by qual­ity of spirit con­tent. Phys­i­cal-grav­ity ac­tion is a quan­ti­ta­tive de­ter­miner of non­spirit en­ergy; spir­i­tual-grav­ity ac­tion is the qual­i­ta­tive mea­sure of the liv­ing en­ergy of di­vin­ity.

• consciousness of d. is progressive spiritual experience

12:8.15In cos­mic evo­lu­tion mat­ter be­comes a philo­sophic shadow cast by mind in the pres­ence of spirit lu­mi­nos­ity of di­vine en­light­en­ment, but this does not in­val­i­date the re­al­ity of mat­ter-en­ergy. Mind, mat­ter, and spirit are equally real, but they are not of equal value to per­son­al­ity in the at­tain­ment of di­vin­ity. Con­scious­ness of di­vin­ity is a pro­gres­sive spir­i­tual ex­pe­ri­ence.

• humbly obedient to creature choice

13:4.5The de­ter­miner of the dif­fer­en­tial of spir­i­tual pres­ence ex­ists in your own hearts and minds and con­sists in the man­ner of your own choos­ing, in the de­ci­sions of your minds, and in the de­ter­mi­na­tion of your own wills. This dif­fer­en­tial is in­her­ent in the free­will re­ac­tions of in­tel­li­gent per­sonal be­ings, be­ings whom the Uni­ver­sal Fa­ther has or­dained shall ex­er­cise this lib­erty of choos­ing. And the De­i­ties are ever true to the ebb and flow of their spir­its in meet­ing and sat­is­fy­ing the con­di­tions and de­mands of this dif­fer­en­tial of crea­ture choice, now be­stow­ing more of their pres­ence in re­sponse to a sin­cere de­sire for the same and again with­draw­ing them­selves from the scene as their crea­tures de­cide ad­versely in the ex­er­cise of their di­vinely be­stowed free­dom of choice. And thus does the spirit of di­vin­ity be­come humbly obe­di­ent to the choos­ing of the crea­tures of the realms.

• evil inherent in segmentalized conception of d.

19:1.4In this con­nec­tion, how­ever, it may be noted that Teacher Sons are the su­preme co-or­di­nat­ing per­son­al­i­ties of Trin­ity ori­gin. In such a far-flung uni­verse of uni­verses there is al­ways great dan­ger of suc­cumb­ing to the er­ror of the cir­cum­scribed view­point, to the evil in­her­ent in a seg­men­tal­ized con­cep­tion of re­al­ity and di­vin­ity.

• Paradise residents partake of essence of

26:7.4When an as­cen­dant soul ac­tu­ally starts for Par­a­dise, he is ac­com­pa­nied only by the tran­sit trio: the super­aphic cir­cle as­so­ciate, the Grad­u­ate Guide, and the ever-pres­ent servi­tal as­so­ciate of the lat­ter. These ex­cur­sions from the Ha­vona cir­cles to Par­a­dise are trial trips; the as­cend­ers are not yet of Par­a­dise sta­tus. They do not achieve res­i­den­tial sta­tus on Par­a­dise un­til they have passed through the ter­mi­nal rest of time sub­se­quent to the at­tain­ment of the Uni­ver­sal Fa­ther and the fi­nal clear­ance of the Ha­vona cir­cuits. Not un­til af­ter the di­vine rest do they par­take of the “essence of di­vin­ity” and the “spirit of su­prem­acy” and thus re­ally be­gin to func­tion in the cir­cle of eter­nity and in the pres­ence of the Trin­ity.

• divine technique in approach to d.

27:4.2Har­mony is the keynote of the cen­tral uni­verse, and de­tectable or­der pre­vails on Par­a­dise. Proper con­duct is es­sen­tial to prog­ress by way of knowl­edge, through phi­los­o­phy, to the spir­i­tual heights of spon­ta­neous wor­ship. There is a di­vine tech­nique in the ap­proach to Di­vin­ity; and the ac­quire­ment of this tech­nique must await the pil­grims’ ar­rival on Par­a­dise. The spirit of it has been im­parted on the cir­cles of Ha­vona, but the fi­nal touches of the train­ing of the pil­grims of time can be ap­plied only af­ter they ac­tu­ally at­tain the Isle of Light.

• greatness is Godlikeness

28:6.22The es­ti­mate of great­ness varies from sphere to sphere. To be great is to be God­like. And since the qual­ity of great­ness is wholly de­ter­mined by the con­tent of good­ness, it fol­lows that, even in your pres­ent hu­man es­tate, if you can through grace be­come good, you are thereby be­com­ing great. The more stead­fastly you be­hold, and the more per­sis­tently you pur­sue, the con­cepts of di­vine good­ness, the more cer­tainly will you grow in great­ness, in true mag­ni­tude of gen­uine sur­vival char­ac­ter.

• plural in manifestation

34:6.2Al­though Di­vin­ity may be plu­ral in man­i­fes­ta­tion, in hu­man ex­pe­ri­ence De­ity is sin­gu­lar, al­ways one. Nei­ther is spir­i­tual min­istry plu­ral in hu­man ex­pe­ri­ence. Re­gard­less of plu­ral­ity of ori­gin, all spirit in­flu­ences are one in func­tion. In­deed they are one, be­ing the spirit min­istry of God the Sev­en­fold in and to the crea­tures of the grand uni­verse; and as crea­tures grow in ap­pre­ci­a­tion of, and re­cep­tiv­ity for, this uni­fy­ing min­istry of the spirit, it be­comes in their ex­pe­ri­ence the min­istry of God the Su­preme.

• comprehended as truth, beauty, goodness; love, mercy, ministry; justice, power, sovereignty

44:7.4These di­vine qual­i­ties are per­fectly and ab­so­lutely uni­fied in God. And ev­ery God-know­ing man or an­gel pos­sesses the po­ten­tial of un­lim­ited self-ex­pres­sion on ever-pro­gres­sive lev­els of uni­fied self-re­al­iza­tion by the tech­nique of the never-end­ing achieve­ment of God­like­ness—the ex­pe­ri­en­tial blend­ing in the evo­lu­tion­ary ex­pe­ri­ence of eter­nal truth, uni­ver­sal beauty, and di­vine good­ness.

• pursuit of d. leads to kingdom of God

54:0.1Evo­lu­tion­ary man finds it dif­fi­cult fully to com­pre­hend the sig­nif­i­cance and to grasp the mean­ings of evil, er­ror, sin, and in­iq­uity. Man is slow to per­ceive that con­trastive per­fec­tion and im­per­fec­tion pro­duce po­ten­tial evil; that con­flict­ing truth and false­hood cre­ate con­fus­ing er­ror; that the di­vine en­dow­ment of free­will choice even­tu­ates in the di­ver­gent realms of sin and righ­teous­ness; that the per­sis­tent pur­suit of di­vin­ity leads to the king­dom of God as con­trasted with its con­tin­u­ous re­jec­tion, which leads to the do­mains of in­iq­uity.

• in Supreme Creators

56:5.3The pres­ent func­tion­ing of di­vin­ity in the super­uni­verses is ac­tively man­i­fest in the op­er­a­tions of the Su­preme Cre­ators—the lo­cal uni­verse Cre­ator Sons and Spir­its, the super­uni­verse An­cients of Days, and the Seven Mas­ter Spir­its of Par­a­dise. These be­ings con­sti­tute the first three lev­els of God the Sev­en­fold lead­ing in­ward to the Uni­ver­sal Fa­ther, and this en­tire do­main of God the Sev­en­fold is co-or­di­nat­ing on the first level of ex­pe­ri­en­tial de­ity in the evolv­ing Su­preme Be­ing.

• comprehended in worship, service, and personal spiritual experience

56:10.3Phi­los­o­phy you some­what grasp, and di­vin­ity you com­pre­hend in wor­ship, so­cial ser­vice, and per­sonal spir­i­tual ex­pe­ri­ence, but the pur­suit of beauty—cos­mol­ogy—you all too of­ten limit to the study of man’s crude artis­tic en­deav­ors. Beauty, art, is largely a mat­ter of the uni­fi­ca­tion of con­trasts. Va­ri­ety is es­sen­tial to the con­cept of beauty. The su­preme beauty, the height of fi­nite art, is the drama of the uni­fi­ca­tion of the vast­ness of the cos­mic ex­tremes of Cre­ator and crea­ture. Man find­ing God and God find­ing man—the crea­ture be­com­ing per­fect as is the Cre­ator—that is the su­per­nal achieve­ment of the su­premely beau­ti­ful, the at­tain­ment of the apex of cos­mic art.

• comprehended as truth, beauty, goodness; love, mercy, ministry; justice, power, sovereignty
• fruits are peace, progress, satisfaction, joy, wisdom

56:10.20To fi­nite man truth, beauty, and good­ness em­brace the full rev­e­la­tion of di­vin­ity re­al­ity. As this love-com­pre­hen­sion of De­ity finds spir­i­tual ex­pres­sion in the lives of God-know­ing mor­tals, there are yielded the fruits of di­vin­ity: in­tel­lec­tual peace, so­cial prog­ress, moral sat­is­fac­tion, spir­i­tual joy, and cos­mic wis­dom. The ad­vanced mor­tals on a world in the sev­enth stage of light and life have learned that love is the great­est thing in the uni­verse—and they know that God is love.

• functions in mortal personality as Adjuster, Spirit of Truth, Holy Spirit, and Supreme

101:2.12Rev­e­la­tion as an ep­ochal phe­nom­e­non is pe­ri­odic; as a per­sonal hu­man ex­pe­ri­ence it is con­tin­u­ous. Di­vin­ity func­tions in mor­tal per­son­al­ity as the Ad­juster gift of the Fa­ther, as the Spirit of Truth of the Son, and as the Holy Spirit of the Uni­verse Spirit, while these three super­mor­tal en­dow­ments are uni­fied in hu­man ex­pe­ri­en­tial evo­lu­tion as the min­istry of the Su­preme.

• comprehended in worship, service, and personal spiritual experience
• no scientific proofs of d.; discoverable only by faith

101:10.4It is only through the mor­ontial av­enue lead­ing to spir­i­tual in­sight that man can ever break the fet­ters in­her­ent in his mor­tal sta­tus in the uni­verse. En­ergy and mind do lead back to Par­a­dise and De­ity, but nei­ther the en­ergy en­dow­ment nor the mind en­dow­ment of man pro­ceeds di­rectly from such Par­a­dise De­ity. Only in the spir­i­tual sense is man a child of God. And this is true be­cause it is only in the spir­i­tual sense that man is at pres­ent en­dowed and in­dwelt by the Par­a­dise Fa­ther. Man­kind can never dis­cover di­vin­ity ex­cept through the av­enue of re­li­gious ex­pe­ri­ence and by the ex­er­cise of true faith. The faith ac­cep­tance of the truth of God en­ables man to es­cape from the cir­cum­scribed con­fines of ma­te­rial lim­i­ta­tions and af­fords him a ra­tio­nal hope of achiev­ing safe con­duct from the ma­te­rial realm, whereon is death, to the spir­i­tual realm, wherein is life eter­nal.

• no scientific proofs of d.; discoverable only by faith

101:10.6Never can there be ei­ther sci­en­tific or log­i­cal proofs of di­vin­ity. Rea­son alone can never val­i­date the val­ues and good­nesses of re­li­gious ex­pe­ri­ence. But it will al­ways re­main true: Whoso­ever wills to do the will of God shall com­pre­hend the va­lid­ity of spir­i­tual val­ues. This is the near­est ap­proach that can be made on the mor­tal level to of­fer­ing proofs of the re­al­ity of re­li­gious ex­pe­ri­ence. Such faith af­fords the only es­cape from the me­chan­i­cal clutch of the ma­te­rial world and from the er­ror dis­tor­tion of the in­com­plete­ness of the in­tel­lec­tual world; it is the only dis­cov­ered so­lu­tion to the im­passe in mor­tal think­ing re­gard­ing the con­tin­u­ing sur­vival of the in­di­vid­ual per­son­al­ity. It is the only pass­port to com­ple­tion of re­al­ity and to eter­nity of life in a uni­ver­sal cre­ation of love, law, unity, and pro­gres­sive De­ity at­tain­ment.

• cohesive qualities

106:2.4This ex­pe­ri­en­tial power aris­ing out of the di­vin­ity achieve­ments of God the Sev­en­fold it­self man­i­fests the co­he­sive qual­i­ties of di­vin­ity by syn­the­siz­ing—to­tal­iz­ing—as the al­mighty power of the at­tained ex­pe­ri­en­tial mas­tery of the evolv­ing cre­ations. And this al­mighty power in turn finds spirit-per­son­al­ity co­he­sion on the pi­lot sphere of the outer belt of Ha­vona worlds in union with the spirit per­son­al­ity of the Ha­vona pres­ence of God the Su­preme. Thus does ex­pe­ri­en­tial De­ity cul­mi­nate the long evo­lu­tion­ary strug­gle by in­vest­ing the power prod­uct of time and space with the spirit pres­ence and di­vine per­son­al­ity res­i­dent in the cen­tral cre­ation.

• attained by conforming to will of Creator

130:4.3The high­est level to which a fi­nite crea­ture can pro­gress is the rec­og­ni­tion of the Uni­ver­sal Fa­ther and the know­ing of the Su­preme. And even then such be­ings of fi­nal­ity des­tiny go on ex­pe­ri­enc­ing change in the mo­tions of the phys­i­cal world and in its ma­te­rial phe­nom­ena. Like­wise do they re­main aware of self­hood pro­gres­sion in their con­tin­u­ing as­cen­sion of the spir­i­tual uni­verse and of grow­ing con­scious­ness in their deep­en­ing ap­pre­ci­a­tion of, and re­sponse to, the in­tel­lec­tual cos­mos. Only in the per­fec­tion, har­mony, and una­nim­ity of will can the crea­ture be­come as one with the Cre­ator; and such a state of di­vin­ity is at­tained and main­tained only by the crea­ture’s con­tin­u­ing to live in time and eter­nity by con­sis­tently con­form­ing his fi­nite per­sonal will to the di­vine will of the Cre­ator. Al­ways must the de­sire to do the Fa­ther’s will be su­preme in the soul and dom­i­nant over the mind of an as­cend­ing son of God.