supreme seraphim

39:1.15The fourth crea­ture be­stowal of the Cre­ator Son was in the like­ness of a teach­ing coun­selor of the su­preme ser­a­phim of Neb­a­don.

119:4.1It was at the end of one of the pe­ri­odic mil­len­nial roll calls of Uversa that Mi­chael pro­ceeded to place the gov­ern­ment of Neb­a­don in the hands of Im­manuel and Ga­briel; and, of course, re­call­ing what had hap­pened in times past fol­low­ing such ac­tion, we all pre­pared to wit­ness Mi­chael’s dis­ap­pear­ance on his fourth mis­sion of be­stowal, and we were not long kept wait­ing, for he shortly went out upon the Sal­ving­ton dis­patch­ing field and was lost to our view.

119:4.2On the third day af­ter this be­stowal dis­ap­pear­ance we ob­served, in the uni­verse broad­casts to Uversa, this sig­nif­i­cant news item from the se­raphic head­quar­ters of Neb­a­don: “Re­port­ing the unan­nounced ar­rival of an un­known ser­a­phim, ac­com­pa­nied by a soli­tary super­na­phim and Ga­briel of Sal­ving­ton. This un­reg­is­tered ser­a­phim qual­i­fies as of the Neb­a­don or­der and bears cre­den­tials from the Uversa An­cients of Days, cer­ti­fied by Im­manuel of Sal­ving­ton. This ser­a­phim tests out as be­long­ing to the su­preme or­der of the an­gels of a lo­cal uni­verse and has al­ready been as­signed to the corps of the teach­ing coun­selors.”

119:4.3Mi­chael was ab­sent from Sal­ving­ton dur­ing this, the se­raphic be­stowal, for a pe­riod of over forty stan­dard uni­verse years. Dur­ing this time he was at­tached as a se­raphic teach­ing coun­selor, what you might de­nom­i­nate a pri­vate sec­re­tary, to twenty-six dif­fer­ent mas­ter teach­ers, func­tion­ing on twenty-two dif­fer­ent worlds. His last or ter­mi­nal as­sign­ment was as coun­selor and helper at­tached to a be­stowal mis­sion of a Trin­ity Teacher Son on world 462 in sys­tem 84 of con­stel­la­tion 3 in the uni­verse of Neb­a­don.

119:4.4Never, through­out the seven years of this as­sign­ment, was this Trin­ity Teacher Son wholly per­suaded as to the iden­tity of his se­raphic as­so­ciate. True, all ser­a­phim dur­ing that age were re­garded with pe­cu­liar in­ter­est and scrutiny. Full well we all knew that our beloved Sov­er­eign was abroad in the uni­verse, dis­guised as a ser­a­phim, but never could we be cer­tain of his iden­tity. Never was he pos­i­tively iden­ti­fied un­til the time of his at­tach­ment to the be­stowal mis­sion of this Trin­ity Teacher Son. But al­ways through­out this era were the su­preme ser­a­phim re­garded with spe­cial so­lic­i­tude, lest any of us should find that we had un­awares been host to the Sov­er­eign of the uni­verse on a mis­sion of crea­ture be­stowal. And so it has be­come for­ever true, con­cern­ing an­gels, that their Cre­ator and Ruler has been “in all points tried and tested in the like­ness of se­raphic per­son­al­ity.”

119:4.5As these suc­ces­sive be­stowals par­took in­creas­ingly of the na­ture of the lower forms of uni­verse life, Ga­briel be­came more and more an as­so­ciate of these in­car­na­tion ad­ven­tures, func­tion­ing as the uni­verse li­ai­son be­tween the be­stowed Mi­chael and the act­ing uni­verse ruler, Im­manuel.

119:4.6Now has Mi­chael passed through the be­stowal ex­pe­ri­ence of three or­ders of his cre­ated uni­verse Sons: the Mel­chiz­e­deks, the La­non­an­deks, and the Ma­te­rial Sons. Next he con­de­scends to per­son­al­ize in the like­ness of an­gelic life as a su­preme ser­a­phim be­fore turn­ing his at­ten­tion to the var­i­ous phases of the as­cend­ing ca­reers of his low­est form of will crea­tures, the evo­lu­tion­ary mor­tals of time and space.

53:7.6Of the su­preme or­der of ser­a­phim, not an an­gel was lost, but a con­sid­er­able group of the next or­der, the su­pe­rior, were de­ceived and en­snared. Like­wise a few of the third or super­vi­sor or­der of an­gels were mis­led. But the ter­ri­ble break­down came in the fourth group, the ad­min­is­tra­tor an­gels, those ser­a­phim who are nor­mally as­signed to the du­ties of the sys­tem cap­i­tals. Man­otia saved al­most two thirds of them, but slightly over one third fol­lowed their chief into the rebel ranks. One third of all the Je­ru­sem cheru­bim at­tached to the ad­min­is­tra­tor an­gels were lost with their dis­loyal ser­a­phim.

48:6.28Mota is more than a su­pe­rior phi­los­o­phy; it is to phi­los­o­phy as two eyes are to one; it has a stereo­scopic ef­fect on mean­ings and val­ues. Ma­te­rial man sees the uni­verse, as it were, with but one eye—flat. Man­sion world stu­dents achieve cos­mic per­spec­tive—depth—by super­im­pos­ing the per­cep­tions of the mor­ontia life upon the per­cep­tions of the phys­i­cal life. And they are en­abled to bring these ma­te­rial and mor­ontial view­points into true fo­cus largely through the un­tir­ing min­istry of their se­raphic coun­selors, who so pa­tiently teach the man­sion world stu­dents and the mor­ontia pro­gres­sors. Many of the teach­ing coun­selors of the su­preme or­der of ser­a­phim be­gan their ca­reers as ad­vis­ers of the newly lib­er­ated souls of the mor­tals of time.

39:1.1These ser­a­phim are the high­est of the seven re­vealed or­ders of lo­cal uni­verse an­gels. They func­tion in seven groups, each of which is closely as­so­ci­ated with the an­gelic min­is­ters of the Se­raphic Corps of Com­ple­tion.

39:1.21. Son-Spirit Min­is­ters. The first group of the su­preme ser­a­phim are as­signed to the ser­vice of the high Sons and Spirit-ori­gin be­ings res­i­dent and func­tion­ing in the lo­cal uni­verse. This group of an­gelic min­is­ters also serve the Uni­verse Son and the Uni­verse Spirit and are closely af­fil­i­ated with the in­tel­li­gence corps of the Bright and Morn­ing Star, the uni­verse chief ex­ec­u­tive of the united wills of the Cre­ator Son and the Cre­ative Spirit.

39:1.3Be­ing of as­sign­ment to the high Sons and Spir­its, these ser­a­phim are nat­u­rally as­so­ci­ated with the far-flung ser­vices of the Par­a­dise Avo­nals, the di­vine off­spring of the Eter­nal Son and the In­fi­nite Spirit. The Par­a­dise Avo­nals are al­ways at­tended on all mag­is­te­rial and be­stowal mis­sions by this high and ex­pe­ri­enced or­der of ser­a­phim, who are at such times de­voted to or­ga­niz­ing and ad­min­is­ter­ing the spe­cial work con­nected with the ter­mi­na­tion of one plan­e­tary dis­pen­sa­tion and the in­au­gu­ra­tion of a new age. But they are not con­cerned in the work of ad­ju­di­ca­tion which might be in­ci­den­tal to such a change in dis­pen­sa­tions.

39:1.4Be­stowal At­ten­dants. Par­a­dise Avo­nals, but not Cre­ator Sons, when on a be­stowal mis­sion are al­ways ac­com­pa­nied by a corps of 144 be­stowal at­ten­dants. These 144 an­gels are the chiefs of all other Son-Spirit min­is­ters who may be as­so­ci­ated with a be­stowal mis­sion. There might pos­si­bly be le­gions of an­gels sub­ject to the com­mand of an in­car­nated Son of God on a plan­e­tary be­stowal, but all these ser­a­phim would be or­ga­nized and di­rected by the 144 be­stowal at­ten­dants. Higher or­ders of an­gels, super­na­phim and se­con­a­phim, might also form a part of the at­tend­ing host, and though their mis­sions are dis­tinct from those of the ser­a­phim, all these ac­tiv­i­ties would be co-or­di­nated by the be­stowal at­ten­dants.

39:1.5These be­stowal at­ten­dants are com­ple­tion ser­a­phim; they have all tra­versed the cir­cles of Seraph­ing­ton and have at­tained the Se­raphic Corps of Com­ple­tion. And they have been fur­ther es­pe­cially trained to meet the dif­fi­cul­ties and to cope with the emer­gen­cies as­so­ci­ated with the be­stowals of the Sons of God for the ad­vance­ment of the chil­dren of time. Such ser­a­phim have all achieved Par­a­dise and the per­sonal em­brace of the Sec­ond Source and Cen­ter, the Eter­nal Son.

39:1.6Ser­a­phim equally crave as­sign­ment to the mis­sions of the in­car­nated Sons and at­tach­ment as des­tiny guard­i­ans to the mor­tals of the realms; the lat­ter is the surest se­raphic pass­port to Par­a­dise, while the be­stowal at­ten­dants have achieved the high­est lo­cal uni­verse ser­vice of the com­ple­tion ser­a­phim of Par­a­dise at­tain­ment.

39:1.72. Court Ad­vis­ers. These are the se­raphic ad­vis­ers and helpers at­tached to all or­ders of ad­ju­di­ca­tion, from the con­cil­ia­tors up to the high­est tri­bu­nals of the realm. It is not the pur­pose of such tri­bu­nals to de­ter­mine puni­tive sen­tences but rather to ad­ju­di­cate hon­est dif­fer­ences of opin­ion and to de­cree the ev­er­last­ing sur­vival of as­cend­ing mor­tals. Herein lies the duty of the court ad­vis­ers: to see that all charges against mor­tal crea­tures are stated in jus­tice and ad­ju­di­cated in mercy. In this work they are closely as­so­ci­ated with the High Com­mis­sion­ers, Spirit-fused as­cen­dant mor­tals serv­ing in the lo­cal uni­verse.

39:1.8The se­raphic court ad­vis­ers serve ex­ten­sively as de­fend­ers of mor­tals. Not that there ever ex­ists any dis­po­si­tion to be un­fair to the lowly crea­tures of the realms, but while jus­tice de­mands the ad­ju­di­ca­tion of ev­ery de­fault in the climb to­wards di­vine per­fec­tion, mercy re­quires that ev­ery such mis­step be fairly ad­judged in ac­cor­dance with the crea­ture na­ture and the di­vine pur­pose. These an­gels are the ex­po­nents and ex­em­pli­fi­ca­tion of the el­e­ment of mercy in­her­ent in di­vine jus­tice—of fair­ness based on the knowl­edge of the un­der­ly­ing facts of per­sonal mo­tives and racial ten­den­cies.

39:1.9This or­der of an­gels serves from the coun­cils of the Plan­e­tary Princes to the high­est tri­bu­nals of the lo­cal uni­verse, while their as­so­ciates of the Se­raphic Corps of Com­ple­tion func­tion in the higher realms of Or­von­ton, even to the courts of the An­cients of Days on Uversa.

39:1.103. Uni­verse Ori­en­ta­tors. These are the true friends and post­grad­u­ate coun­selors of all those as­cend­ing crea­tures who are paus­ing for the last time on Sal­ving­ton, in their uni­verse of ori­gin, as they stand on the brink of the spirit ad­ven­ture stretch­ing out be­fore them in the vast super­uni­verse of Or­von­ton. And at such a time many an as­cender has a feel­ing which mor­tals could un­der­stand only by com­par­i­son with the hu­man emo­tion of nos­tal­gia. Be­hind lie the realms of achieve­ment, realms grown fa­mil­iar by long ser­vice and mor­ontia at­tain­ment; ahead lies the chal­leng­ing mys­tery of a greater and vaster uni­verse.

39:1.11It is the task of the uni­verse ori­en­ta­tors to fa­cil­i­tate the pas­sage of the as­cend­ing pil­grims from the at­tained to the un­attained level of uni­verse ser­vice, to help these pil­grims in mak­ing those kalei­do­scopic ad­just­ments in the com­pre­hen­sion of mean­ings and val­ues in­her­ent in the re­al­iza­tion that a first-stage spirit be­ing stands, not at the end and cli­max of the lo­cal uni­verse mor­ontia as­cent, but rather at the very bot­tom of the long lad­der of spir­i­tual as­cent to the Uni­ver­sal Fa­ther on Par­a­dise.

39:1.12Many of the Seraph­ing­ton grad­u­ates, mem­bers of the Se­raphic Corps of Com­ple­tion who are as­so­ci­ated with these ser­a­phim, en­gage in ex­ten­sive teach­ing in cer­tain Sal­ving­ton schools con­cerned with the prepa­ra­tion of the crea­tures of Neb­a­don for the re­la­tion­ships of the next uni­verse age.

39:1.134. The Teach­ing Coun­selors. These an­gels are the in­valu­able as­sis­tants of the spir­i­tual teach­ing corps of the lo­cal uni­verse. Teach­ing coun­selors are sec­re­taries to all or­ders of teach­ers, from the Mel­chiz­e­deks and the Trin­ity Teacher Sons down to the mor­ontia mor­tals who are as­signed as helpers to those of their kind who are just be­hind them in the scale of as­cen­dant life. You will first see these as­so­ciate teach­ing ser­a­phim on some one of the seven man­sion worlds sur­round­ing Je­ru­sem.

39:1.14These ser­a­phim be­come as­so­ciates of the di­vi­sion chiefs of the nu­mer­ous ed­u­ca­tional and train­ing in­sti­tu­tions of the lo­cal uni­verses, and they are at­tached in large num­bers to the fac­ul­ties of the seven train­ing worlds of the lo­cal sys­tems and of the sev­enty ed­u­ca­tional spheres of the con­stel­la­tions. These min­is­tra­tions ex­tend on down to the in­di­vid­ual worlds. Even the true and con­se­crated teach­ers of time are as­sisted, and of­ten at­tended, by these coun­selors of the su­preme ser­a­phim.

39:1.165. Di­rec­tors of As­sign­ment. A body of 144 su­preme ser­a­phim is elected from time to time by the an­gels serv­ing on the evo­lu­tion­ary and on the ar­chi­tec­tural spheres of crea­ture habi­ta­tion. This is the high­est an­gelic coun­cil on any sphere, and it co-or­di­nates the self-di­rected phases of se­raphic ser­vice and as­sign­ment. These an­gels pre­side over all se­raphic as­sem­blies per­tain­ing to the line of duty or the call to wor­ship.

• 6. recorders

39:1.176. The Re­cord­ers. These are the of­fi­cial re­cord­ers for the su­preme ser­a­phim. Many of these high an­gels were born with their gifts fully de­vel­oped; oth­ers have qual­i­fied for their po­si­tions of trust and re­spon­si­bil­ity by dili­gent ap­pli­ca­tion to study and faith­ful per­for­mance of sim­i­lar du­ties while at­tached to lower or less re­spon­si­ble or­ders.

• 7. unattached ministers

39:1.187. Un­at­tached Min­is­ters. Large num­bers of un­at­tached ser­a­phim of the su­preme or­der are self-di­rected servers on the ar­chi­tec­tural spheres and on the in­hab­ited plan­ets. Such min­is­ters vol­un­tar­ily meet the dif­fer­en­tial of de­mand for the ser­vice of the su­preme ser­a­phim, thus con­sti­tut­ing the gen­eral re­serve of this or­der.