System Sovereigns

45:2.1The chief ex­ec­u­tive of a lo­cal sys­tem of in­hab­ited worlds is a pri­mary La­non­an­dek Son, the Sys­tem Sov­er­eign. In our lo­cal uni­verse these sov­er­eigns are in­trusted with large ex­ec­u­tive re­spon­si­bil­i­ties, un­usual per­sonal pre­rog­a­tives. Not all uni­verses, even in Or­von­ton, are so or­ga­nized as to per­mit the Sys­tem Sov­er­eigns to ex­er­cise such un­usu­ally wide pow­ers of per­sonal dis­cre­tion in the di­rec­tion of sys­tem af­fairs. But in all the his­tory of Neb­a­don these un­tram­meled ex­ec­u­tives have ex­hib­ited dis­loy­alty only three times. The Lu­cifer re­bel­lion in the sys­tem of Sa­ta­nia was the last and the most wide­spread of all.

45:2.2In Sa­ta­nia, even af­ter this dis­as­trous up­heaval, ab­so­lutely no changes have been made in the tech­nique of sys­tem ad­min­is­tra­tion. The pres­ent Sys­tem Sov­er­eign pos­sesses all the power and ex­er­cises all the au­thor­ity that were in­vested in his un­wor­thy pre­de­ces­sor ex­cept for cer­tain mat­ters now un­der the super­vi­sion of the Con­stel­la­tion Fa­thers which the An­cients of Days have not yet fully re­stored to Lanaforge, the suc­ces­sor of Lu­cifer.

45:2.3The pres­ent head of Sa­ta­nia is a gra­cious and bril­liant ruler, and he is a re­bel­lion-tested sov­er­eign. When serv­ing as an as­sis­tant Sys­tem Sov­er­eign, Lanaforge was faith­ful to Mi­chael in an ear­lier up­heaval in the uni­verse of Neb­a­don. This mighty and bril­liant Lord of Sa­ta­nia is a tried and tested ad­min­is­tra­tor. At the time of the sec­ond sys­tem re­bel­lion in Neb­a­don, when the Sys­tem Sov­er­eign stum­bled and fell into dark­ness, Lanaforge, the first as­sis­tant to the erring chief, seized the reins of gov­ern­ment and so con­ducted the af­fairs of the sys­tem that com­par­a­tively few per­son­al­i­ties were lost ei­ther on the head­quar­ters worlds or on the in­hab­ited plan­ets of that un­for­tu­nate sys­tem. Lanaforge bears the dis­tinc­tion of be­ing the only pri­mary La­non­an­dek Son in all Neb­a­don who thus func­tioned loy­ally in the ser­vice of Mi­chael and in the very pres­ence of the de­fault of his brother of su­pe­rior au­thor­ity and an­te­ced­ent rank. Lanaforge will prob­a­bly not be re­moved from Je­ru­sem un­til all the re­sults of the for­mer folly have been over­come and the prod­ucts of re­bel­lion re­moved from Sa­ta­nia.

45:2.4While all the af­fairs of the iso­lated worlds of Sa­ta­nia have not been re­turned to his ju­ris­dic­tion, Lanaforge dis­closes great in­ter­est in their wel­fare, and he is a fre­quent vis­i­tor on Uran­tia. As in other and nor­mal sys­tems, the Sov­er­eign pre­sides over the sys­tem coun­cil of world rulers, the Plan­e­tary Princes and the res­i­dent gov­er­nors gen­eral of the iso­lated worlds. This plan­e­tary coun­cil as­sem­bles from time to time on the head­quar­ters of the sys­tem—“When the Sons of God come to­gether.”

45:2.5Once a week, ev­ery ten days on Je­ru­sem, the Sov­er­eign holds a con­clave with some one group of the var­i­ous or­ders of per­son­al­i­ties domi­ciled on the head­quar­ters world. These are the charm­ingly in­for­mal hours of Je­ru­sem, and they are never-to-be-for­got­ten oc­ca­sions. On Je­ru­sem there ex­ists the ut­most fra­ter­nity be­tween all the var­i­ous or­ders of be­ings and be­tween each of these groups and the Sys­tem Sov­er­eign.

45:2.6These unique as­sem­blages oc­cur on the sea of glass, the great gath­er­ing field of the sys­tem cap­i­tal. They are purely so­cial and spir­i­tual oc­ca­sions; noth­ing per­tain­ing to the plan­e­tary ad­min­is­tra­tion or even to the as­cen­dant plan is ever dis­cussed. As­cend­ing mor­tals come to­gether at these times merely to en­joy them­selves and to meet their fel­low Jerusemites. Those groups which are not be­ing en­ter­tained by the Sov­er­eign at these weekly re­lax­ations meet at their own head­quar­ters.

35:9.5The Sys­tem Sov­er­eigns are true to their names; they are well-nigh sov­er­eign in the lo­cal af­fairs of the in­hab­ited worlds. They are al­most pa­ter­nal in their di­rec­tion of the Plan­e­tary Princes, the Ma­te­rial Sons, and the min­is­ter­ing spir­its. The per­sonal grasp of the sov­er­eign is all but com­plete. These rulers are not super­vised by Trin­ity ob­servers from the cen­tral uni­verse. They are the ex­ec­u­tive di­vi­sion of the lo­cal uni­verse, and as cus­to­di­ans of the en­force­ment of leg­isla­tive man­dates and as ex­ec­u­tives for the ap­pli­ca­tion of ju­di­cial ver­dicts, they pre­sent the one place in all uni­verse ad­min­is­tra­tion where per­sonal dis­loy­alty to the will of the Mi­chael Son could most eas­ily and read­ily in­trench it­self and seek to as­sert it­self.

35:9.6Our lo­cal uni­verse has been un­for­tu­nate in that over seven hun­dred Sons of the La­non­an­dek or­der have re­belled against the uni­verse gov­ern­ment, thus pre­cip­i­tat­ing con­fu­sion in sev­eral sys­tems and on nu­mer­ous plan­ets. Of this en­tire num­ber of fail­ures only three were Sys­tem Sov­er­eigns; prac­ti­cally all of these Sons be­longed to the sec­ond and third or­ders, Plan­e­tary Princes and ter­tiary La­non­an­deks.

119:2.1For al­most one hun­dred and fifty mil­lion years af­ter the Mel­chiz­e­dek be­stowal of Mi­chael, all went well in the uni­verse of Neb­a­don, when trou­ble be­gan to brew in sys­tem 11 of con­stel­la­tion 37. This trou­ble in­volved a mis­un­der­stand­ing by a La­non­an­dek Son, a Sys­tem Sov­er­eign, which had been ad­ju­di­cated by the Con­stel­la­tion Fa­thers and ap­proved by the Faith­ful of Days, the Par­a­dise coun­selor to that con­stel­la­tion, but the protest­ing Sys­tem Sov­er­eign was not fully rec­on­ciled to the ver­dict. Af­ter more than one hun­dred years of dis­sat­is­fac­tion he led his as­so­ciates in one of the most wide­spread and dis­as­trous re­bel­lions against the sov­er­eignty of the Cre­ator Son ever in­sti­gated in the uni­verse of Neb­a­don, a re­bel­lion long since ad­ju­di­cated and ended by the ac­tion of the An­cients of Days on Uversa.

119:2.2This rebel Sys­tem Sov­er­eign, Lu­ten­tia, reigned su­preme on his head­quar­ters planet for more than twenty years of stan­dard Neb­a­don time; where­upon, the Most Highs, with ap­proval from Uversa, or­dered his seg­re­ga­tion and req­ui­si­tioned the Sal­ving­ton rulers for the des­ig­na­tion of a new Sys­tem Sov­er­eign to as­sume di­rec­tion of that strife-torn and con­fused sys­tem of in­hab­ited worlds.

119:2.3Si­mul­ta­ne­ously with the re­cep­tion of this re­quest on Sal­ving­ton, Mi­chael ini­ti­ated the sec­ond of those ex­traor­di­nary procla­ma­tions of in­ten­tion to be ab­sent from the uni­verse head­quar­ters for the pur­pose of “do­ing the bid­ding of my Par­a­dise Fa­ther,” promis­ing to “re­turn in due sea­son” and con­cen­trat­ing all au­thor­ity in the hands of his Par­a­dise brother, Im­manuel, the Union of Days.

119:2.4And then, by the same tech­nique ob­served at the time of his de­par­ture in con­nec­tion with the Mel­chiz­e­dek be­stowal, Mi­chael again took leave of his head­quar­ters sphere. Three days af­ter this un­ex­plained leave-tak­ing there ap­peared among the re­serve corps of the pri­mary La­non­an­dek Sons of Neb­a­don, a new and un­known mem­ber. This new Son ap­peared at noon, unan­nounced and ac­com­pa­nied by a lone ter­tiaphim who bore cre­den­tials from the Uversa An­cients of Days, cer­ti­fied by Im­manuel of Sal­ving­ton, di­rect­ing that this new Son be as­signed to sys­tem 11 of con­stel­la­tion 37 as the suc­ces­sor of the de­posed Lu­ten­tia and with full au­thor­ity as act­ing Sys­tem Sov­er­eign pend­ing the ap­point­ment of a new sov­er­eign.

119:2.5For more than sev­en­teen years of uni­verse time this strange and un­known tem­po­rary ruler ad­min­is­tered the af­fairs and wisely ad­ju­di­cated the dif­fi­cul­ties of this con­fused and de­mor­al­ized lo­cal sys­tem. No Sys­tem Sov­er­eign was ever more ar­dently loved or more widespreadly hon­ored and re­spected. In jus­tice and mercy this new ruler set the tur­bu­lent sys­tem in or­der while he painstak­ingly min­is­tered to all his sub­jects, even of­fer­ing his re­bel­lious pre­de­ces­sor the priv­i­lege of shar­ing the sys­tem throne of au­thor­ity if he would only apol­o­gize to Im­manuel for his in­dis­cre­tions. But Lu­ten­tia spurned these over­tures of mercy, well know­ing that this new and strange Sys­tem Sov­er­eign was none other than Mi­chael, the very uni­verse ruler whom he had so re­cently de­fied. But mil­lions of his mis­guided and de­luded fol­low­ers ac­cepted the for­give­ness of this new ruler, known in that age as the Sav­ior Sov­er­eign of the sys­tem of Palo­nia.

119:2.6And then came that event­ful day on which there ar­rived the newly ap­pointed Sys­tem Sov­er­eign, des­ig­nated by the uni­verse au­thor­i­ties as the per­ma­nent suc­ces­sor of the de­posed Lu­ten­tia, and all Palo­nia mourned the de­par­ture of the most no­ble and the most be­nign sys­tem ruler that Neb­a­don had ever known. He was beloved by all the sys­tem and adored by his fel­lows of all groups of the La­non­an­dek Sons. His de­par­ture was not un­cer­e­mo­ni­ous; a great cel­e­bra­tion was ar­ranged when he left the sys­tem head­quar­ters. Even his erring pre­de­ces­sor sent this mes­sage: “Just and righ­teous are you in all your ways. While I con­tinue in re­jec­tion of the Par­a­dise rule, I am com­pelled to con­fess that you are a just and mer­ci­ful ad­min­is­tra­tor.”

20:1.10Mel­chiz­e­deks are the joint off­spring of a lo­cal uni­verse Cre­ator Son, Cre­ative Spirit, and Fa­ther Mel­chiz­e­dek. Both Voron­dadeks and La­non­an­deks are brought into be­ing by a Cre­ator Son and his Cre­ative Spirit as­so­ciate. Voron­dadeks are best known as the Most Highs, the Con­stel­la­tion Fa­thers; La­non­an­deks as Sys­tem Sov­er­eigns and as Plan­e­tary Princes. The three­fold or­der of Life Car­ri­ers is brought into be­ing by a Cre­ator Son and Cre­ative Spirit as­so­ci­ated with one of the three An­cients of Days of the super­uni­verse of ju­ris­dic­tion. But the na­tures and ac­tiv­i­ties of these Lo­cal Uni­verse Sons of God are more prop­erly por­trayed in those pa­pers deal­ing with the af­fairs of the lo­cal cre­ations.

35:8.41. Pri­mary La­non­an­deks. Of the high­est rank there were 709,841. These are the Sons des­ig­nated as Sys­tem Sov­er­eigns and as­sis­tants to the su­preme coun­cils of the con­stel­la­tions and as coun­selors in the higher ad­min­is­tra­tive work of the uni­verse.

114:3.4The Uran­tia gov­ern­ment is rep­re­sented in the coun­cils of Je­ru­sem in ac­cor­dance with an ar­range­ment whereby the re­turn­ing gov­er­nor gen­eral sits as a tem­po­rary mem­ber of the Sys­tem Sov­er­eign’s cab­i­net of Plan­e­tary Princes. It was ex­pected, when Ma­chi­venta was des­ig­nated vicegerent Prince, that he would im­me­di­ately as­sume his place in the coun­cil of the Plan­e­tary Princes of Sa­ta­nia, but thus far he has made no ges­ture in this di­rec­tion.

35:9.2The Sys­tem Sov­er­eigns rule in com­mis­sions of two or three on the head­quar­ters of each sys­tem of in­hab­ited worlds. The Con­stel­la­tion Fa­ther names one of these La­non­an­deks as chief ev­ery dekamil­len­nium. Some­times no change in the head of the trio is made, the mat­ter be­ing en­tirely op­tional with the con­stel­la­tion rulers. Sys­tem gov­ern­ments do not sud­denly change in per­son­nel un­less a tragedy of some sort oc­curs.

35:10.1The third group of seven worlds in the Sal­ving­ton cir­cuit of sev­enty plan­ets, with their re­spec­tive forty-two satel­lites, con­sti­tute the La­non­an­dek clus­ter of ad­min­is­tra­tive spheres. On these realms the ex­pe­ri­enced La­non­an­deks be­long­ing to the ex-Sys­tem Sov­er­eign corps of­fi­ci­ate as ad­min­is­tra­tive teach­ers of the as­cend­ing pil­grims and the se­raphic hosts. The evo­lu­tion­ary mor­tals ob­serve the sys­tem ad­min­is­tra­tors at work on the sys­tem cap­i­tals, but here they par­tic­i­pate in the ac­tual co-or­di­na­tion of the ad­min­is­tra­tive pro­nounce­ments of the ten thou­sand lo­cal sys­tems.

• rule local systems

15:2.31. The Sys­tem. The ba­sic unit of the super­gov­ern­ment con­sists of about one thou­sand in­hab­ited or in­hab­it­able worlds. Blaz­ing suns, cold worlds, plan­ets too near the hot suns, and other spheres not suit­able for crea­ture habi­ta­tion are not in­cluded in this group. These one thou­sand worlds adapted to sup­port life are called a sys­tem, but in the younger sys­tems only a com­par­a­tively small num­ber of these worlds may be in­hab­ited. Each in­hab­ited planet is pre­sided over by a Plan­e­tary Prince, and each lo­cal sys­tem has an ar­chi­tec­tural sphere as its head­quar­ters and is ruled by a Sys­tem Sov­er­eign.

• enforce mandates of constellations and local universes

33:8.1On Sal­ving­ton, the head­quar­ters of Neb­a­don, there are no true leg­isla­tive bod­ies. The uni­verse head­quar­ters worlds are con­cerned largely with ad­ju­di­ca­tion. The leg­isla­tive as­sem­blies of the lo­cal uni­verse are lo­cated on the head­quar­ters of the one hun­dred con­stel­la­tions. The sys­tems are chiefly con­cerned with the ex­ec­u­tive and ad­min­is­tra­tive work of the lo­cal cre­ations. The Sys­tem Sov­er­eigns and their as­so­ciates en­force the leg­isla­tive man­dates of the con­stel­la­tion rulers and ex­e­cute the ju­di­cial de­crees of the high courts of the uni­verse.

35:10.2These ad­min­is­tra­tive schools of the lo­cal uni­verse are super­vised by a corps of La­non­an­dek Sons who have had long ex­pe­ri­ence as Sys­tem Sov­er­eigns and as con­stel­la­tion coun­selors. These ex­ec­u­tive col­leges are ex­celled only by the ad­min­is­tra­tive schools of Ensa.

• 100 sit in council on constellation headquarters

43:4.7The one hun­dred Sys­tem Sov­er­eigns come pe­ri­od­i­cally to the Eden­tia con­claves which de­lib­er­ate on the wel­fare of the con­stel­la­tion. Af­ter the Sa­ta­nia re­bel­lion the arch­re­bels of Je­ru­sem were wont to come up to these Eden­tia coun­cils just as they had on for­mer oc­ca­sions. And there was found no way to stop this ar­ro­gant ef­fron­tery un­til af­ter the be­stowal of Mi­chael on Uran­tia and his sub­se­quent as­sump­tion of un­lim­ited sov­er­eignty through­out all Neb­a­don. Never, since that day, have these in­sti­ga­tors of sin been per­mit­ted to sit in the Eden­tia coun­cils of the loyal Sys­tem Sov­er­eigns.

• dispatch Material Sons to planets

49:5.24On a nor­mal evo­lu­tion­ary world, racial prog­ress at­tains its nat­u­ral bi­o­logic peak dur­ing the regime of the Plan­e­tary Prince, and shortly there­after the Sys­tem Sov­er­eign dis­patches a Ma­te­rial Son and Daugh­ter to that planet. These im­ported be­ings are of ser­vice as bi­o­logic up­lifters; their de­fault on Uran­tia fur­ther com­pli­cated your plan­e­tary his­tory.

• dispatch and direct Planetary Princes, Material Sons, ministering spirits

50:0.1While be­long­ing to the or­der of La­non­an­dek Sons, the Plan­e­tary Princes are so spe­cial­ized in ser­vice that they are com­monly re­garded as a dis­tinct group. Af­ter their Mel­chiz­e­dek cer­ti­fi­ca­tion as sec­ondary La­non­an­deks, these lo­cal uni­verse Sons are as­signed to the re­serves of their or­der on the con­stel­la­tion head­quar­ters. From here they are as­signed to var­i­ous du­ties by the Sys­tem Sov­er­eign and even­tu­ally com­mis­sioned as Plan­e­tary Princes and sent forth to rule the evolv­ing in­hab­ited worlds.

50:0.2The sig­nal for a Sys­tem Sov­er­eign to act in the mat­ter of as­sign­ing a ruler to a given planet is the re­cep­tion of a re­quest from the Life Car­ri­ers for the dis­patch of an ad­min­is­tra­tive head to func­tion on this planet whereon they have es­tab­lished life and de­vel­oped in­tel­li­gent evo­lu­tion­ary be­ings. All plan­ets which are in­hab­ited by evo­lu­tion­ary mor­tal crea­tures have as­signed to them a plan­e­tary ruler of this or­der of son­ship.

• dispatch Material Sons to planets

51:0.1Dur­ing the dis­pen­sa­tion of a Plan­e­tary Prince, prim­i­tive man reaches the limit of nat­u­ral evo­lu­tion­ary de­vel­op­ment, and this bi­o­logic at­tain­ment sig­nals the Sys­tem Sov­er­eign to dis­patch to such a world the sec­ond or­der of son­ship, the bi­o­logic up­lifters. These Sons, for there are two of them—the Ma­te­rial Son and Daugh­ter—are usu­ally known on a planet as Adam and Eve. The orig­i­nal Ma­te­rial Son of Sa­ta­nia is Adam, and those who go to the sys­tem worlds as bi­o­logic up­lifters al­ways carry the name of this first and orig­i­nal Son of their unique or­der.

• dispatch and direct Planetary Princes, Material Sons, ministering spirits

51:2.1Upon re­ceipt of the news that an­other in­hab­ited world has at­tained the height of phys­i­cal evo­lu­tion, the Sys­tem Sov­er­eign con­venes the corps of Ma­te­rial Sons and Daugh­ters on the sys­tem cap­i­tal; and fol­low­ing the dis­cus­sion of the needs of such an evo­lu­tion­ary world, two of the vol­un­teer­ing group—an Adam and an Eve of the se­nior corps of Ma­te­rial Sons—are se­lected to un­der­take the ad­ven­ture, to sub­mit to the deep sleep prepara­tory to be­ing en­ser­a­phimed and trans­ported from their home of as­so­ci­ated ser­vice to the new realm of new op­por­tu­ni­ties and new dan­gers.

• dispatch and direct Planetary Princes, Material Sons, ministering spirits

52:1.8Within one hun­dred thou­sand years from the time man ac­quires erect pos­ture, the Plan­e­tary Prince usu­ally ar­rives, hav­ing been dis­patched by the Sys­tem Sov­er­eign upon the re­port of the Life Car­ri­ers that will is func­tion­ing, even though com­par­a­tively few in­di­vid­u­als have thus de­vel­oped. Prim­i­tive mor­tals usu­ally wel­come the Plan­e­tary Prince and his vis­i­ble staff; in fact, they of­ten look upon them with awe and rev­er­ence, al­most with wor­ship­ful­ness, if they are not re­strained.

• dispatch and direct Planetary Princes, Material Sons, ministering spirits

52:3.1When the orig­i­nal im­pe­tus of evo­lu­tion­ary life has run its bi­o­logic course, when man has reached the apex of an­i­mal de­vel­op­ment, there ar­rives the sec­ond or­der of son­ship, and the sec­ond dis­pen­sa­tion of grace and min­istry is in­au­gu­rated. This is true on all evo­lu­tion­ary worlds. When the high­est pos­si­ble level of evo­lu­tion­ary life has been at­tained, when prim­i­tive man has as­cended as far as pos­si­ble in the bi­o­logic scale, a Ma­te­rial Son and Daugh­ter al­ways ap­pear on the planet, hav­ing been dis­patched by the Sys­tem Sov­er­eign.

• appear on planets in light and life to elevate Planetary Princes to Planetary Sovereigns

52:7.10The Trin­ity Teacher Sons may re­turn many times to the same world. But sooner or later, in con­nec­tion with the ter­mi­na­tion of one of their mis­sions, the Plan­e­tary Prince is el­e­vated to the po­si­tion of Plan­e­tary Sov­er­eign, and the Sys­tem Sov­er­eign ap­pears to pro­claim the en­trance of such a world upon the era of light and life.

• perpetually head local systems in light and life; no more rotation

55:8.3Af­ter the set­tling of an en­tire sys­tem in light and life the Sys­tem Sov­er­eigns will no more come and go. Such a sov­er­eign re­mains per­pet­u­ally at the head of his sys­tem. The as­sis­tant sov­er­eigns con­tinue to change as in for­mer ages.

55:9.2When a con­stel­la­tion is thus set­tled in light, the leg­isla­tive func­tion ceases, and the house of Sys­tem Sov­er­eigns, pre­sided over by the Most Highs, func­tions in­stead. Now, for the first time, such ad­min­is­tra­tive groups deal di­rectly with the super­uni­verse gov­ern­ment in mat­ters per­tain­ing to Ha­vona and Par­a­dise re­la­tion­ships. Oth­er­wise the con­stel­la­tion re­mains re­lated to the lo­cal uni­verse as be­fore. From stage to stage in the set­tled life the uni­v­i­ta­tia con­tinue to ad­min­is­ter the con­stel­la­tion mor­ontia worlds.

72:0.2Of all the Sa­ta­nia worlds which be­came iso­lated be­cause of par­tic­i­pa­tion in the Lu­cifer re­bel­lion, this planet has ex­pe­ri­enced a his­tory most like that of Uran­tia. The sim­i­lar­ity of the two spheres un­doubt­edly ex­plains why per­mis­sion to make this ex­traor­di­nary pre­sen­ta­tion was granted, for it is most un­usual for the sys­tem rulers to con­sent to the nar­ra­tion on one planet of the af­fairs of an­other.

35:9.3When Sys­tem Sov­er­eigns or as­sis­tants are re­called, their places are filled by se­lec­tions made by the su­preme coun­cil lo­cated on the con­stel­la­tion head­quar­ters from the re­serves of that or­der, a group which is larger on Eden­tia than the av­er­age in­di­cated.

35:9.4The su­preme La­non­an­dek coun­cils are sta­tioned on the var­i­ous con­stel­la­tion head­quar­ters. Such a body is pre­sided over by the se­nior Most High as­so­ciate of the Con­stel­la­tion Fa­ther, while the ju­nior as­so­ciate super­vises the re­serves of the sec­ondary or­der.