Paper 121 Overview: The Times of Michael's Bestowal

The times into which Jesus was born represented the most favorable conditions that had ever existed for the Creator Son's bestowal on our world. Greek culture and language had spread throughout the Mediterranean, while Roman rule had established peace, good roads, and unified governance. The Jewish people, with their monotheistic religion and network of synagogues throughout the empire, provided the ideal cultural bridge between East and West for the dissemination of a new religious message.

These unique historical conditions created a perfect convergence of factors for Jesus' message to take root and spread. The Greco-Roman world offered material stability and cultural receptivity, while Jewish religious thought had evolved to a point where it could serve as a foundation for a more universal message. The spiritual hunger of the gentile world, evident in the popularity of mystery religions offering personal salvation, further prepared the way for Christianity's eventual acceptance beyond its Jewish origins.

This paper begins with an introduction by a secondary midwayer who was once attached to the Apostle Andrew. The midwayer states that he is authorized to record the narrative of Jesus' life as observed by his order of earth creatures, and as partially recorded by Andrew. The introduction explains that Andrew, following Jesus' example of avoiding written records, refused to make copies of his written narrative.

This reluctance by Andrew and the other apostles significantly delayed the writing of the Gospels. The midwayer commission overseeing this narrative consists of twelve members of the United Brotherhood of Urantia Midwayers, jointly sponsored by the presiding head of their order and the Melchizedek of record. This introduction establishes the narrative's source and authority while explaining why contemporary records of Jesus' life were limited.

Jesus was born during a time of spiritual revival on Urantia, not during a period of spiritual decline. When Michael incarnated, the world presented the most favorable conditions for a Creator Son's bestowal that had ever existed before or since that time. In the preceding centuries, Greek culture and language had spread throughout the Western world, while the Jews, being partly Western and partly Eastern in nature, were perfectly positioned to utilize these cultural and linguistic conditions to effectively spread a new religion eastward and westward. These advantageous circumstances were further enhanced by the stable political environment of Roman rule.

This remarkable convergence of favorable conditions is well illustrated by the activities of Paul, who, though culturally a "Hebrew of the Hebrews," proclaimed the gospel of a Jewish Messiah in the Greek language while enjoying the rights and protections of Roman citizenship. European civilization at this time was unified under three extraordinary influences: the Roman political and social systems, the Greek language and culture (including elements of Greek philosophy), and the rapidly spreading influence of Jewish religious and moral teachings. When Jesus was born, the entire Mediterranean world existed as a unified empire with good roads connecting major centers for the first time in world history, clearing the seas of pirates and encouraging travel and trade at a level not seen again until the nineteenth century.

The Jews were part of the older Semitic race and held considerable influence during the first century after Christ. They occupied a strategically significant geographic position at a time when many of the great highways connecting ancient nations passed through Palestine. This made their homeland a crossroads for three continents, where travel routes, trade caravans, and armies from various empires had moved through the region throughout history.

Greece provided a language and culture, Rome built unifying roads and established an empire, but it was the dispersed Jews with their network of over two hundred synagogues throughout the Roman world that provided the cultural centers where the new gospel found its initial reception. Each Jewish synagogue tolerated a fringe of gentile believers called "God-fearers," and it was among these proselytes that Paul made the majority of his early converts to Christianity. The centralization of Jewish temple worship in Jerusalem preserved their monotheism and created the foundation for spreading this expanded concept of one God who is Father of all mortals throughout the world.

Although the Roman state's social and economic conditions were not ideal, the widespread domestic peace and prosperity provided favorable circumstances for Michael's bestowal. In the first century after Christ, Mediterranean society consisted of five well-defined social strata: the privileged aristocracy, the merchant princes and bankers, a small but influential middle class that later formed the moral backbone of the early Christian church, the free proletariat with little social standing, and slaves who comprised half the empire's population.

Slavery remained a feature of Roman conquests, with masters holding unlimited power over their slaves. However, superior slaves often received wages and could eventually purchase their freedom, sometimes rising to high positions in society. This possibility made the early Christian church more tolerant of this modified form of slavery. There was no widespread social unrest in the Roman Empire at this time, as most people accepted their social position without feeling it was unjust. Christianity was not primarily an economic movement aimed at improving conditions for the lower classes, though it did recognize the spiritual equality of all believers regardless of social status.

The gentiles, while morally somewhat inferior to the Jews, possessed sufficient natural goodness and potential for human affection to receive and nurture the seeds of Christianity. The gentile world of Jesus' time was dominated by four major philosophical schools, all somewhat derived from earlier Greek Platonism, that influenced how people understood their place in the world and their relationship to divine forces.

These four philosophical traditions were: the Epicureans, who pursued happiness and helped deliver Romans from fatalism; the Stoics, who believed in a controlling Reason-Fate and developed sublime moral ideals that were never surpassed by any purely human philosophical system; the Cynics, who preached that people could save themselves through simplicity and virtue and prepared the way for Christian missionaries with their public preaching; and the Skeptics, who asserted that knowledge was unreliable and certainty impossible. These philosophies were semi-religious in nature and often ethically uplifting, but with the possible exception of Cynicism, they remained philosophies for the strong and wise rather than religions of salvation accessible to all people.

Throughout previous ages, religion had primarily been a tribal or national affair rather than a matter of individual concern. Gods were typically associated with specific peoples or territories, providing little satisfaction for the average person's spiritual longings. By Jesus' time, this had begun to change as more personal forms of religious expression emerged throughout the Western world.

The religions of the Occident during Jesus' time included: traditional pagan cults combining Greek and Latin mythology with patriotism; emperor worship that later led to persecutions of Jews and Christians; astrology from Babylon; and mystery religions that promised individual salvation. These mystery religions marked the end of national religious beliefs and gave rise to personal cults characterized by mythical legends, non-national membership, elaborate initiation ceremonies, and promises of salvation after death. While these mystery religions failed to adequately satisfy humanity's spiritual hunger, they prepared the way for Jesus' teachings about the bread of life and living water by demonstrating people's genuine desire for personal religion.

By the end of the first century before Christ, religious thought in Jerusalem had been significantly influenced by Greek cultural teachings and philosophy. In the ongoing contest between Eastern and Western schools of Hebrew thought, Jerusalem and the Western regions generally adopted the Hellenistic viewpoint. Three languages prevailed in Palestine during Jesus' time: common people spoke Aramaic, priests and rabbis used Hebrew, and educated classes spoke Greek.

The translation of Hebrew scriptures into Greek at Alexandria substantially influenced the subsequent development of Judaism. This vital cultural shift ultimately determined that Paul's Christian movement would spread westward rather than eastward. Hellenized Jewish beliefs incorporated elements of Platonic philosophy and Stoic doctrines of self-denial. Philo of Alexandria played a crucial role in harmonizing Greek philosophy with Hebrew theology into a coherent system of religious belief and practice. This combined teaching of Greek philosophy and Hebrew theology prevailed in Palestine during Jesus' lifetime and provided the foundation Paul later used to develop his more advanced Christian teachings.

By Jesus' time, the Jews had developed fixed concepts regarding their origin, history, and destiny. They had erected rigid barriers separating themselves from the gentile world, viewing non-Jewish customs with contempt. They worshipped the letter of the law and took pride in their ancestry, having formed predetermined notions about the promised Messiah that largely involved national and racial expectations rather than spiritual renewal.

Jesus' teachings on tolerance and kindness toward all peoples directly contradicted the long-standing Jewish attitude toward outsiders. For generations, Jews had cultivated an exclusive approach to the outside world that made it difficult for them to accept Jesus' message about the spiritual brotherhood of all humanity. The scribes, Pharisees, and priesthood held the Jewish people in bondage through ritualism and legalism, subjugating them not only to Roman political rule but also to the slavish demands of traditions that dominated every aspect of personal and social life. These circumstances made it impossible for the Jews to fulfill their divine destiny as messengers of spiritual freedom, requiring different peoples to carry forward Jesus' teachings about personal sanctity and spiritual liberty.

In preparing this record of Jesus' life, the author has drawn from various sources, including the lost record of the Apostle Andrew and collaboration with numerous celestial beings who were present during Michael's bestowal. The author has also utilized the four Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, explaining their origins and the unique perspective each provides on Jesus' life and teachings.

Mark wrote the earliest, briefest, and simplest record at Peter's request for the church in Rome, presenting Jesus as a man among men. Matthew's Gospel, actually written by his disciple Isador, portrayed Jesus as fulfilling Jewish prophecy and law. Luke, a gentile physician converted by Paul, emphasized Jesus as "the friend of publicans and sinners" and highlighted the grace of the Lord. John's Gospel, written last with Nathan's assistance, covered Jesus' work in Judea that was omitted from the other accounts. Despite their imperfections, these records have been sufficient to change the course of Urantia's history for almost two thousand years.