Meredith Sprunger's Synopsis of The Urantia Book
Synopsis of Paper 76
THE SECOND GARDEN
1. Cain and Sansa were both born before the Adamic caravan had reached its destination between the rivers in Mesopotamia. Laotta, the mother of Sansa, perished at the birth of her daughter...Sansa grew up to be a woman of great ability.
2. It required almost a full year for the caravan of Adam to reach the Euphrates River... And here in this new location Adam and his helpers set themselves to work to build new homes and establish a new center of culture and religion.
3. Less than two years after Cain's birth, Abel was born, the first child of Adam and Eve to be born in the second garden. When Abel grew up to the age of twelve years, he elected to be a herder; Cain had chosen to follow agriculture…The two boys never got along well ...Cain's natural bellicose inheritance, caused him to nourish an ever‑increasing hatred for his younger brother. The boys were respectively eighteen and twenty years of age when the tension between them was finally resolved, one day, when Abel's taunts so infuriated his bellicose brother that Cain turned upon him in wrath and slew him.
4. Abel had an ideal inheritance, and heredity lies at the bottom of all character; but the influence of an inferior environment virtually neutralized this magnificent inheritance... Good social environment and proper education are indispensable soil and atmosphere for getting the most out of a good inheritance.
5. To Adam and Eve, Cain was fast becoming the grim reminder of their folly, and they encouraged him in his decision to leave the garden ...Fear, and some remorse, led him to repent…he now went to Eve, his mother, and asked for spiritual help and guidance, and when he honestly sought divine assistance, an Adjuster indwelt him…He became a great leader among one group of his father's people and did, to a certain degree, fulfill the predictions of Serapatatia, for he did promote peace between this division of the Nodites and the Adamites throughout his lifetime.
6. Adam wisely spent most of the time training his children and their associates in civil administration, educational methods, and religious devotions. Had it not been for this foresight, pandemonium would have broken loose upon his death.
7. The religious rulers, or priesthood, originated with Seth, the eldest surviving son of Adam and Eve born in the second garden... The Sethite priesthood was a threefold undertaking, embracing religion, health, and education.
8. Up to the time of leaving the first garden, Adam and his family had always subsisted on fruits, cereals, and nuts. On the way to Mesopotamia they had, for the first time, partaken of herbs and vegetables. The eating of meat was early introduced into the second garden, but Adam and Eve never partook of flesh as a part of their regular diet.
9. The Adamites greatly excelled the surrounding peoples in cultural achievement and intellectual development...Here in the lands between the Tigris and Euphrates they maintained the arts of writing, metalworking, pottery making, and weaving and produced a type of architecture that was not excelled in thousands of years.
10. Adam and Eve were the founders of the violet race of men, the ninth human race to appear on Urantia. Adam and his offspring had blue eyes, and the violet peoples were characterized by fair complexions and light hair color ‑ yellow, red, and brown.
11. Both the physical and spiritual visions of Adam and Eve were far superior to those of the present‑day peoples. Their special senses were much more acute, and they were able to see the midwayers and the angelic hosts, the Melchizedeks, and the fallen Prince Caligastia...They retained the ability to see these celestial beings for over one hundred years after the default.
12. After becoming established in the second garden on the Euphrates, Adam elected to leave behind as much of his life plasm as possible to benefit the world after his death. Accordingly, Eve was made the head of a commission of twelve on race improvement, and before Adam died this commission had. selected 1,682 of the highest type of women on Urantia, and these women were impregnated with the Adamic life plasm...Though these candidate mothers were selected from all the surrounding tribes and represented most of the races on earth, the majority were chosen from the highest strains of the Nodites, and they constituted the early beginnings of the mighty Andite race.
13. It was always a comfort to Adam and Eve, as well as something difficult for them to understand, to ponder the only personal message they ever received from Michael. This message, among other expressions of friendship and comfort, said: "1 have given consideration to the circumstances of your default, I have remembered the desire of your hearts ever to be loyal to my Father's will, and you will be called from the embrace of mortal slumber when I come to Urantia if the subordinate Sons of my realm do not send for you before that time.”
14. The Edenic pair always proclaimed that a Son of God would sometime come, and they communicated to their loved ones the belief, at least the longing hope, that the world of their blunders and sorrows might possibly be the realm whereon the ruler of this universe would elect to function as the Paradise bestowal Son. It seemed too good to be true, but Adam did entertain the thought that strife‑born Urantia might, after all, turn out to be the most fortunate world in the system of Satania, the envied planet of all Nebadon.
15. Adam lived for 530 years; he died of what might be termed old age ...Eve had died nineteen years previously of a weakened heart. They were both buried in the center of the temple of divine service ...And this was the origin of the practice of burying noted and pious men and women under the floors of the places of worship.
16. Misfortune has not, however, been the sole lot of Urantia; this planet has also been the most fortunate in the local universe of Nebadon. Urantians should count it all gain if the blunders of their ancestors and the mistakes of their early world rulers so plunged the planet into such a hopeless state of confusion, all the more confounded by evil and sin, that this very background of darkness should so appeal to Michael of Nebadon that he selected this world as the arena wherein to reveal the loving personality of the Father in heaven.
17. On the third day after Adam's death ...Adam and Eve were repersonalized and reassembled in the resurrection halls of the mansion worlds of Satania together with 1,316 of their associates in the experience of the first garden.
18. Adam and Eve quickly passed through the worlds of progressive ascension until they attained citizenship on Jerusem...They were immediately attached to the Urantia service on the system capital, later being assigned membership among the four and twenty counselors who constitute the present advisory‑control body of Urantia.
19. Adam and Eve...left a great culture on earth, but it was not possible for such an advanced civilization to survive in the face of the early dilution and the eventual submergence of the Adamic inheritance. It is the people who make a civilization; civilization does not make the people.
Discussion Questions
1. Why do we have virtually no record of the first Garden of Eden?
2. Why do you think the Biblical account of Cain has both Adam and Eve as his parents?
3. How does science today evaluate heredity and environment?
4. Why were the first generation Adamites vegetarians?
5. What do you think of the ethics of Adam’s impregnating 1682 women?
6. Which is preferable, Adam and Eve’s status as a material son and daughter or their status as ascendant citizens of Jerusem?
7. When do you think Adam and Eve will be allowed to resume their ascension to Paradise?
A Service of
The Urantia Book Fellowship