Attached Paper In-person November Annual Meeting 2026

Is the Urantia Book Gnostic?

Abstract for Online Program Book (maximum 150 words)

In academic writing, “Gnostic” does not mean someone who achieves a deep relationship with God. It refers to a recognizable kind of theologizing found in the Nag Hammadi texts, which is an anti-traditional, intellectualizing, holds that believes human spirits are prisoners within the body, oppressed by heavenly archons, including the deranged archon who created the world, and that salvation means achieving hidden wisdom and escape from the body. In that sense, The Urantia Book is decidedly anti-Gnostic. It affirms the goodness of the creator (who is Jesus), that the heavenly authorities are not hostile to individual mortals, and that this world is a vale of soul-making. On the issue of spiritual “inwardness.” I compare the “kingdom within” passage in Luke 17:21 to its two close parallels in the Gospel of Thomas.