{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 266a/1908-02-26/p009","lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"text":"Now it is a law in occultism that every esoteric truth wears out after a certain time. And it is the task of the leaders of humanity to ensure that a new one is proclaimed. But now there are also many in esotericism who say: what do we need a new truth for? Such people cause religions to become stagnant and prevent any esoteric progress. However, it is the task of the true esotericist to ensure that the whole life of thought is kept alive and flowing. This is achieved by taking in the thoughts of the divine creative beings. These thoughts work at night in the astral body and have an effect on the etheric body. And when the work of these thoughts in the astral body becomes ever stronger and more effective in relation to the etheric body, then gradually that moment approaches which must come sooner or later for every student, when he becomes conscious of the spiritual worlds, where thoughts are imprinted in the etheric body like a seal in wax. ![266-37](images/266-37.webp) During the Earth period, the fourth element is added. While the heat of the Saturn period in combination with the air of the Sun period produced combustion, and the interaction with the cold of the surrounding space produced moisture, the interaction of fire and water, heat and moisture now produces crystallization, and thus we have the fourth element: Earth. This is also the fourth stage in divine development. And the will, feeling, and creative thought of the three previous periods give rise to the form of the fourth stage, the physical human being of the Earth period.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"title":"Esoteric Lesson","site_heading":"Divine Thoughts and Human Development: The Rosicrucian Cosmology","site_heading_note":"A heading the site wrote for this unit from a summary of it; not in the edition, and not the words of Rudolf Steiner or of the translator. Cite the unit by its title and locus, never by this heading, and do not quote it.","date":"1908-02-26","location":null,"word_count":273,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/266a/1908-02-26/p009","alignment_confidence":"low","alignment_reason":"count_diverges","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":{"scope":"unit","status":"established","translator":"Steiner Online Library","identified_edition":"SOL2024","book_title":"Esoteric Lessons 1904–1909","publisher":"Steiner Online Library","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA266I/English/SOL2024/19080226e02.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"edition_coverage":{"de":["original"],"en":["English"]},"available_versions":[{"lang":"de","edition":"original","edition_basis":null,"is_original":true,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/266a/1908-02-26/p009"},{"lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/266a/1908-02-26/p009"}],"figures":[{"file":"266-37.webp","alt":"266-37","url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/ga/266a/images/English/266-37.webp","in_source_tree":true}],"record":{"record_type":"listeners_notes","scope":"volume","note":"Written from listeners' notes, summaries, or memory rather than a shorthand transcript. The wording is the note-taker's as much as Steiner's: weigh a single striking phrase here far more cautiously than the same phrase in a stenographic volume, and do not rest an argument on one word.","evidence":"Gedächtnisaufzeichnungen von Teilnehmern sowie Notizen von Vorträgen","evidence_translation":"Participants' records written from memory, and notes of lectures","evidence_source":"Rudolf Steiner Verlag Gesamtverzeichnis 2022, volume subtitle. The translation is the maintainer's, not a published one."},"witness_completeness":{"ratio":1.02,"band":"comparable","note":null,"word_count":3847,"original_word_count":3760,"may_be_abridged":false},"witness_quality":{"translator":{"scope":"unit","status":"recorded","translator":"Steiner Online Library","identified_edition":"SOL2024","book_title":"Esoteric Lessons 1904–1909","publisher":"Steiner Online Library","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA266I/English/SOL2024/19080226e02.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"entity_parity":{"status":"not_checkable","note":"No verified paragraph alignment covers this passage, so its names cannot be compared with the German."},"note":"quote_safe certifies the bytes of this text. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. See witness_completeness for how much of the original this witness holds."}}