{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 266b/1912-04-24/p023","lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"text":"Theosophists can understand this if they pay attention to the conflict in human nature. Two forces are at work in human beings: descending and ascending. If only the former were present in human beings, they would never be able to come to earth; they would have to remain in the spiritual world. If only the ascending forces were present in them, they would never be able to leave the physical world once they were in it. (An example of the descending forces acting alone is provided by the group souls of animals, which is why they cannot descend to the physical plane.) Both forces are at work in human beings, but initially the ascending forces predominate. This continues until about the age of thirty-three or thirty-five, when the descending forces gain the upper hand. This is also the reason why Christ had to die at the age of thirty-three: the descending forces were at work in him, those of heaven, which could no longer keep him on earth. In Adam, the ascending forces were at work — not these alone, of course, just as both forces are present in human beings, but one prevails over the other. Thus, in human evolution, the first type of forces to manifest themselves are the ascending forces in Adam, the earthly forces given to him by the divine Father — and then the descending forces in Christ, the fatherless human being. Until the age of thirty-three, we carry Adam within us; at the age of thirty-three, we have developed everything that the earth can give us. Then we have within us everything that will later be returned to the earth—or to fire. What we develop after this time happens through the Christ forces, which become stronger and stronger as decay increases.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"title":"Esoteric Lesson","site_heading":"Adam and Christ: Ascending and Descending Forces","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 Cite the unit by its title and locus, never by this heading, and do not quote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":"1912-04-24","location":null,"word_count":297,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/266b/1912-04-24/p023","alignment_confidence":"low","alignment_reason":"count_diverges","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":{"scope":"unit","status":"established","translator":"Steiner Online Library","identified_edition":"SOL2025","book_title":"Esoteric Lessons 1910–1912","publisher":"Steiner Online Library","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA266II/English/SOL2025/19120424e02.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":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/266b/1912-04-24/p023"}],"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","evidence_translation":"Participants' records written from memory","evidence_source":"Rudolf Steiner Verlag Gesamtverzeichnis 2022, volume subtitle. The translation is the maintainer's, not a published one."},"paired_german":{"status":"no_paragraph_pairing","note":"No paragraph pairing exists for this paragraph, so no German text is given. The German paragraph of the same number is a different passage or an unestablished one. Read the German unit (german_unit.fetch_unit) and find the place by its content.","german_unit":{"lang":"de","edition":"original","unit_locus":"GA 266b/1912-04-24","paragraph_count":10,"fetch_unit":{"ga":"266b","lecture":"1912-04-24","lang":"de","edition":"original"},"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/266b/1912-04-24","json_url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/ga/266b/1912-04-24?lang=de"},"pairing_state":"proposed","verified":false},"witness_completeness":{"ratio":1.03,"band":"comparable","note":null,"word_count":2482,"original_word_count":2409,"may_be_abridged":false},"witness_quality":{"translator":{"scope":"unit","status":"recorded","translator":"Steiner Online Library","identified_edition":"SOL2025","book_title":"Esoteric Lessons 1910–1912","publisher":"Steiner Online Library","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA266II/English/SOL2025/19120424e02.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."}}