How an Entry Is Made

1. 01The sources come first. Before anything is written, the entry's source shelf is fixed: the primary sources and the earliest surviving evidence for them, the public-domain translations that may be quoted, and the modern editions and studies that may only be cited.
2. 02Drafting from the sources. Entries are drafted with the help of an AI model, working from those sources and in the structure every entry shares: sources and dating, the account itself, key terms, comparisons, later reception, and a labelled AKASHA Reading.
3. 03Automated checks. Every build of the site checks each entry. A quotation from a source whose licence does not allow it, a source missing from the bibliography, a summary of the wrong length, or a link to an item that does not exist or is not yet published stops the build, so the entry cannot be published.
4. 04Independent review. A separate reviewer that took no part in the drafting is given only the entry, the bibliography and a checklist. It checks every quotation against the printed page, every date, every native term, every evidence label and the rules below, and writes a report. Problems are fixed before publication.
5. 05Sign-off and publication. The founder signs the entry off. Only then is it marked verified, dated and published, with its first line of revision history. Drafts never appear on the site.

Each entry's status line says when it was verified and who reviewed it. A human specialist is named there only with their written permission; otherwise it reads “an independent review pass”. Every entry is bylined “AKASHA Archive”: we do not attach invented authors or credentials.

Attested

A primary source states it, or it is settled scholarship with a standard reference.

Contested

Qualified scholars disagree. The entry names at least one position on each side.

Not supported

A claim in circulation that the sources do not bear out. The entry says where the claim comes from.

Labels sit at the point where a claim is made, not in a disclaimer at the top. They mark what a knowledgeable reader could dispute; settled facts are left unmarked, because a page where everything is labelled has labelled nothing. Every label is written out in words, never shown by colour alone.

We quote only from translations we are free to reprint: works in the public domain in the United States (today, those published before 1931; the line moves forward every 1 January), and works released under an open licence that allows it, with the credit that licence requires. Modern translations and studies under copyright, including those under licences that forbid commercial use or changes, are read, cited and summarised in our own words, but never quoted.

Every quotation names its translator, edition, year and the line or chapter it comes from, and links to the printed page wherever a scan of the book exists. A citation shows that a passage is real; it does not by itself give the right to reprint it, so both are checked.

The texts in the Codex are transcribed from page images of the printed editions, never copied from another website's transcription. The editor's brackets, gaps and line numbers are kept exactly where the editor put them, so a scholar's restoration always stays visibly a restoration. Each text has an “About this translation” panel saying what later discoveries have changed, because an old translation carries old scholarship.

AKASHA does not publish translations of its own. The AKASHA Reading at the end of an entry is our interpretation, labelled as such and kept apart from what the sources say.

Dates are given as BCE and CE, with “c.” for approximate ones. We always separate when a work was composed from when its surviving copies were made: a poem may be centuries older than its oldest manuscript.

Every entry and text records its earliest evidence and how that date is known: from a manuscript, an inscription, a mention in another source, or an estimate from the language itself. The timeline and the series are ordered by that evidence, not by the age a tradition claims for itself.

If you find a mistake, use “Report an error” at the foot of any entry, or write to support@akashacodex.com. A confirmed error is fixed in a dated revision, and the entry's revision history says what changed. Errors are never removed silently, and corrected text is never republished in its old form.

Popular claims about the traditions are checked on their own pages, the Corrections.

• Medical or health claims of any kind.
• Instructions for practices, rituals or exercises. Practices are described, never prescribed.
• Closed ceremonial material. What a living tradition keeps for its initiates stays with them.
• Later works passed off as ancient. A modern book is dated where it is mentioned, for example the Kybalion (1908).
• Quotations that cannot be traced to a named source, or that the source does not contain.
• Invented authors, reviewers or credentials.