LDC-E5308 — Timeless edition cannot carry lifecycle dates

What it means

An edition is either placed in time or explicitly timeless. A timeless edition claims no adoption, repeal, or suspension moment — that is the point of the claim. When such an edition still carries lifecycle fields such as an adoption date, the two claims contradict each other, and the compiler refuses the edition until one of them goes: either date the edition or drop the dates.

Example

Arxo Law

language "law.core" version "0.2";
package demo.diagnostics version "0.1.0";
namespace "urn:law:demo:diagnostics";

source TORAH { kind scripture; }
edition WLC of TORAH {
  language he; officiality official;
  applicability timeless;
  adopted @2026-01-01;
}

Fix

Arxo Law

language "law.core" version "0.2";
package demo.diagnostics version "0.1.0";
namespace "urn:law:demo:diagnostics";

source TORAH { kind scripture; }
edition WLC of TORAH {
  language he; officiality official;
  applicability timeless;
}

Engine message

The engine reports this in its own wording:

Output

example.law:6:9: error LDC-E5308: edition "WLC": `applicability timeless` is incompatible with lifecycle (§31): do not set a fictitious adoption/repeal date

Related

• Sources — how editions of a source work are declared.
• Time — how editions live in time.