Taoist Texts

from that stage on the work proceeds in the great Heavenly orbit, it is not allowed to deviate from it even for a single moment

In the beginning there was nothing in the universe except a formless chaos. This chaos coalesced into a cosmic egg for about 18,000 years. Within it, the perfectly opposed principles of Yin and Yang became balanced, and Pangu emerged (or woke up) from the egg. Pangu is usually depicted as a primitive, hairy giant who has horns on his head and wears furs. Pangu began creating the world: he separated Yin from Yang with a swing of his giant axe, creating the Earth (murky Yin) and the Sky (clear Yang). To keep them separated, Pangu stood between them and pushed up the Sky. This task took 18,000 years; with each day the sky grew ten feet (3 meters) higher, the Earth ten feet thicker, and Pangu ten feet taller. In some versions of the story, Pangu is aided in this task by the four most prominent beasts, namely the Turtle, the Qilin, the Phoenix, and the Dragon. After the 18,000 years had elapsed, Pangu died. His breath became the wind, mist and clouds; his voice, thunder; his left eye, the sun; his right eye, the moon; his head, the mountains and extremes of the world; his blood, rivers; his muscles, fertile land; his facial hair, the stars and Milky Way; his fur, bushes and forests; his bones, valuable minerals; his bone marrow, sacred diamonds; his sweat, rain; and the fleas on his fur carried by the wind became animals. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pangu

if the stages are multiudinous why to refer to them as 1 2 3?

yeah well may be, in a manner of speaking...on the other hand: If one does not know to which port one is sailing, no wind is favorable. –Seneca

The rightness of the track is defined by its destination. What is your destination? At any event dont worry about teachers, since there are no 'teachers' their imprtance is overrated.

Nobody thinks about these things except Marblehead. He knows.

Fantastic work Dawei, and to build on it further now I riddle you this: why all things need the Three (whatever those are) to get born? Why not they are not born straight from Dao or One or Two?

Yes there is, as laid down by one of the earliest commentaries Heshangong (2 CE) , which has those as 三生萬物。天地人共生萬物也 Heaven Earth Man. One has to remember that in early cosmology numbers do not have to represent anything. The Number and The Word are cosmic forces per se. also this https://www.academia.edu/4212037/_Forming_Spirits_for_the_Way_The_Cosmology_of_the_Xianger_Commentary_to_the_Laozi._

Its very simple: if they advertise then they need something, if they need anything then they are just like everybody else, if they are just like everybody else then they are not sages.

乾坤定位，人物生焉。 Qian and Kun establish their positions (at creation of the world) so humans and things are born from there. 人物之生，亦来源于此炁。 at this birth of human and things also this qi originally comes.

Your basic instinct of procreation is a mechanism that rewards you with the feeling of pleasure when you obey its command to spill your sperm; on the other hand, when you try to resist this biological programming - it punishes you with the feeling of depression. Its an old biological carrot and stick, nothing more. Same with the feeling good when retaining initially, thats the carrot, because in these case you obey the command to accumulate a healthy sperm reserve for successful insemination.

defo;)

I understand, thats a valid question with a disappointing answer: there is no such thing. There are no 'daoist criteria' as to who is a true daoist and who is a false one. There are two reasons for that: A. 'daoism' is a western construct with no consensual definition http://www.daoistcenter.org/daoist3.html B. Any criticism historicaly levelled by some 'daoists' against 'other daoists' was not in a format of 'You are not a true daoist! - No, you are not! ' but was directed at methods or results rather than at schools, the schools themselves being posteriori notions of later outgroup historiographers, and not self-identifications by the former ingroups. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ingroups_and_outgroups

you seem to ignore these 2 negations.

There is no such thing as a false school. False is not definable, it is a subjective characterization.

all of them actually.

also i goofed on this : 4 not 3

sure: birth from moisture (Sanskrit: Samsvedaja; Pali: Saṃsedaja; Chinese: 濕生; Standard Tibetan: Drod-skyes)—probably referring to the appearance of animals whose eggs are microscopic, like maggots appearing in rotting flesh;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J%C4%81ti_(Buddhism) The Four Manners of RebirthThe chapter begins with a discussion of the grossest internal cycle, which is the recurrence of death, bardo and rebirth. In general, Buddhism asserts four manners of rebirth: from a womb, from an egg, from heat and moisture, http://www.berzinarchives.com/web/en/archives/e-books/published_books/kalachakra_initiation/pt2/kalachakra_initiation_04.html Evolution Born of Moisture: Analogies and Parallels Between Anaximander's Ideas on Origin of Life and Man and Later Pre-Darwinian and Darwinian Evolutionary Concepts.This study focuses on the origin of life as presented in the thought of Anaximander of Miletus but also points to some parallel motifs found in much later conceptions of both the pre-Darwinian German romantic science and post-Darwinian biology. According to Anaximander, life originated in the moisture associated with earth (mud). http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22864993 Abiogenesis (/ˌeɪbaɪ.ɵˈdʒɛnɨsɪs/ ay-by-oh-jen-ə-siss[1]) or biopoiesis[2] is the natural process of life arising from non-living matter such as simple organic compounds.[3][4][5][6] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenesis

Whether born by transformation from foetus, egg or moisture, all living beings.... (from) 胎 foetus卵egg濕 moisture 化 transformed: 3 ways of being born into a living being.

In this yogi-ridden age, it is too readily assumed that ‘non-attachment’ is not only better than a full acceptance of earthly life, but that the ordinary man rejects it because it is too difficult; in other words, that the average human being is a failed saint. It is doubtful whether this is true. Many people genuinely do not wish to be saints, and it is probable that some who achieve or aspire to sainthood have never felt much temptation to be human beings. If one could follow it to its psychological roots, one would, I believe, find that the main motive for ”non-attachment” is a desire to escape from the pain of living, and above all from love, which, sexual or non-sexual, is hard work. But it is not necessary here to argue whether the other-worldly or the humanistic ideal is ‘higher’.’ The point is that they are incompatible. — George Orwell, Reflections on Gandhi

A saint is one who has been recognized for having an exceptional degree of holiness. While the English term "saint" originated in Christianity, historians of religion now use the term "in a more general way to refer to the state of special holiness that many religions attribute to certain people,"[1] with the Jewish Tzadik, the Islamic Mu'min, the Hindu rishi or guru, and the Buddhist arhat orbodhisattva also referred to as saints. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint

i like these goings-on for xian.

thats not bad for a top of the head explanation but stil could use more detail. You see xian 仙人 (which is translated as immortal) means a special kind of spiritual beings, who may or may not have been mortal at some point in time. Same with the sages 圣人 or 聖人, they might have been mortal or not, regardless of what happened to their physical bodies. Also TTC does not contain 仙人, only 聖人. On the other hand, Zhuangzi contains several appellations: an utter man至人a spiritual man 神人，a sage man 聖人; but no 仙人. In my translations i translate 仙人 as a saint, not an immortal, the latter being misleading.

How we know that they are not the same?

所屬 is a combo meaning 'vassals, subordinates' 道德經19 《道德經》: 絕聖棄智，民利百倍；絕仁棄義，民復孝慈；絕巧棄利，盜賊無有。 此三者以為文不足。故令有所屬：見素抱樸，少私寡欲。 《老子河上公章句·還淳》: 絕聖棄智，民利百倍。絕仁棄義，民復孝慈。絕巧棄利，盜賊無有。此三者，以為文不足，故令有所屬。見素抱樸，少私寡欲。 《郭店·老子甲》: 絕智棄辯，民利百倍。絕巧棄利，盜賊亡有。絕偽棄慮，民復季子。三言以為文不足，或令之或乎屬。視素保樸，少私寡欲。 《馬王堆·老子甲道經》: 絕聲棄知，民利百負；絕仁棄義，民復畜茲；絕巧棄利，盜賊無有。此三言也，以為文未足。故令之有所屬：見素抱□□□□□。 《馬王堆·老子乙道經》: 絕聖棄知，而民利百倍；絕仁棄義，而民復孝茲；絕巧棄利，盜賊無有。此三言也，以為文未足。故令之有所屬：見素抱樸，少□而寡欲。 此三者，以為文不足，These three tactics make up for insufficiency of culture 故令有所屬。Therefore to make your vassals obedient 見素抱樸，少私寡欲。Observe your own simplicity, lessen your desires.