Arkady Shadursky

I have created the thread about a month ago containing correct translations, but for some reason this thread disappeared and even mod team doesn't know where did it go... I had consulted with the administration and was advised to simply restore the thread by creating new one. Thank you. --- Arkady

As far I've got direct accusation, I want to openly answer it and clarify my position. My goal of being here is the spreading of Traditional Daoism (Ancient Dao). Showing it from every perspective and helping fellow members to find out more about it. So, I'd like explain my latest activity here with an example: Let's imagine you are entering the shop and see several shelves with apples. All the apples are similar at the first glance but some of them are made of plastic while the others are natural. Plastic apples look so real that it is almost impossible to distinguish where is the real one and where is plastic. So you see that people come and choose an apple to take. And much of them are taking plastic ones (to be honest there are much more plastic than natural ones on the shelves). Being a professional apple cultivator you start feeling yourself responsible to highlight that, saying "Please notice, this apple is plastic. It hasn't several attributes which natural apple has and regardless how does it look at the surface the result of eating it will be different to eating the natural one, so please be careful". It seems to be your natural desire to explain this to people... We can continue the story with opinions from the store . Like (from buyers): "- It is said in the instruction to this (you say plastic) apple that you need to imagine that you feel very good and it is tasty. I visualize this really well and am absolutely satisfied with this (you say plastic) apple." (from sellers): "- Why you criticizing my apples! - You are bad! - You are only trying to sell your own apples! - You should be tolerant to all kind of apples! - You are making money! - Then your apples are made from rubber!" That's it. --- Best Regards, Arkady

Dawei, I really happy for those people who are practicing some methods better than Lu Dongbin and Lao Zi have transmitted to us. However ordinary people should simply follow words of Lao Zi, Lu Dongbing and other Patriarchs. We are doing our best to help with that. P.S. Usually the Masters who have higher level can easily understand the concepts of lower methods. For example if one has understood the Heavenly laws any earthly interpretations like Bagua, Yijing etc. become obvious to him/her. Thus anyone can easily check himself his own level (same for women).--- Best Regards, Arkady

Lu Dongbin and Zhongli Quan were writing about the methods which one should follow to attain Dao (http://www.all-dao.com/ghost-immortal.html) And they also were writing about the methods which will never lead to the Golden Elixir (http://www.thedaobums.com/topic/35815-minor-schools-and-inconsistent-methods-from-zhong-l%C3%BC-chuan-dao-ji/#entry569095) So, if Zhongli and Lu are telling us what are correct methods to attaind Dao and what are side-roads I'd listen to them carefully and take it to the heart. I this case it probably becomes possible to acheive the stages Lu and Zhongli were talking about. On the other hand if you follow H'oppo'no'no's master methods then you'd acheive the results H'oppo'no'no's master have. That's it. Everyone chooses his/her own way. --- Best Regards, Arkady

Well, as far as there is no more "proofs" for misleading concepts, Dao can finally take it's rights Actually, I'm glad that we finally end this discussion. I only hope that every member who provides translation here would keep in mind that there are other translators in the community. And any attempt of mistranslation wouldn't go unnoticed. This is also true for translators from DaoDe. (and for sincere translators this is only for good - they are always greatfully accept corrections to their own mistakes) --- Best Regards, Arkady

What would you say if lets say Lui Dongbin, Zhongli Quan, Zhang Boduan, Wu Chongxu, Liu Huayang and other Patriarchs of the Past would say in their numerous texts that some specific kind of practice you are doing for a long time is wrong? Would you say "ah, it all words and papers, my real practice experience is more important"? Or would you say "Very interesting. I need to research and think about it, probably change my practice." Or would you say "How good I know that now! I need to search for proper practice! Probably first I need to read that texts..." The question is rhetorical. Not to answer, but to think - for everyone. --- Best Regards, Arkady

Perfect! After 2 months of intensive searches you finally managed to find a single link that looks like supportive for your mistranslation. So let me provide fellow members a little "Chinese for dummies" explanation about this single-in-entire-internet example you are referring to. 不可多得 Literally: "Can not (be) much (of something)", meaning rare. Figuratively: probably, as an idiom it can be used in sense of "you shouldn't pass by this, you wouldn't find more of it, etc." And the corresponding usages: 不可多得的机会 rare opportunity 不可多得的人才 exceptional talent 不可多得的佳作 a rare specimen of good writing However there is no idiom "不可晓" meaning "hard to understand". So it means - literally - 不可 impossible 晓 to understand (please see 2nd message of this topic for the origin of what we are talking about, the text in red). You probably should understand that continuing insisting on your mistranslation you are again and again showing anyone knowing Chinese on TheDaoBums the true reason you initially "translated" 不可 as "hard to". BTW, if it took 2 months for you to find such a link - what dictionary were you originally basing on for your initial "translation"? Which dictionary says that 不可 is "hard to"? What textbook? Or were it only your personal thoughts? --- Best Regards, Arkady

Thank you. I totally agree and accept.) Absolutely) Thank you very much, now we clearly see what is your approach to the Neidan The above is one of the many examples of the Daoist practice results in our Center. In our work we do not use any faith / religion approaches. --- Best Regards, Arkady

If one is reading the entire book and there is a phrase "Wu said" by context it is obvious which Wu had said it. But putting this phrase without context not commenting whose are these words - is a translator failure. Anyway we are happy that now you do know that Wu Chongxu and Wu Shouxu are two different man - school brothers and cousins and neither a single author nor twin brothers as you guessed erlier ( http://www.thedaobums.com/topic/43462-correct-words-of-patriarchs/page-1#entry738652 http://www.thedaobums.com/topic/43034-correcting-some-misinterpretations/page-1#entry730239 ). This actually is for sure constructive for the community . So do you recognize that translating 不可 as "hard to" is false? --- Best Regards, Arkady

If I tell you awaken'Pai has much worse situation you might be very angry and attack me. So let her keep her religion. --- Arkady P.S. Sorry, I couldn't resist

Hello everyone. In this thread I'd like to continue discussion about "if it is possible/impossible to get everything from Books" which has started here ( http://www.thedaobums.com/topic/43462-correct-words-of-patriarchs/) Back in time A.A. Khokhlov provided quotes from multiple Treatises where explicitly written that it's impossible to attain the Dao without the True Teacher (http://www.thedaobums.com/topic/42854-about-necessity-of-having-a-true-teacher/). This shows us that it's not a position of a single writer, but position of entire Traditional Daoism. I would say that if such great Patriarchs as Zhang Boduan, Liu Huayang and others were writing that one can't get full knowledge from books even if he/she is smartest and talented person, than its most likely they had reasons to write it. This is the position of the Tradition (and also my point) Thank you --- Regards, Arkady

Usually people learn how to apply logic to reality in high school. In our world it is a basement for any further education / learning / understanding / discussion. For me this phrase is a pointer how should I treat the entire post...--- Arkady

Could you please provide the link to this translation? I never seen professional translation of Yuan Gongfu text available. Or could it be you are mixing up Yuan Gongfu's and Zhang Boduan's texts? Yuan Gongfu in his commentary slightly changed Zhang Boduan's words. In original Zhang Boduan's text there is no 不可 - impossible. While in Yuan Gongfu's commentary we see 不可 - impossible. Yes teachings are changing over time. Lets consider Christian Teaching and its "evolution": Initially God was speaking directly to people, there were miracles happening... There was Edem in the end! Later the Christianity has changed. God hasn't shown himself but luckily (for us) Jesus came and he was able to rise people from the dead. Later (lets say medieval period) the Christianity has changed again. There were no more persons like Jesus but "at least" there were Saints who were making miracles and heal people. And nowadays the Christianity has "evolved" even more. A lot of traditional values are being "upgraded" to fit modern society. And now we can see neither Saints nor miracles anymore. So - yes the teaching may change over time. That's for sure. However the results of practicing it may change as well. Isn't there a saying in Bible "By their fruit you will recognize them"? The analogy is quite clear. Fruit and result mean the same... We believe - (considering the human structure hasn't changed) if we want to achieve same results as Patriarchs of the Past the only thing we need to do is to practice the same methods they did. It is what we are researching in DaoDe Center, what we are seeking for in our numerous travels to Chinese heartland. Of course it's not, kar3n. It pains me to hear you make such accusations when my only concern is for spreading the Dao Teaching. I'd like to answer you separately in the other thread so nobody has doubts in this respect any more. Please follow the link: http://www.thedaobums.com/topic/43568-the-goal/ That would be invaluable contribution! I'm looking forward to have a look at your research. I don't think the first language matters much. Discussing it would be labeling the translator, I'd prefer to avoid it.--- Best Regards, Arkady

Marblehead, kar3n, Wu Ming Jen, thank you for sharing your opinion. However this thread is not about possibility of oneself to understand everything from books, but about particular translation and its mistakes. And concerning translation we see here 不可 which can be translated no way else but impossible. (literally 不 - not 可 - possible). That is what Yuan Gongfu has written in his passage. If you'd like to discuss if it is possible to understand everything from books in Traditional Daoism, please welcome to my thread I specially created for that. (http://www.thedaobums.com/topic/43551-understanding-everything-from-daoist-texts/) Unfortunately this logic doesn't work here and can't be applied to Chinese reality. We can discuss a lot about why do we have 师父 but don't have 师妈 and if it is ever possible to be 弟子 without having 师妈 and so on and on. However it has nothing to do with how it really setup in Traditional Schools. If you would ever been accepted to Traditional School you'd know that disciples are calling each other "brother" or "sister". BTW, to extend your understanding of Chinese culture and Traditional relationships in the Schools you can read Journey to the West, and check how do disciples of Xuanzang are calling each other ("Brother Pig", "Second Brother", "Elder Brother", "Brother Monkey" etc.) Anyway latest two posts of you have nothing to do with translating 不可 and the other mistake - treating two different authors as one and calling them twins as you did before. --- Best Regards, Arkady

It is ok if we are talking about the big topic of necessity of Teacher's transmission - A.A.Khokhlov has started a separate topic about this earlier (http://www.thedaobums.com/topic/42854-about-necessity-of-having-a-true-teacher/#entry726940) and we can discuss it there. But here we are mostly discussing the translation in academic way - and it seems there is no way to translate "不可" as "hard". I understand it. I can only point you to basic dictionaries and examples so you can make your own opinion. We can not study Wenyan together as part of this discussion So here I can only tell you the conclusions of our research: according to context - it also can not be "not allowed" as in the entire text there is no other place where someone would "disallow understanding". Neither in other neidan texts . It also doesn't contain grammatical constructions pointing us to such a meaning. Moreover these words of Yuan Gongfu are rephrased words of Patriarch Zhang Boduan, you can see the original quote here (http://www.thedaobums.com/topic/42854-about-necessity-of-having-a-true-teacher/#entry726940). It also says about necessity of verbal teaching and corresponds to the sense of "not possible". And anyway, it doesn't seems possible to translate "不可" as "hard". --- Best Regards, Arkady

Because we have contacts with different Schools in China and we are open for different approaches. That visit was planned many years ago and it should have happened. Later we are going to organize seminars of Zhengyidao and Yuxianpai Masters, probably even more in future. We are not criticizing Longmen, what about Zhao Bichen's school - modern WuLiupai representatives doesn't recognize it as a successor of WuLiupai, nothing more. You better talk about sex games on specialized forums. It is Chinese reality, no matter if you like it or dislike it - it will remain the same. Here is one more story: In early 2000s we were traveling in Chinese mountains and stayed for several days in a Daoist monastery there. One of beginners from our group asked if it is possible to study from Daoists of this monastery. We asked - and got special allowance for that (now such lessons are common in many places, but in 90s-00s it was much harder for foreigner to study in a Daoist temple or monastery)... So the lesson started the next day. Daoist said student to take some posture, made some corrections and went to a nearby building. The posture was uncomfortable and when Daoist has gone, student has changed the posture to much simplier one. When Daoist returned - student took the original posture, when he left - student again changed the posture to have a rest. Very soon Daoist has noticed this and asked us in Chinese: "- Can I hit him?" We replied "- No, please, he is a foreigner and may not be ready for it." "- In this case I see no way to teach him." - said Daoist and stopped the lesson. --- Regards, Arkady

If it were "not allowed" the entire phrase would sound like "... even if you are very talented - yet you are not allowed to understand" - which contains 2 illogicalities: 1) allowance / disallowance can hardly be connected to the quality of being talented 2) it is impossible to allow / disallow someone to understand because the process of understanding is happening inside of person, no one can affect it. That is why here it more likely seems to be reasonable "not possible". Anyway both disallowed or impossible are completely different from original translator's "hard". You know what? I may agree with you here (in terms of personal like / dislike). Wouldn't it be wonderful to be able to read a book and become immortal, without necessity of traveling to find a teacher, not fulfilling traditional requirements for students etc.? I say - it would be really wonderful! But unfortunately, it is not what Patriarchs of the Past say to us in their texts. "Hard to" instead of "impossible to" - is may not be a translation. It might be an interpretation, but in this case we should honestly say like you do: "it is my opinion and interpretation of originally different words of Yuan Gongfu".--- Best Regards, Arkady

Literally it means that all the texts describe only the latest stages of practice (principles of the refining). But what about the beginning work (foundation) and "subtleties of the fire phases" - even if you are smarter than 颜(yán) and 闵(mǐn) (smartests students of Confucius) - yet you will be unable to get it without a Teacher.

"not permitted", "not allowed", "not possible" - all of this is denying of possibility. But this phrase can not be translated as "hard to". It doesn't have a symbol for "hard". If there is not enough links were provided above, I'd provide more: https://books.google.ru/books?id=OxjRAgAAQBAJ&pg=PT1135&lpg=PT1135&dq=不可+impossible&source=bl&ots=b0hvTzcsER&sig=sxQ7P9hEiJFNadgn87CYNYEXZqc&hl=ru&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=%E4%B8%8D%E5%8F%AF%20impossible&f=false "不可 impossible, not allowed" https://books.google.ru/books?id=MerDDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA87&lpg=PA87&dq=不可+impossible&source=bl&ots=paBCeyxDcN&sig=1vzddmQ2oWn9yyy1Zkk0b1an9iU&hl=ru&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=%E4%B8%8D%E5%8F%AF%20impossible&f=false "The term used there is bu ke 不可.50 There are myriad instances of ke or bu ke 不可(impossible/impermissible/ disapproval) in direct speech in early texts..." This is well known for everyone. 不可晓 - means impossible to understand, not hard to understand Is it a racial harassment of the forum members? Are you pointing that nationality "Chinese" overcome other nationalities? That non-Chinese could not understand ancient Chinese better than Chinese? "bunch of laowai tourists " - well, this actuallly is an example of personal offend attempt. There are neither arguments behind nor it pointing to a mistake - nothing. This is your common tactic, when you are out of arguments for polite answer Just in case, I'd remind: "Laowai is the Mandarin pronunciation of 老外 (pinyin: lǎowài, lit. "Very foreign"), an informal term or slang for "foreigner," usually neutral but possibly impolite or loose in some circumstances." In this particular case it was tried to be used in "impolite or loose" meaning. --- Arkady

Sure. Here is a case when a word changed the sense of entire concept. We were originally discussing if Traditional Daoism admits possibility to attain Dao from books, without a Teacher or not. So if that phrase translated correctly - we see "the myriad of the texts describe only the principles of refining the elixir, but as to starting the work and incepting it, and as to the subtleties of the fire phases – without getting those personally from a teacher – even if your talent surpasses 颜(yán) and 闵(mǐn), then these are impossible to comprehend" - meaning there is no way to comprehend without a Teacher. But if we switch "impossible" with "hard" as was done by the original translator - the entire sense of Yuan Gongfu's words changes and becomes misleading. That is why that mistake (?) of translating 不可 as "hard to" seemed very strange to me, especially taking into account that in neighboring topic (http://www.thedaobums.com/topic/42694-liu-huayang/page-8#entry724228) we've together with "Taoist Texts" and awaken discussed that 不可 means impossible. Well, "bad" is a general word for the above. If I see incorrect and probably intentionally false translation - do I have a right to say that? I can be wrong - but I have published my opinion openly, and anyone is free to discuss it and show me my (probable) mistakes. I am free for argued discussion and it is how I believe, for example, our talk with Marblehead goes. The tries to expose oneself as a victim for several days not providing a single argued comment on the topic itself - is quite rough kind of that Taiji play Especially in our case, when I'm simply politely and openly expressing my opinion. Thank you. --- Arkady

Hello dawei, I'd like to mention that I am not talking about a person. Please don't treat that as personal. I'm not saying that someone is bad, however I'm saying that the translation is bad. I'd like to discuss the translation in constructive manner with arguments and proofs on board.--- Best Regards, Arkady

How about laying money, asking not Zhuangzi, but simply some modern translator? It is not about who is right and who is wrong. It is about correctness of the translation. They were brothers in School and cousins genealogically. Yes it matters for providing correct translation - to distinguish words of 2 different people. It was not done in initial translation by "Taoist Texts" - and here I've pointed it out. --- Best Regards, Arkady

Here I can not agree with you. Firstly, there is a science - Chinese linguistics and for such simple case it is able to say definitely what is correct translation and what is wrong translation. Every translator would say you that 不可 means literally 不 - not 可 - possible. You can make your own judgement Please see this link https://www.mdbg.net/chindict/chindict.php?page=worddict&wdrst=0&wdqb=不可 And examples from dictionary: bù kě （不可以） cannot; should not; must not; not allowed; forbidden: 不可一概而论 must not make sweeping generalizations 不可剥夺的权利 an inalienable right 不可抗拒的历史潮流 an irresistible historical trend 两者不可偏废。 Neither can be neglected. 我们不可这样匆促作出决定。 No (such) hasty decision should be made by us. （“非...不可”表示“一定”） must: 这部电影太精彩了，我非看不可。 The film is extremely good, I just cannot miss it. 这个会太重要了，我非去不可。 The meeting is very important. I simply must go. etc. Secondly, about "intention". Please read message #2, point 1). There described the basis of the suspicion any fellow member may have (it being a simplest Chinese and reference to the previous discussion). It is your right to either agree with it or start discussion or disagree. But in case of discussion - please provide your arguments. --- Best Regards, Arkady

Continuing this tactic (see post #11) wouldn't benefit you since it became obvious to everyone. Words, words, words... Students of the same School are called brothers (sisters in case of women) in Daoism. It would be nice to learn it before attempting to translate Daoist texts --- Regards, Arkady

Agree. The image of "calm Daoist" is mostly a Western legend about Daoists of China. Two examples from our personal experience: The first is from 1990s, when a Russian tourist came with us to a Chinese Daoist temple. Daoists didn't allow to make any photo or video recording there. We warned this tourist to not try to film something. He did not listen us and started to film. Suddenly Daoist angrily came to that tourist, pulled out the camera from his hands and has broken the expensive lens, powerly throwing it on the floor. The tourist was shocked, saying "I thought Daoists should be calm and non-doing so I can do whatever I want..." The other is from 2016. When Longmenpai Master came to DaoDe Center in Moscow, students asked us to request some additional neidan training on the last day as it was the most interesting topic for everyone and it was planned by the Seminar Program provided by Master (while Master said he plans to give a historical lecture instead of it). We asked Master about it privately after the classes. His face has suddenly changed, the voice became very loud and unpleasant. He "angrily" said - when we teach him - we will decide how to teach but now it is not our business. He said he will punish us hitting with bamboo stick we had in our Center. We humbly apologized and said it is what our students asked - and again he "angrily" replied that we should be much more strict with them. There are much more examples of it, especially from in-School education. The reason behind this happening is quite obvious. There is not only Yin in the world. There is also Yang. Sometimes Teachers use the first and sometimes the second, depending on students' deviations. --- Best Regards, Arkady