majc

I find it very difficult to stay serious for any extended period of time. I think it's a birth defect.

Okay, let's allow that "guarding your center" is correct and is really Lao Tzu's doctrine of the mean or Middle Way. It's an uncharacteristically imprecise definition, but fine. What about the rest? You have deviated from the original text in key areas without explanation. So why the warped translation? So far your answer has been "because I just know. Only a very select few can understand. It's not for everyone. *additional generic appeal to intrigue over apparently mysterious and privileged information*" Someone like you with such a profound understanding of the way things are can surely see why I find this transparent audience-persuading technique about as convincing as the Jesus I saw burned into that midwestern American housewife's toast.

Stop hiding behind links and just address the conversation directly. Who are those people? What on earth makes them an authority? And more than that, a doctrinal authority? Really? lol, lol and lol. Following the Tao is following the Tao. It is not obeying some Buddhist-infused doctrinal system of instructions you found on the internet. It is not exclusively "aiming for the mean", "aiming at being easy", "aiming at being a buddha", "aiming at freeing yourself from worldly cares". Read line #1. Your link looks an awful lot like a Tao that is being told. And it looks an awful lot like a (for some reason Buddhist?) doctrine of "correct practice". So instead of distracting with (yet another) link to some rubbish which seems ominous and therefore makes it seem like you have a point, how about just answering straight?

And are we just going to brush over how bent out of shape and obviously forced your translation is? Government is one part of life. No matter how obsessive you are about it personally, that's not going to change.

bla bla bla, the world is evil etc. *identification of fucked up human behaviour from roughly the same time period*, *attempted connection of cherry picked historical example to the TTC via the ambiguity of straw dog metaphor*. Rinse, repeat. Yeah because I mean, the world works like that... Lao Tzu writes a few words down and the whole country just gets to burnin' people. Are you serious?

Actually I don't like that ending I'm changing it: But words for this are useless... They are better kept inside. Thank you Tian****! ****Mod Action **** Removed personal insult in accordance with Mod rules. Please avoid attacking other posters. Thanks. Mod Apech **** Mod action ****

Ok fine. I got some time to explain now so let's hold you to your own rules then. First of all, how do you justify the invention of a dual meaning for 仁? 'Not having a kernel' and 'not humane'. Two different meanings are not suggested by the text at all. Either nature is not humane, or the 'ruler' doesn't have a kernel. (And where exactly does 'ruler' come from anyway?) Good start..... And then 'Heaven and Earth use all things as straw dogs'? Could you try and force that to sound any more sinister? It's not sinister, it's neutral - 'use' would be 用 not 為. This sentence actually reads: 天地 Heaven and Earth 不 do not 仁 prefer*. 以 As if 萬物 the 10,000 things 為 exist as 芻狗 straw dogs. And the next line reads: 聖人 The wise man 不 does not 仁 prefer. 以 As if 百姓 the 100 [distinctions] 為 exist as 芻狗 straw dogs. *this character is literally a human picking one over another. You got this line right: 天地 Heaven and Earth 之 's 間 space. 其 This 猶 [is almost like] 橐籥 bellows! 乎 The bellows thing follows as an exaggerated illustration, by reversing one of the most common of the hundred distinctions we all make - between solids and spaces. Really, they are different aspects of one thing, (two poles of one magnet etc. whatever). Solids aren't powerful. Solid-space is powerful. Solids create spaces and spaces create solids. You can never have one without the other; they arise mutually - as soon as there is solid, there is space. See ch 2. Inexhaustible / not exhaustible is wrong. And cycles is a fabrication. I don't care about your explanations to do with funerals and needing to believe in afterlives and eternities. That's religious bullshit. This is an observational commentary on The Way Things Are - of which religious ceremonies and the governing of nations make up a pathetically small part. 虛 Empty 而 but 不 not 屈 powerless. 動 Move it 而 and 愈 [more & more] 出 [it] produces. You say your version contains practical advice? And yet you end on 'guard your empty center'... Even allowing for your translator-addition of the word empty, this weighs in at a solid 6 or 7 out of 10 on my supersonically-unclear-instruction-o-meter. 多 Many 言 words 數 add up to 窮 poorness [of understanding]. 不如 Better to 守 keep [it] 中 inside. Or, in better English: "But words for this are useless. No amount of words here could present a balanced view."

That's exactly what I'm talking about.

There's always the (more than likely) chance that the meaning of straw dog in chinese culture, like all myths/traditions/rituals, changed over time and took on a life of its own. Ideas grow, especially as new people get their hands on them, and the unexplainable ceremonial stuff that doesn't really seem relevant to chapter 5 could have followed after (or even in parallel with) Lao Tzu's original, possibly very simplistic use. Obviously I'm not claiming I know this is the case. I'm just saying I can see a clear way in which straw dog - meaning literally a dog made of straw, without any vague, special, somehow-meaningful ceremonial bullshit attached - makes perfect sense, both in this chapter and the broader context of the TTC. As I think you implied, I find it very strange that the otherwise plainly spoken Lao Tzu supposedly veers off suddenly at the start of chapter 5 into such an esoteric example... it makes no sense to me why that would happen.

ha, yeah - for that middle bit you're talking about, at one point mine read: The female entrance is the middleground. It's easy to relate this to reality, but I'm not convinced that it's a fair representation of what was originally intended to have been said.

Yeah sorry about that dawei, I was tired last night and my writing was a bit moronic. Definitely, I wasn't debating that at all! 10,000 things just means, quite literally, "all objects". Well of course that's its historical use among those in power. For those in positions of government, people are the contents of their domain. But the contents of a domain could be anything. Like Aaron said, "ruling a kingdom" doesn't have to be about countries or even people. That's not to say that this view can't be applied to the totalitarian government of countries - it can... - but that's just one very narrow, obsessive route to take it. No, my fault sorry. The hundred families = the hundred classes. A class could be any categorization/grouping/delineation of objects like "important things", "pointless things", "ugly things", "big things" - any line of distinction separating one or more objects from everything else. There are lots of different solid things in the world and lots of different spaces. These spaces can also be considered "things", all of them potentially creative. ---- This is where I should've been much clearer though. I'm suggesting that the first two lines are a comparison between: The way Nature works with the domain it "presides over" - the ten thousand things as they really are; "the territory". and The way the Master works with the domain he "presides over" - the hundred families: his simplified, delineated, categorized internal representation of the ten thousand things; his "map" of "the territory". ---- Nature does not prefer any particular arrangement of the ten thousand things. It invests no energy in judging any particular arrangement of the territory to be good or bad and is always letting every arrangement go, moving on from moment to moment as if each were as meaningless to it as a straw dog. The Master does not prefer any particular arrangement of the hundred families delineations of the ten thousand things. He invests no energy in judging any particular map (arrangement of delineations) to be good or bad and is always letting every arrangement go, moving on from moment to moment as if each were as meaningless to him as a straw dog.

Interesting. Do you see any way that "the hundred families/given names for the elevated" is not intended literally, but as imagery? As a metaphor to indicate a type of relationship, similar to Mother, ancestor etc. used throughout the text? For a modern example of exactly the same thing: anyone familiar with programming? Objects and classes. A class = a specification/categorization of a set - i.e. family - of objects. These classes are, in a way, "raised" or "elevated" just as the suggested 'nobility' is, in a way, "raised" or "elevated". (It's pretty easy to see how these meanings would become crossed by those searching for a historical context in which Lao Tzu can be framed). So you've got the ten thousand things, and the hundred families which "sit on top" of that. Specifications, categorizations, classifications... somethings and nothings, highs and lows... John Does and Jane Smiths... smart people and dumb people, good people and bad people... important things and unimportant things, useful things and useless things... solids and spaces. Could this be the same sort of thing as in chapter 2 with a different focus? Applying not just to descriptions (ch. 2), not just to people, but universally to all classes? If this is right, then the creative power of space follows naturally as a deliberately (and humourously) overstated example to illustrate the point (something both Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu seem fond of). This would explain the exclamation involved in his making the comparison too, almost like a standup comedian. So - he makes the point by reversing our instinctive focus on solid over space... How space is like bellows! It's empty, and that's its power. The more you move it, the more it produces. Instead of overlooking the emptiness of space, he's seeing it as a powerful attribute - even comparing it to the power of the emptiness in bellows! (haha lol old man - you jest.. you jest.. etc.) This all fits with chapter 11's power of the hole which moves the cart. And it would also explain the "futility of words in conveying the point" (at the end of the chapter) because words are classifiers. Words, by definition, automatically enter the reader into a domain of classification, so no amount of words could ever give a balanced view.

And you've got the way things are all wrapped up, right? Ok I believe you. In no uncertain terms then - forget the exact Chinese characters in Laozi's 2500 year old expression - please explain in plain English, pure and simple, the practical advice you believe this chapter is giving the reader.

Do you not find it odd that space and bellows have absolutely nothing to do with the idea of treating people like pieces of shit to be abused and discarded as the reader/psychofuhrer sees fit? Straw dogs could mean something as simple as "they don't stand up of their own accord." And therefore, laying any judgment of superiority/inferiority on things (first part of sentence) is as dopey as judging a straw dog to be stupid or lazy. Obviously that doesn't fit as neatly with a preconception of the TTC as a guide to ruthless dictatorship, but it does fit better with the rest of the chapter, and with the broader theme of the TTC as a whole. It's difficult to resist the pun of "grasping at straws" for the way your interpretation pivots almost entirely around the ambiguity of this single metaphor.

Awesome post. I don't see it either. This character took me down exactly the same route. ---------------------------------------- The Tao flows, and though used, it keeps coming. With its motion, everything grows! As it moves... The pointed smoothes over. The tangled unwinds. The glaring fades. The dust settles. But what a mystery it remains! Who knows how it started? I can imagine nothing superior. http://www.openwisdom.org/tao-te-ching/#4 ----------------------------------------

The last bunch of posts about how to force these threads to unfold in the "correct" way has had nothing to do with the TTC. TianShi may have been swinging his handbag of global tyranny and fear around, but he does genuinely believe that the vast majority of useless crap falling out of it alongside his lipstick and mascara provides a coherent framework for Chapter 3. This chapter is regularly interpreted as instructions for the government of others - even though this would conflict with ch 2's "teaching without words" / "forming a method without worded instruction" (whichever way you look at that line). Go figure, eh?

Lots of different things happened 2500 years ago. You are projecting wildly speculative lines of connection between things according to a preconceived idea of history (and more relevantly, of the Tao Te Ching) which you hold fixedly in your mind. Connecting this tomb thing and the Tao Te Ching is ridiculous. What did I say about extrapolation? No-one, I'm using you to demonstrate the practical application of Chapter 3. Feel free to learn at any time.

Nice. So what you're suggesting to everyone here (based on a speculative reading of Chapter 3 and some cherry-picked individual lines spread thinly throughout a 2500 year old book expressing joy in the non-purposiveness of action), is that all of this comes down to two possible types of view: A "correct" view - which involves sharing in your realization of the existence of hypercontrolling all-powerful superkings who like to kill people. And approximately 7 billion "incorrect" views - which involve made up fairy tales which we-the-ignorant tell ourselves in order to hide from the terrible reality of the existence of hypercontrolling all-powerful superkings who like to kill people. Well thank you for the contribution. I have considered your suggestion and although I do recognize how strongly you believe this to be true, I nonetheless disagree - respectfully of course - because it's stupid. Maybe now we can return to discussing this single chapter of the Tao Te Ching without claiming that opinions based on gross personal bias and humongous theoretical extrapolations are, in fact, facts. Peace, etc.

Say, angry-sounding man, what about the vast majority of chapters which make barely any reference to government whatsoever? How do they fit in with your hopelessly irrational theory, I mean, 'obvious fact'? All you're doing is betraying a personal preoccupation with power, and a fearful mistrust of it. Power exists. It's a perfectly natural dynamic (on many levels, not just in human beings, and not just in running countries) and the world isn't a perfect, safe, secure place. Why try and pretend otherwise? And why on earth would you expect someone perceptive enough to write the Tao Te Ching to adopt such an unrealistic, blinkered view of the way things are?

Haha, wow. Iron - meet E.

I made a mistake: it should be With not a thing to prove, things are ordered. These threads are awesome.

hehe, it was this one (where you agreed with certain good and bad categories of practice) but there's no need to go back to that thread - it's a very simple point. How is there a difference? Better automatically implies 'than' and 'for'. I'd love to know how you can see a distinction between the two! Better than [x] for something. Better for [x] than something.

Hello. I like it too. I think it's my favourite. That's not what I get from it personally, but I suppose there could be a way it means that.

Wei wu wei doesn't need to be made complicated - there's no need to bring in confusing shit like "nondual" action which means nothing to anyone... (unless of course you want to write a book... ) Try unacted action. Action not made; not manufactured. Action free from purposefully trying to conform to a preconceived image. Action free from trying to make a certain impression. Action free from trying to prove itself to be something: With not a thing to prove, there is order.