ChiDragon

Welcome! Alibabachi Dao Fa Zi Ran: 道法自然 Tao follows its natural self.

That may be close but I wouldn't play a joke like this to a serious person....

There is no right answer in phonetics. Look how many ways people spell LaoTze and other Chinese names....???

Stay with this wise man and follow his advice. He may became a Sage someday if he is not too practical..... Stay away from the Taoist religion if you want to study Taoist philosophy. Alchemic Taoism is very confusing. It might lead one to believe that something was produced with fire in an oven but it was not....

1. A butterfly once was a caterpillar. 2. A butterfly was a caterpillar. 3. A butterfly is a caterpillar. 4. A caterpillar will be a butterfly. 5. A caterpillar is a butterfly. To humans, that was what they had learned as the process of Nature. Lines 3 and 4 maybe not be accepted as the truth. To Tao, regardless in space or time, all the above are the truth due to the whole natural process of Tao.

You guys are way ahead of me. I haven't got this far yet. ZZ says: "A thing become useless was because its function has not been utilized to the ultimate by its user. Thus it was useless."

Chapter 1. 逍遙遊 Chapter 1. Enjoyment in Untroubled Ease I was wondering was the title of Chapter One properly translated into English. Is the title "Enjoyment in Untroubled Ease" reflects ZZ's philosophy...??? Is "Enjoyment" was what ZZ after or he was after "Untroubled Ease"...??? As a philosopher, I would tend to believe that he was more after the "Untroubled Ease" than "Enjoyment". Let's analyze it. The title in the Chinese characters, 逍遙遊. 逍遙: free and unfettered 遊: a journey Thus 逍遙遊 is the Free and Unfettered Journey. The emphasis lays on Free and Unfettered which more toward ZZ's philosophy. From the meaning of "Unfettered", ZZ was after the freedom from all restrictions in life. It has an indication that he wants to be independent and tried not to be relied on anything to restrict his state of freedom. Chapter One has three parts to reveal his "Unfettered" philosophy: In part A, he used the Kun, Peng and the cicada and the little dove to distinguish the contrast of smallness and greatness. Most people are heavily dwell in the small thing and stuck with a narrow view. He wants to eliminate the restriction by looking into something big and extraordinary to have a broader vision to see the overall picture of a story. In part B, he pointed out that is very distressful for being an government official. He suggested to be a 真人 (real person) must be 無己(selfless), 無功(no merit), and 無名(no fame) in order to be in the state of "Unfettered". Part C will be discussed in the part C post later.

hmmm... 1. Isn't Marble a piece of rock...??? 2. The Tibet mountains have geological restrictions. The reason Tibetan Monks eat meat is because there are limited foods in the mountains but abundance of animals like the sheep and Yaks(a bison like animal). It seems like these animals are the major source of foods for them.

I hope you are not four years old. The Yin here is the shadow on the North side of the hills; and the Yang here is to sun light on the South side. Aren't Yin and Yang the phenomena of Nature and the manifestation of Tao....???

Tibetan Buddhist monks do eat meat. The Chinese Buddhist monks do not. You got rocks in your head. Please stay with your Taoist philosophy...

lienshan, my friend You are too inflexible with the hidden meanings of the terms. Maybe it was learning from your misguided source...

Yao wants to hand his well established throne to a highly qualified respectable person as his successor. It was because his son was not good enough to rule his kingdom.

"Taoist Master" was only a term recognized by people who respect them. No one has ever cultivated enough Chi. It was only a matter of how much Chi can one absorb at one time by breathing. If one learned to breathe efficiently, then one can cultivate more Chi. As soon one learned the efficient breathing method and continue breathing with the method, then one become the master of breathing. It one stop breathing with the method, then there will not be enough Chi for the body to function properly. In summary, Chi must be constantly provided to a living body. Indeed, it was determined by how much Chi can be absorbed at a time for one to be a good cultivator. PS... I only speak on the level of my understanding and capability...

There is a Jasmine Tea. The flower was added to enhance the flavor and fragrance of the tea, thus there is no need to eat the flower. hehehehe............

無為, Wu Wei These two compound characters are just one specific term with a philosophy behind it. We do not translate its meaning by the superficial meaning of each character. Wu Wei has different meaning in different philosophy, religion, and ordinary expression in our daily lives. Literally, in daily life, it means do nothing. In LaoTze's philosophy, Wu Wei is do nothing to interfere with Nature and let Nature to take its course. Another word, just let everything to be natural by allowing them to go through the process with Nature. His main idea was pointing at the rulers by asking them not to interfere with the lives of the people. Just let them be and live as freely as possible. In ZhuangTze's philosophy, Wu Wei to him was to be natural with Nature. So, Nature does not interfere with his life in anyway. Thus just let him be and live as freely as possible. In Chinese Buddhism, Wu Wei means those things that the followers do not do as taboo. In daily life, it applies to a lazy person which does nothing and have no accomplishment in life. PS... The "unmanifest action" will be manifested without one's realization though....

hmmmmmmm...... I believe ZZ is a philosopher. He was not a Taoist priest nor a shaman.

西門 拉利

Yes, you do....

The six chi are: 陰、陽、風、雨、晦、明: Yin, Yang, Wind, Rain, Darkness and Brightness. Just by looking at the nomenclatures, it was pretty much self explanatory that they are the phenomenons of Nature. Thus they cannot by controlled by human.

RongZi Th people praise RongZi, but he will not given up his diligence because of that. When people put him down, he will not be discouraged neither. He clearly laid out the boundary between himself and the external world. He can distinguish the difference between praise and insult. It was only that. RongZi within the entire society, he had never rushed to pursuit anything. Even so, he hasn't reached the ultimate state. LiZi LiZi can ride with the wind, that will be a light way to travel; and then it only takes him 15 days for a round trip. In the case in seeking for happiness, there was never an indication that he has to be hasty. That will eliminate the fatigue from running around; but still there was a need to depended on something else. In order to follow the universal law for all things, by keeping track of the changes of the "six chi" and to travel the endless boundaries. What else does he has to be depended on...???

I am foolish indeed...!!!

Would you settle for 70% knowledge and 30% experience...??? According to my knowledge, that was how I have gained my experience though knowledge. It was not all experiences. Sometimes, experience alone are very deceiving. However, we must learn from experience to fulfill the other 30% of knowledge.

In the case about cicada and the little dove. The cicada was lived such a short time, only in the summer. Indeed it doesn't even know there are four seasons during the year. The little dove only flies up and down the tree. If it fails, then it'll try again to fly up the tree. There was not much expectation for both the cicada and the dove. ZZ used them to express the small creatures are only limited to do small things. However, he was not discriminating about the small things against the big things. He was only using them as an illustration. In his metaphor, he illustrated the difference between a broad minded and a narrow minded by using specific animals with their limitations. The one with a broader knowledge which has greater expectation and with a lesser knowledge has lower expectation. He was also pointing out the irony about the little dove which didn't know better but laughed at the broad minded Peng bird.

You know, ZhangTze loves to tell stories. However, the way he tells his story was by use a third party approach. He doesn't use first person nouns as LaoTze does. He figured that if the story come out from his mouth, then the people will not believe him. In his thinking that People would only believe the words from a third party. Even though ZZ use the greatness and the smallness which might lead us to think that one is complement to each other. However, this is not the case with ZZ. As I said before, ZZ's thinking is not about duality or dyad in his thoughts. When he tell a story, he wants to draw everybody's attention. Therefore, he did some exaggerations by making something big to start off with like the Kun fish and the Pend bird. The example in Chapter One, ZZ imagined that he himself as the Kun fish was isolated in the northern sea which depriving him to seek knowledge beyond his own environment. Then he imagine that he turns into a Peng bird and fly high above and travel far away for a long time to see all he can. He needed to fly high the allow more space for the wind from the big ocean drifts to help him to fly away. The Peng bird flew to the south was because it is the brighter side of the world.