[DDJ Meaning] Chapter 63

[dawei]

David Hinton 2002
63

If you're nothing doing what you do,
you act without acting and savor without savoring,
you render the small vast and the few many,
use Integrity to repay hatred,
see the complexity in simplicity,
find the vast in the minute.
The complex affairs of all beneath heaven are there in simplicity,
and the vast affairs of all beneath heaven are there in the minute.
That's why a sage never bothers with vastness and so becomes utterly vast.
Easy promises breed little trust, and too much simplicity breeds too much complexity.
That's why a sage inhabits the complexity of things and so avoids all complexity.

 

Dwight Goddard 1919
63

One should avoid assertion (wu wei) and practice inaction. 
One should learn to find taste in the tasteless, to enlarge the small things, and multiply the few. He should respond to hatred with kindness. 
He should resolve a difficulty while it is easy, and manage a great thing while it is small. 
Surely all the world's difficulties arose from slight causes, and all the world's great affairs had small beginnings.
Therefore the wise man avoids to the end participation in great affairs and by so doing establishes his greatness.
Rash promises are lacking in faith and many things that appear easy are full of difficulties. 
Therefore the wise man considers every thing difficult and so to the end he has no difficulties.

 

 

Bradford Hatcher 2005

63

Act without acting
Work without working
Savor without tasting
Greatness is ordinary, much is little
Repay ill will with virtue
Plan for the complicated while it is simple
Develop the great while it is small
The difficult tasks under heaven
Always begin in simplicity
The greatest tasks under heaven
Always begin as minutiae
This is why wise ones never assume greatness
And so can achieve such greatness
Those who lightly promise will surely be less trusted
Much ease is surely much difficulty
This is why wise ones look for things to get complicated
And so in the end have no complications at all

 

 

Wing-Tsit Chan 1963
63 

Act without action. Do without ado. Taste without tasting. 
Whether it is big or small, many or few, repay hatred with virtue. 
Prepare for the difficult while it is still easy. Deal with the big while it is still small. 
Difficult undertakings have always started with what is easy. And great undertakings have always started with what is small. 
Therefore the sage never strives for the great, And thereby the great is achieved. 
He who makes rash promises surely lacks faith. He who takes things too easily will surely encounter much difficulty. 
For this reason even the sage regards things as difficult. And therefore he encounters no difficulty. 

 

 

Gu Zhengku 1993

63

Act by means of inaction;
Deal with matters by means of not being meddlesome;
Taste by means of tastelessness.
The big stems from the small;
The many is based on the few.
To overcome the difficult should begin with the easy;
To accomplish what is big should begin with the small.
The difficult things in the world must originate in the easy;
The big things in the world must take root in the small.
That is why the sage can accomplish what is great by never attempting to be great.
Light promise-giving, light promise-breaking;
The easier one considers things, the more difficult things become.
That is why the sage never meets with difficulty
Because he always considers things difficult.

 

 

Ch'u Ta-Kao 1904
63

Act non-action; undertake no undertaking; taste the tasteless.
The Sage desires the desireless, and prizes no articles that are difficult to get.
He learns no learning, but reviews what others have passed through.
Thus he lets all things develop in their own natural way, and does not venture to act.
Regard the small as the great; regard the few as many.
Manage the difficult while they are easy;
Manage the great while they are small.
All difficult things in the world start from the easy.
All the great things in the world start from the small.
The tree that fills a man's arms arises from a tender shoot.
The nine-storied tower is raised from a heap of earth;
A thousand miles' journey begins from the spot under one's feet.
Therefore the Sage never attempts great things, and thus he can achieve what is great.
He who makes easy promises will seldom keep his word;
He who regards many things as easy will find many difficulties.
Therefore the Sage regards things as difficult, and consequently never has difficulties.

 

Flowing Hands 1987
63
In the Universe, the Dao and the Ten Thousand Things all flow according to their natures.
The Heavenly bodies move and glow according to how they were formed
Man should take note of this and exercise himself according to their influence,
and then he will be in keeping with the Dao.
By following the flow and entering into emptiness,
practise the ways of doing without doing, influencing without interfering.
For the Heavenly bodies influence our lives, but we can never feel their influence.
The Sage follows the flow and so he practises influence without interfering.
He rewards anger and strife with care and understanding.
He meets aggression with yielding softness.
So he remains at one, unattached and unharmed.
His nature is simple and yielding.
So he never complicates his life.
He never demands too much of the people

[Marblehead]

Wu Wei Baby!

 

[OldDog]

It is interesting in these passages to see how virtue is defined. 

 

Virtue as Integrity ... kindness ... as care and understanding ...

 

Suitable for dealing with hatred and ill will.

 

 

[dawei]

On 10/28/2018 at 11:51 AM, OldDog said:

It is interesting in these passages to see how virtue is defined. 

 

Virtue as Integrity ... kindness ... as care and understanding ...

 

Suitable for dealing with hatred and ill will.

 

 

 

Virtue is generally the wrong word as it is more Confucian.

 

De is the 'virtue' of Dao... do we assign integrity or kindness or caring or understanding to Dao ?

[OldDog]

1 hour ago, dawei said:

Virtue is generally the wrong word as it is more Confucian.

 

De is the 'virtue' of Dao... do we assign integrity or kindness or caring or understanding to Dao ?

 

And yet these usages persist.

 

Use of virtue seems to be highly dependent upon context. As received by each person the conext would be that person's experience. 

 

 

 

[dawei]

virtue is a human trait.. Dao is not human. 

 

De is the action of Dao in you... Efficacy or capacity will work in a laoist sense.   

[Jeff]

1 hour ago, dawei said:

 

Virtue is generally the wrong word as it is more Confucian.

 

De is the 'virtue' of Dao... do we assign integrity or kindness or caring or understanding to Dao ?

 

Virtue of the Dao is clarity.  At a manifest level in the world, it is more commonly felt as energy/qi. Things like kindness (or love) is more of a local mind translation of it. 

[Rara]

On 28/10/2018 at 12:25 AM, dawei said:

He should respond to hatred with kindness.

 

Interestingly, this line doesn't really appear in the translations lower down, but I do like it. It's something I've been trying to figure out for my whole time on this path, and now I think I've figured it out.

 

It isn't about being "kind", as in telling people it is ok when something is wrong. It's about not fighting, sparing both parties from further harm. Maybe the confusion on western thought is why some translators have omitted it?

[dawei]

6 hours ago, Rara said:

 

Interestingly, this line doesn't really appear in the translations lower down, but I do like it. It's something I've been trying to figure out for my whole time on this path, and now I think I've figured it out.

 

It isn't about being "kind", as in telling people it is ok when something is wrong. It's about not fighting, sparing both parties from further harm. Maybe the confusion on western thought is why some translators have omitted it?

 

There is a really big issue with translations and that has to do with culture, which is difficult to translate in a line.   The literal translation is to, 'pay back according to virtue'  (virtue / goodness / morality / ethics / kindness / favor / character / kind)

 

Of course, pay back can be understood as positive or negative but the meaning here is positive.   There are some translations that are just more practical than academic. 

 

David Hinton 2002
63

If you're nothing doing what you do,
you act without acting and savor without savoring,
you render the small vast and the few many,
use Integrity to repay hatred,
 

 

Dwight Goddard 1919
63

One should avoid assertion (wu wei) and practice inaction. 
One should learn to find taste in the tasteless, to enlarge the small things, and multiply the few. He should respond to hatred with kindness. 
 

 

Bradford Hatcher 2005

63

Act without acting
Work without working
Savor without tasting
Greatness is ordinary, much is little
Repay ill will with virtue
 

Wing-Tsit Chan 1963
63 

Act without action. Do without ado. Taste without tasting. 
Whether it is big or small, many or few, repay hatred with virtue. 
 

 

Gu Zhengku 1993

63

Act by means of inaction;
Deal with matters by means of not being meddlesome;
Taste by means of tastelessness.
The big stems from the small;
The many is based on the few.
To overcome the difficult should begin with the easy;
 

 

 

Ch'u Ta-Kao 1904
63

Act non-action; undertake no undertaking; taste the tasteless.
The Sage desires the desireless, and prizes no articles that are difficult to get.
He learns no learning, but reviews what others have passed through.
Thus he lets all things develop in their own natural way, and does not venture to act.
Regard the small as the great; regard the few as many.
Manage the difficult while they are easy;
 

 

Flowing Hands 1987
63
In the Universe, the Dao and the Ten Thousand Things all flow according to their natures.
The Heavenly bodies move and glow according to how they were formed
Man should take note of this and exercise himself according to their influence,
and then he will be in keeping with the Dao.
By following the flow and entering into emptiness,
practise the ways of doing without doing, influencing without interfering.
For the Heavenly bodies influence our lives, but we can never feel their influence.
The Sage follows the flow and so he practises influence without interfering.
He rewards anger and strife with care and understanding.
He meets aggression with yielding softness.
So he remains at one, unattached and unharmed.
His nature is simple and yielding.
So he never complicates his life.
He never demands too much of the people

[ilumairen]

16 hours ago, Rara said:

 

Interestingly, this line doesn't really appear in the translations lower down, but I do like it. It's something I've been trying to figure out for my whole time on this path, and now I think I've figured it out.

 

It isn't about being "kind", as in telling people it is ok when something is wrong. It's about not fighting, sparing both parties from further harm. Maybe the confusion on western thought is why some translators have omitted it?

Hi Rara,

 

I actually like it translated as, “repay ill will with virtue.” And feel it correlates with what you were exploring in the amoral dao thread.

Virtue/de when understood as dawei put it, “the action of Dao within you” points, imo, to not losing one’s inner connection when faced with ill will or hatred. One responds from “center” or according to their natural virtue.

 

Edited June 24, 2020 by ilumairen
dang autocorrect

[Rara]

16 hours ago, dawei said:

 

There is a really big issue with translations and that has to do with culture, which is difficult to translate in a line.   The literal translation is to, 'pay back according to virtue'  (virtue / goodness / morality / ethics / kindness / favor / character / kind)

 

Of course, pay back can be understood as positive or negative but the meaning here is positive.   There are some translations that are just more practical than academic. 

 

David Hinton 2002
63

If you're nothing doing what you do,
you act without acting and savor without savoring,
you render the small vast and the few many,
use Integrity to repay hatred,
 

 

Dwight Goddard 1919
63

One should avoid assertion (wu wei) and practice inaction. 
One should learn to find taste in the tasteless, to enlarge the small things, and multiply the few. He should respond to hatred with kindness. 
 

 

Bradford Hatcher 2005

63

Act without acting
Work without working
Savor without tasting
Greatness is ordinary, much is little
Repay ill will with virtue
 

Wing-Tsit Chan 1963
63 

Act without action. Do without ado. Taste without tasting. 
Whether it is big or small, many or few, repay hatred with virtue. 
 

 

Gu Zhengku 1993

63

Act by means of inaction;
Deal with matters by means of not being meddlesome;
Taste by means of tastelessness.
The big stems from the small;
The many is based on the few.
To overcome the difficult should begin with the easy;
 

 

 

Ch'u Ta-Kao 1904
63

Act non-action; undertake no undertaking; taste the tasteless.
The Sage desires the desireless, and prizes no articles that are difficult to get.
He learns no learning, but reviews what others have passed through.
Thus he lets all things develop in their own natural way, and does not venture to act.
Regard the small as the great; regard the few as many.
Manage the difficult while they are easy;
 

 

Flowing Hands 1987
63
In the Universe, the Dao and the Ten Thousand Things all flow according to their natures.
The Heavenly bodies move and glow according to how they were formed
Man should take note of this and exercise himself according to their influence,
and then he will be in keeping with the Dao.
By following the flow and entering into emptiness,
practise the ways of doing without doing, influencing without interfering.
For the Heavenly bodies influence our lives, but we can never feel their influence.
The Sage follows the flow and so he practises influence without interfering.
He rewards anger and strife with care and understanding.
He meets aggression with yielding softness.
So he remains at one, unattached and unharmed.
His nature is simple and yielding.
So he never complicates his life.
He never demands too much of the people

 

That explains the Gu and Ch'u translations much better. Thanks again.

[Rara]

15 hours ago, ilumairen said:

 

Virtue/de when understood as dawei put it, “the action of Dao within you” points, imo, to not losing one’s inner connection when faced with ill will or hatred. One responds from “center” or according to their natural virtue.

 

 

Hello! This is quite synchronous to an Adam Mizner taiji interview I was watching the other day. He said something along the lines of, "people think that you are perfecting a form, but really, you are perfecting you.

 

So "the action of Dao within you" / "one responds from the centre" are all the right sounds for me 🙂

[Sketch]

• Verse Sixty Three

爲無爲

Wei wu wei.

Cause, nothing, cause.

 

Pause between actions, let the moment land.

Act, don’t act, act. Rhythm, peristalsis.

 

Chew, swallow, chew.

 

Large, small, many or few,

You can always use these as complaints.

 

But it is difficult to see the big map.

Look out for the fine details 

And Heaven will take care of the rest

With ease.

 

Join the person you should be emulating

in not worrying about the big things.

 

Deal with your own life, let the universe 

Deal with itself.

 

A so called grown up

Who says too lightly what they will do

May not mean the words they choose.

 

Many things turn out easy, many turn out difficult.

 

Nevertheless, the Wise person

Treats it all the same

And just deals with whatever 

difficulties come up.