Benjamin Hoff's "Tao Te Ching"

[Cobie]

Anyone is free to create a new religion/philosophy from whatever is around, that’s fine with me. 
 

 

Edited May 17, 2022 by Cobie

[Cobie]

 Why don’t you buy the book, I am curious to know why he deleted those chapters. 

[wandelaar]

(...)  

 

[Cobie]

2 hours ago, wandelaar said:

(...) 

 

 Seems you achieved 無 (wu2 - nothingness). 
 

 

Edited May 17, 2022 by Cobie

[Cobie]

On 17/05/2022 at 7:51 AM, Cobie said:

Hoff deleted chapter 5 

Henricks thinks Chapter 5 is two separate unconnected parts.
 

The two parts may have been removed from other chapters by ancient ‘Hoff-like’ reshuffling scribblers.

 

 

Edited May 20, 2022 by Cobie

[Cobie]

Does anyone know about the credentials of Hoff? Does he have knowledge of (ancient Chinese) palaeography? 
 

 

Edited May 17, 2022 by Cobie

[treebuffalo]

I bought this book and read it when it came out. He makes some good points about writing utensils, but the book as a reference doesn't hold up. He offers no citations, bibliographies, or examples of the original brushwork. The commentary is separated from the translation. And the writing could have gone through several more revisions, and had better editing. 

 

I liked the commentary as a casual read but I don't run to it very often if I am curious about a chapter. As for the Chapters he deleted, I only really agree with one of them (Chap 58). But I did appreciate his attention to tone and vocabulary throughout the DDJ as a whole, something I never paid much attention to before. 

 

It's more like a translators private journal of the translation process. 

[Cobie]

8 minutes ago, treebuffalo said:

… He offers no citations, bibliographies, or examples of the original brushwork. …

 
Thanks for the info. 

[wandelaar]

@treebuffalo

 

Thank you very much. My own impression of the book from reading the preview was the same. Didn't he mention any dictionary or internet site as a source for the supposed earlier meanings of the characters that as he claims were ignored by all scholars before him?

Edited May 20, 2022 by wandelaar

[treebuffalo]

On 5/20/2022 at 2:19 PM, wandelaar said:

@treebuffalo

 

Thank you very much. My own impression of the book from reading the preview was the same. Didn't he mention any dictionary or internet site as a source for the supposed earlier meanings of the characters that as he claims were ignored by all scholars before him?

He claims he is the only Westerner to translate the DDJ according to the original characters. But he never writes the term "seal script" or "small script." He takes the lid off the subject but doesn't drill down or even include any original script.

 

I can personally vouch for at least one author who has access to a seal script source, Red Pine. He actually loaned me one of his books that has the entire Guodian DDJ in seal script. 

 

Which puts us in Goldberg territory. You got all these authors making translations, all pretty close, but all still pretty impractical. How many do we have to read before we try and ingest the meaning over the words? I think that's what Hoff was trying to say. He duffed it a little, but it's nice to crack the window at least on all these stuffy translations. 

[wandelaar]

Was the book with the original characters this book?

 

https://www.bol.com/nl/nl/f/the-bamboo-texts-of-guodian/9200000004725749/

[Cobie]

7 hours ago, treebuffalo said:

He claims he is the only Westerner to translate the DDJ according to the original characters. But he never writes the term "seal script" or "small script." …

Seeing the link above, me thinks ‘so much for the Hoff’. 

[Cobie]

 

8 hours ago, treebuffalo said:

… You got all these authors making translations, all pretty close …

 

It’s like they all copy each other, they are all in the same range; Hoff too (based on the preview only).

 

 

Edited May 24, 2022 by Cobie

[Cobie]

 

 

8 hours ago, treebuffalo said:

… You got all these authors making translations … all still pretty impractical. …

 

“impractical”. Hmm … could you say a bit more about that?

 

 

Edited May 24, 2022 by Cobie

[Cobie]

8 hours ago, treebuffalo said:

You got all these authors making translations … all still pretty impractical. … 

I think bits are basically unintelligible.
 

 

 

Edited May 24, 2022 by Cobie

[wandelaar]

Maybe I will buy the book from the link, if that indeed contains pictures of the original characters...

[Cobie]

 

8 hours ago, treebuffalo said:

… You got all these authors making translations, all pretty close, but all still pretty impractical. … 

 

When I look at the transcripts the characters give me an entirely different meaning, that’s very simple, easy to understand and good practical advice. 

 

 

Edited May 24, 2022 by Cobie

[Cobie]

9 hours ago, wandelaar said:

Maybe I will buy the book from the link, if that indeed contains pictures of the original characters...

Gosh, yes, I was tempted to buy it, it looks really interesting. But I think it discuses Confucian books. My interest is in DDJ and I think that’s in volume II.
 

 

Edited May 24, 2022 by Cobie

[Cobie]

@wandelaar I found this review 

https://www.academia.edu/7898095/Review_Article_of_The_Bamboo_Texts_of_Guodian_A_Study_and_Complete_Translation_By_Scott_Cook 

 

 

Edited May 24, 2022 by Cobie

[wandelaar]

Haha!

 

That's the same article that I linked to earlier. But I have to admit that I still have to read it myself.

[Cobie]

3 hours ago, wandelaar said:

Haha!

 

Good to see you happy. 
 

Quote

That's the same article that I linked to earlier.

 

So you did, lol
https://www.thedaobums.com/topic/53660-benjamin-hoffs-tao-te-ching/?do=findComment&comment=982333

 

 

Edited May 24, 2022 by Cobie

[Cobie]

3 minutes ago, wandelaar said:

… I still have to read it myself.

I had a 10 second read and realised it is way beyond my level.  

[wandelaar]

Hopefully I will read it this evening...

[treebuffalo]

12 hours ago, wandelaar said:

Was the book with the original characters this book?

 

https://www.bol.com/nl/nl/f/the-bamboo-texts-of-guodian/9200000004725749/

I got a look at the first volume of this book at a local university, and like Cobie says, it's pretty dense. But it was a disappointment for me. There were only a couple images of the bamboo strips, and the transcribed seal script was just little bits from here and there, only some from the Laozi. And even those were out of order. The book is not really about translating the Laozi as much as it is about studying the discovery at Guodian and putting it in historical context. I would've been interested in the second volume only to get a look at the bibliography. 

 

If you want an image of a publication that has all the strips pictured I can post it. 

[wandelaar]

4 minutes ago, treebuffalo said:

If you want an image of a publication that has all the strips pictured I can post it. 

 

Yes - I like to see it.