Do you need to learn Chinese

[Mig]

After reading many postings about Daoism, the DDJ, ZZ, LZ etc. I was wondering for all the scholars in this forum,

is it necessary to know modern Chinese and classical Chinese to read those classics? or it is no necessary to learn

none but rely entirely on every English translation since the concepts or messages in those books are just normal

concepts or advises that are natural in humans all over the world. If I read  the DDJ or ZZ, I can understand the sentences

in a translation but I don't have a clue of the meaning, structure or hidden message in each chapter. If I find an explanation

or commentary of each chapter and the point of view of a scholar well versed in Daoism then I understand the reason why.

The problem becomes tricky when everyone has one opinion and their opinion is based on religious or an academic point of

view. The famous dichotomy of religious and philosophical Daoism is seen from differently from the point of a native scholar.

And reading those Daoists books, I realize that is important to learn about Confucianism and then bingo! I can see how terms,

concepts or ideas had evolved after their time until the Tang and Song dynasty and how those texts were interpreted later by

Buddhists, Confucians and Daoists.

So is it necessary to learn Chinese or not to read or understand (to practice in life) the old classics?

[Master Logray]

There are modern Chinese translations of these texts.  Yes, Chinese today need such.

[Taoist Texts]

35 minutes ago, Mig said:

So is it necessary to learn Chinese or not to read or understand (to practice in life) the old classics?

not necessary. except ppl do not know how to think critically in any language. which in turn results in words losing their meaning. ppl lost the ability to ask themselves 'what does this mean in real world'? instead they read not what the classic says in black and white, but their own opinions .

40 minutes ago, Mig said:

The famous dichotomy of religious and philosophical Daoism 

to wit. Ppl repeat that without thinking how the hell would that be possible in real world back then?

[Cobie]

14 hours ago, Mig said:

… is it necessary to learn Chinese or not to read or understand (to practice in life) the old classics?

 

That depends on what you’re interested in. 

If you want to learn about popular Western culture, then reading the translations will suffice 

If you want to learn what the Laozi said, then you must learn Chinese 

 

Edited January 4 by Cobie

[Cobie]

14 hours ago, Master Logray said:

There are modern Chinese translations of these texts.  Yes, Chinese today need such.

 

Yes, I was told Classical Chinese is considered too difficult to read by most Chinese these days. 
 

 

Edited January 4 by Cobie

[Cobie]

I was told most Chinese these days have no interest at all in reading the DDJ. 

They read the popular interpretation of the first line of it: ‘the true Dao, cannot be expressed in words’.

And quite naturally deduce and put it in their minds that there’s no point reading the rest of it. 
 

 

 

Edited January 4 by Cobie

[ChiDragon]

15 hours ago, Mig said:

I was wondering for all the scholars in this forum,

is it necessary to know modern Chinese and classical Chinese to read those classics?

It is better to know the language of one culture to understand it. There is always something got lost in the translation from a non-native. Also, there are always misinterpretations from a native speaker too. If one knows the language, then at least, it is one step closer to comprehend the material of interest.

[Cobie]

On 04/01/2024 at 9:29 PM, Cobie said:

… most Chinese these days have no interest at all in reading the DDJ. 

They read the popular interpretation of the first line of it: ‘the true Dao, cannot be expressed in words’.

And quite naturally deduce and put it in their minds that there’s no point reading the rest of it. 

 

And so too it would have been for the people at the time of Laozi. 

So naturally Laozi would not have said that. And indeed he did not. 

The oldest characters for line 1 Ch 1, include 也 - which totally changes the meaning. 
 

 

[Dao of Rob]

There are some good points made here, but there is an 'end of history' theme implied by the question. By that I mean that we have good historical knowledge of how texts, and the relatively rare individuals who could read them in centuries gone by, have 'transmitted' knowledge and ideas down to the modern era. 

The problem with so many scholarly questions is that at some point in the 20th century (probably the point at which there was a sharp increase in people gaining university degrees and hence the language/methods of academia) an unexamined assumption seems to have spread around the world -- the assumption that we'd finally arrived at the criticial/epistemological place from which everything past and future could be rationally assessed. 

Therefore we 'behave' as if the long tradition we loosely call 'daoism' (in English) has finished and we can now pick over its bones to see what it was all about and extract the 'true' meaning. 

Thus we have 'daoism the evolving, changing, and ever-augmented body of texts and practices' being replaced with 'no new daoism can be created, so let's just analyse the real historical version'. 

In my view, this assumption runs all through this web-site in a way that I do not notice so much in western buddhism. Groups like Triratna (with whom I often practiced/studied under their old FWBO name), Tibetan groups, and many other other groups estabilished in non-native settings overtly ask how the ancient teachings can be adapted to fit with the modern world. 

Daoism should be the same -- that is, the meanings of its texts, and the translations of those texts, have always been free to shift, change and be reinvented (until now it seems) for one simple reason: the nature of the universe inside and outside the reader is the same, and each of these texts is a necessarily imperfect way of helping the reader to throw off misconceptions and see it existence for what it is. 

All of that said, it's can't be true that ANY interpretation of a text can fit into the loose category of 'daoism', which begs the question of how any scholar or follower of these teachings can judge for themselves if an interpretation of a text is an addition to the canon or a distortion of themes common to all other canonical texts. 

This is where it gets difficult for the contemporary academic, because their critical practice usually proceeds for the assumption that language/logic can be used to make this assessment and nothing outside of language/logic can be the litmus test of whether a text fits the 'daoist' category. 

There is another way, of course, and that is to engage in direct practice oneself and to experience the so-called mystical and inexpressable truths that just about every daoist text is hinting at and then return to the texts to see if they serve as a guide towards, or away from those experiences. 

In younger days I sought out those experiences with around a dozen buddhist groups but it was not until I did strict and rigidly traditional Japanese zen training with a monastery-trained teacher that I realised how wrong most of my conceptions of buddhist/daoist texts were. I felt like somebody who had read everything ever written on boxing, but for the first time was experiencing the pain and excitement of standing in the ring, striking out and being hit. 

I suppose you could say that 'boxing' is one tradtion and 'writing about boxing' is another tradition -- they appear to be connected, but the practitioners of each are never (or very rarely) the same individuals. 

That idea can be confronting for academics (I was on staff at a large univerisity for seven years) but should not be at all confronting for somebody interested in using daoist text as the catalyst, inspiration or even instruction on how to experience self/universe as they really are rather than as they have been described to us. 

So to answer the original question, I think learning various kinds of Chinese language would be useful if the texts you have available in your own language are unsatisfying or you suspect their essential mean has been corrupted. To use a christian analogy, if there is a particular passage or the King James bible at odds with one in the Good News bible, and if it is important to your practice as a christian or you think it threatens to derail for others the tradition you love, then you'd better go back to Hebrew.