lienshan

direct experience of the divine is superior to knowledge and wisdom about the divine

There is not much divine in this chapter, so I don't think that this is Laozi's main target here.

I try show the core of the chapter in the way I read the text:

Forsake holiness! Reject wisdom! ........................

Forsake benevolence! Reject righteousness! ..........................

Forsake indigenousness! Reject vantage! ...........................

...................................................................

To regard as matter is to guard as the substance of matter.

Little selfishness is few desires.

I've put what isn't matter in bold and not the last word, that I read as meaning "the objects of longing".

Try to take up sports or endurance sports. I love cycling. The other day, I did 80 miles in a bit over 5 hours.

Put that anger to the pedals and go fast.

I prefer fucking as the symptom cure

One is never angry when in control. One cannot control the world so anger is a natural emotion.

That'll say, the more one wants to control, the more anger.

YES!

 

And go outside and play!!

I followed your wise advice and went out to play with the bookmaker gambling on some horseraces.

Try guess what he said, you have two possibilities:

Either: Forsake holyness!! Reject wisdom!! The win from lienshan is a hundredfold.

Or: Forsake holyness!! Reject wisdom!! lienshan will win a hundredfold.

Either: Forsake cleverness !! Reject wins!! Thieves will rob nothing.

Or: Forsake cleverness !! Reject wins!! Thives and robbers will have no existence.

The bookie is chinese and therefore a little difficult to understand: 盜賊無有

無 is e.g. either a negative particle (nothing) or a verb (have no existence)

I think this would need a 之 between the words to connect their meanings like this.

a 之 between the words ( 巧之絕 ) would nomilize the noun 絕 "forsakenness" as the verb 絕 "forsakening"

so one must choose to read it as either a noun or a verb depending of how one read it within the context.

That's the challenge of this chapter! What makes sense and what is nonsense to you as the reader?

To reject wisdom is nonsense to me. Shall I throw Tao Te Ching out of the window?

So should one compete on being wise and wiser and wiserest?

Or even should one be more philosophical and philosophicalrest that thou?

YES ... and thou succeded

But thou are still only second to DragonsNectar69k who opened my eyes to read this:

Forsake practice. Reject profit. The robbers and thieves disappear.

The practice of forsakenness rejects the profit that the thieves will have nothing to rob.

It's the same original chinese characters as in the exavacated Guodian Tao Te Ching.

They can be read both as a statement and as the arguement against that statement.

The unknown author of I Ching + Niels Bohr + The unknown author of the Guodian Tao Te Ching

One can be 'book smart', but it does not mean they are wise does it?

You're smack on! Here's the 'book smart' way of reading the three sentences:

Forsake holiness. Reject wisdom. The profit of the people is a hundredfold.

Forsake benevolence. Reject righteousness. The return of the people is filial piety.

Forsake practice. Reject profit. The robbers and thieves disappear.

And here's the 'down on earth' way of reading the three sentences:

The holiness of forsakenness rejects the wisdom that the people will profit a hundredfold.

The benevolence of forsakenness rejects the righteousness that the people will return to filial piety.

The practice of forsakenness rejects the profit that the thieves will have nothing to rob.

I've more problems with modern english grammar than with ancient chinese grammar, so I can ensure you, that both ways of reading the three sentences are grammatical correct. Technically: The second character of each sentence is both a verb and a noun (to forsake/the forsakenness) and likewise the thirdlast characters (to profit/the profit, to return to/the return, to rob/the robbers).

how do you justify the following statement.....???

2. People benefited hundredfold.

What you read as a verb (benefited) was meant to be read as a noun:

Laozi used a famous Mozi quote: 民心百倍 the heart-mind of the people hundredfold

but he replaced the graceful 心 heart-mind character with the lousy 利 profit character.

will result in one needing to learn and experience in their own sense, this will result in forsaking wisdom

You have convinced me. The meaning of the character within the context is wisdom.

Please teach me how to get rid of my wisdom and knowledge. It seems quite possible to you.....

wisdom / knowledge

If two persons, a wise man and a knowledgeable man, have an identical thought then:

The wise man names his own thought knowledgeable and the other person's thought wise.

The knowledgeable man names his own thought wise and the other person's thought knowledgeable.

A person can forget his own thought and forsake another person's thought.

A person cannot forsake his own thought and forget another person's thought.

There are four possibilities:

Forsake knowledge

Forget wisdom

Forsake wisdom

Forget knowledge

Beck: discard cleverness

Blackney: Put out the professors!

Bynner: Rid of learning People

Byrn: Forget about knowledge

Chan: discard wisdom

Cleary: abandon knowledge

Crowley: If we forgot our wisdom

Hansen: junk 'wisdom'

LaFargue: throw away "Knowledge"

Legge: If we could discard our wisdom

Lindauer: toss out wisdom

LinYutan: discard knowledge

Mabry: abandon "intelligence"

McDonald: discard knowledge

Merel: If we could discard knowledge

Mitchell: Throw away wisdom

Muller: abandon "wisdom"

Red Pine: Get rid of reason

Ta-Kao: eject wisdom

Walker: Give up knowledge

Wieger: Reject prudence

World: Quit distinguishing the wise and their wisdom

Wu: abandon cleverness

Was Laozi drunk, when he wrote chapter 19, or are Taoist Masters really stupid?

So you mean: "How are the people, and not a single command, similar to self justice," right?

Sounds like a very tricky riddle. I guess when the interrogative is taken out, the answer appears.

Ancient warring states philosophy was expressed like math:

the people + not a single command = self justice

天地相合也 以輸甘露

民莫之命而自均焉

Heaven and earth mutual united do contribute sweet dew.

Isn't the people and not a single command then self justice?

I live in a country where our beloved Queen uses not a single command and that works fine.

US is ruled by a commanding leader ........... the text continues with 始制有名 名亦既有夫

The first established has a name.

The accumulation of names already has the Man ... etc.

Put into my own words:

The accumulation of names = the people ( inclussive the leader)

The first established = the leader = the Man ( 夫 respectful term for a man)

The leader was still in Laozi's days the Son of Heaven, so 夫 was a lese majesty.

How is the people and not a single command similar to self justice?

The alternative way of treating two connected nouns is nonsense because a people cannot command:

How is not a single command of the people similar to self justice?

The Guodian chapter 19 is two texts within one text.
Those knowing the Sheng Dao slogans: Forsake Knowledge Abandon Self read the text this way:

Forsake knowledge. Reject debate. The profit of the people is a hundredfold.
Forsake opportuneness. Reject vantage. The thieves and robbers disappear.
Forsake hypocrisy. Reject anxiety. The people returns to the youngest child.
Three slogans considered inadequate command someone in a subordinate position.
The preferred uncolored of the inspected uncolored is the reduced desire of few grain still on stalks.

Those knowing that to regard as matter is to guard the substance of matter read the text this way:

The knowledge of forsakenness rejects the debate, that the people will profit a hundredfold.
The opportuneness of forsakenness rejects the vantage, that the thieves will have nothing to rob.
The hypocrisy of forsakenness rejects the anxiety, that the return of the people is the youngest child.
Three sentenses considered a composition. Poor someone commands someone from a subordinate position.
To regard as matter is to guard the substance of matter. Little selfishness is few desires.

The Shanghai Museum published in 2007 a translation of some of Sheng Dao's exavacated writings:

If the worthy are subjected by the unworthy, it is because their quan 權 (authority/power) is light and their position is low. If the unworthy can be subjected by the worthy, it is because the quan of the latter is heavy and their position is honorable. When Yao was a commoner, he could not govern even three people; Jie, as the Son of Heaven, could bring chaos to the whole world. From this I know, that positions of power are sufficient to rely on, and that worthiness and wisdom are not worth yearning for.

The position is the keyword in the philosophy of Sheng Dao. That's why Laozi choose to write a two texts in one text. His trick is the characters 乎屬 meaning in a subordinate position or from a subordinate position, depending of the context. But the context depends of how one read ;絕 as the verb forsake or the noun forsakenness; both ways are grammatical correct, because his choice of characters has made it possible.

lienshan, if I do put up an altar it will be a way of expressing my Daoist practice..

My taoist practice is reading the exavacated versions of Tao Te Ching for example chapter 51

The dignifying of Tao,

what's the high-ranking Te, because nobody can ennoble it, thus all the time self-fulfilling,

is Tao made bearing breeding elevating producing erecting poisoning raising returning.

The message is the same as in his chapter 42 and in his TaYiShengShui:

Worship anything else but Tao in your Home Taoist Altar practice.

The sentence is interrogative in the Guodian version: 民莫之命而自均焉

民 the people

莫之 not a single / no one

命 a command

而 similar to / like / and

自 self- (was always followed by a verb)

均 to be fair

焉 an interrogative-how, why, when, etc.

I read 自均 as meaning self justice

I'm loving this conversation. Learning a lot. Thanks for all of the participation.

Is your Home Taoist Altar a way of expressing Te / De / 德 in practice?

If you have the three books in the same size,

then remove the three covers,

and place the written pages in an inspiring wodden box .

That's the ancient way of keeping bamboo books

Another example of Laozi dealing with the logicians is the opening line of the Guodian chapter 15

古之善為士者必微妙玄達深不可識

Old people are good at studying that which surely is a microscopic oneness mysteriously arriving at an extremeness impossible to record.

Laozi's nearsighted and farsighted joke refers to the title of one of the logician Deng Xi' works:

What is without thickness cannot be piled up, yet its extension can cover 1000 li.

"without thickness" means a point (a dimensionless unit) which precedes all others.

Its character is in the Guodian text 妙 that according to the dictionaries means "subtle".

Laozi used too the character 妙 to express oneness in his chapter 1

the Everchange.

the Neverchange is that you (I'm sorry) is going to die one day.

I condole The Unchanging Truth of the Everchange

 

I think you will find the Confucians tend to follow the idea of Heng as permanent and eternal; this seems to stem from a famous passage in the Classic of Poetry where the moon moves to fullness and 'never waning'... and applies that to the longevity of success.

 

 

Those that have a little more detail reflect something else inbetween Nothingness and Heaven and Earth.

I try to put the confucian all the time Eternity into the Mawangdui formula one:

If it's Tao possible Tao, then it isn't the eternal Tao.

If it's a name possible to name, then it isn't the Eternity named.

The beginning of everything was not named.

The Mother of everything is a name.

Consequently:

The Eternity was not desired, considering its singleness.

The Eternity is a desire, considering her offsprings.

It's a pair of the same origin, different words with the same meaning.

They are the swing gates of the profound mystery and the oneness of the multitude.

all the time Eternity is like eternal Tao what's called: a redundancy/pleonasm/tautology

Put in short: saying the same thing twice

The character meaning the swing gates is visualizing what a redundancy means.

Not sure where 'earlier' comes from in: earlier than one's big brother?

The litteral reading of the sentence:

天 地 heaven and earth

而 as likely as

弗能 the impossibility

久 to grow late

有兄 to have a big brother

於人 one's

乎 rethorical ?

It was important for Laozi to use the verb 久 for some specific reason I don't know.

So the litteral read sentence contains a double-negotiation; that'll say:

the impossibility to grow late = the possibility to grow earlier

What is constant and eternal is change

 

 

This seems like a crazy text and translation The one gave birth to water???

I've found the definition of heng 恆 when reading a Confucius quote in the annalects. Put in short:

An one-armed man is heng one-armed that'll say one-armed all the time, day in and day out.

A good man isn't heng good that'll say not good all the time, day in and day out.

The Great One gives birth to water

and the return of water assists the Great One thus completing heaven

and the heavenly return is a big assistance thus completing earth.

The return of heaven and earth mutually assist thus completing light and spirit.

The return of light and spirit mutually assist thus completing yin and yang.

The return of yin and yang mutually assist thus completing the four seasons ... etc. etc.

The text is a part of the Guodian Tao Te Ching and the author is in my opinion Laozi.

What he deals with is a contemporary taoist cosmology and he starts with quoting it.

希: (adj)scarce

言: (noun) words; speech, decree(metaphor in the TTC classic only)

自然: natural

The scarce words are Tao and Te; their natural metaphors are the whirlwind and the cloudburst.

Laozi followed the logicians theory: To correct its character as actuality is to correct its name.

That's why he in his premises states: Tao is Tao and Te is Te

in the same way as a whirlwind is whirlwind and a cloudburst is a cloudburst

That's why he in his premises states: Tao together with Te share losses

in the same way as a whirlwind and a cloudburst share losses (blowing away and flooding things)

The first line of the chapter is meant to be read both as you do and as I do ... by purpose!

That was possible in classical chinese but is impossible in modern english ... we must choose?

Just like when translating the in his arguementation important character 失 (to lose and a loss)