Mair 2:9

[Marblehead]

The Way has never been divided up, speech has never been constant. It's all because of "this " that there are demarcations. Let me explain what I mean by demarcations. There are left and right, discussions and deliberations, analyses and disputes, arguments and altercations. These are the eight types of demarcative assertions. The sages set aside without discussion what lies beyond the world. The sages discuss what lies within the world, but do not deliberate upon it. As for annals and other records of the statesmanship of the former kings, the sages deliberate over them but will not dispute about them. Therefore, wherever there is analysis, something is left unanalyzed. Wherever there is dispute, something is left undisputed. You may ask, "How can this be?" The sages embrace all things, but ordinary people dispute over them to show off to each other. Therefore it is said, wherever there is dispute, something is left unseen.

The great Way is ineffable, great disputation

{{ Philosophical argument, the favorite pursuit of the Sophists or Logicians.}}

is speechless, great humaneness is inhumane, great honesty is immodest, and great bravery is not aggressive. The way that displays itself is not the Way. Speech that is disputatious fails to achieve its aims. Humaneness that is constant cannot go around. Honesty that is aloof will not be trusted. Bravery that is aggressive will not succeed. One who does not abandon these five precepts will be more or less headed in the right direction.

Therefore, she who knows to stop at what she does not know has attained the ultimate. Who knows the disputation that is without words and the Way that cannot be walked upon? If one can have knowledge of them, this is called the Treasury of Heaven. You may pour into it, but it never fills; you may dip from it, but it never empties; and you never know where it comes from. This is called the Inner Light.


 

[Taoist Texts]

The Way has never been divided up, speech has never been constant. It's all because of "this " that there are demarcations.

.....

Therefore, she who knows to stop at what she does not know has attained the ultimate. Who knows the disputation that is without words and the Way that cannot be walked upon? If one can have knowledge of them, this is called the Treasury of Heaven.

You may pour into it, but it never fills; you may dip from it, but it never empties; and you never know where it comes from. This is called the Inner Light.

 

Here ZZ confirms his solution for the non-existent entities, suggested in the previous paragraph: ‘do not create them, do not discuss them, rely on your subconscious for understanding, not on the intellectual / verbal mind’. This solution also provides for attaining the ultimate state of the mind.

The middle portion of the paragraph has been translated more or less correctly, but the intro line and the last paragraph are garbled.

“The Dao is not divided only when it has not began yet, the words are constant only when they have not began yet.

…

Who knows to stop at the non-existent – reached the ultimate knowledge.

Who knows the disputation that is without words and the Way that is not the tangible way – reached the Heavenly Castle. (a Confucian term for the correct attitude of a scholar AND the ideal state of the nation).

The mind that     pour into it, but it never fills;   dip from it, but it never empties;   never know where it comes from. Is called the mind of the Covered Light.” 

[Marblehead]

This goes back to "knowing when to stop", doesn't it?

 

The concept applies to words as well.

 

Reality exists without words.  We don't need to explain it in order to experience it.

 

When we start using words to explain it things then begin to get garbled.

 

So yes, we can speak about the Manifest.  These are of the tangible "Ten Thousand Things".  Things we can put our hands on and say "This is ..."

 

But can we ever speak of the Mystery?  It is still only potential - what "might" be.  Sure, we can talk.  But only of "possibilities".

 

I think we already have enough problems speaking of "what is".  Different interpretations, etc.  How can we presume to know what yet does not exist?

[Taoist Texts]

   How can we presume to know what yet does not exist?

Well we don't. But there are folks who make stuff up for a living. 

[smallsteps]

"knowing when to stop" and actually doing it is the hardest thing I ever tried to do.

 

As you said Marblehead, there is something that exists without words. As soon as mind puts names, categories and concepts, we enter a world ruled by opposites and differences. Hence the disputes and the never ending disagreements because everyone believes his own mind over 'what is' that the mind can't see. 'What is' is larger than any thinking system or philosophy, it is inconceivable.

When I see a flower, what I see is beyond any thought of mine about what a flower is and it would take an infinite book to describe with words the reality of what I see, because language is conceptual by nature and selects and cuts from reality to produce meaning. So there is indeed always something that is unseen by the mind. Senses are closer to reality when mind gives them break but it is still not it.

 

So if we can't get rid of conceptual mind because we are human beings and not potatoes, the only practical way lies into knowing when to stop.

 

To that, we have to know the difference between the small bucket (our mind) and the large bucket (the Dao) and stop at the entrance of the Dao which is inevitably also neither an entrance nor an exit because it is there that all directions (= concepts) are erased. It is where there is no ground anymore for the mind and where everything is dissolved into what our mind takes as nothingness when it is only the end of things ( = no thing) as mind sees them.

 

Hard to be humble enough to stop believing our own mind, our own thinking instead of following the way of the Dao.

Actually my above chitchat is something full of pride. Silly me

 

Edited the last line:  'the' is replaced by 'my'

Edited August 31, 2016 by smallsteps

[Geof Nanto]

The Song of Shadowy Radiance (Inner Light)

 

The moon’s dark, night touches mystery. 

Sitting alone, a recluse opens to Zhuangzi’s song.

 

Yin stillness, emerald-water clarities. 

And suddenly, as if gentle breezes were singing,

 

Wordlessly, beyond knowing: Heaven’s Treasury, 

heart-deep harmonies, a timeless reservoir of belonging. 

 

Alas, those dark-bright ancients who could evoke

a song of such warm depths vanished long ago.