Chapter of the Week: #34

Carl

My mind shouted at me ‘Life is short – it’s a vacation from death!’ but lets see how these words correlate…

Life – stirs – needs – takes - work
Death – settles – satiates – gives – rest

(Perhaps!… I nearly wasn’t brave enough to try post that.)

‘Need’ calls us into action to satiate, but we all know too well that contentment is fleeting. So I would agree that death is the vacation, the rest from action. But it seems that 'not acting' doesn’t last ‘long’ and will emerge into action again. Like the swing of a pendulum... the stillness is when it reaches its boundary before it helplessly continues the only way it can.
Due to our survival instinct’s bias towards action, more often we tend to need reminding of sameness and that all things return to stillness. Those who are drawn to a taoist viewpoint find this soothing. But perhaps the most lingering stillness lays in surrendering to that which is without substance, which in turn means accepting feeling drawn to fill the void. Phew.. wish me luck.

Carl

Each week we address one chapter of the Tao Te Ching. The Tao Te Ching can be obscure, especially if you think you're supposed to understand what it's saying! We find it easier and more instructive to simply contemplate how the chapter resonates with your personal experience. Becoming more aware at this fundamental level simplifies life. This approach conforms to the view that true knowing lies within ourselves. Thus, when a passage in the scripture resonates, you've found your inner truth. The same applies for when it evokes a question; questions are the grist for self realization.

Chapter 34
The way is broad, reaching left as well as right.
The myriad creatures depend on it for life yet it claims no authority.
It accomplishes its task yet lays claim to no merit.
It clothes and feeds the myriad creatures yet lays no claim to being their master.

For ever free of desire, it can be called small; yet, as it lays no claim to
being master when all things turn to it, it can be called great.

It is because it never attempts itself to be great that it succeeds in becoming great.

Read commentary previously posted for this chapter.
Read notes on translations

Carl

[Note: I italicize phrases I borrow from the chapter, and link to phrases I borrow from other chapters to help tie chapters together. While making it more tedious to read, :? the Tao Te Ching is best pondered in the context of the whole.]

Christ said, "Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it", which sound quite opposite from the way is broad, reaching left as well as right. However, I no longer see these as that different. :shock: The last phrase, "few there be that find it" is right in line with [chref=70]yet no one in the world can understand them or put them into practice.[/chref] Even the first part rings true when we are talking about balance. The ability of words to point in various directions demonstrates the wisdom of not placing all our awareness eggs in the [chref=23]word's[/chref] and [chref=32]name's[/chref] basket. But, that's a tall order considering how tightly we link awareness with the words we [chref=71]think[/chref].

Even so, I prefer the view that 'the great way inundates the same, left or right.' But then this sound more like the omni presence of God to which Christians refer. When I dig down deep to feel the pre-word origins I see great similarity everywhere and in everything. Words and names divide the whole - [chref=10]the One[/chref]. It sure is easy to get sidetracked haggling over issues, which if we dug deeper we would find peace giving similarity. Of course, half of life - the yang half - is supposed to be contention and struggle. Perhaps the balance is off and we have more contention that harmony. Or perhaps we want to have our cake and eat it too.

The literal Chinese:
big (great) way inundate ( flood, float, nonspecific) its same left right.
10,000 things depend on of use (because of, so as to) birth (life, existence) and not decline (take leave),
meritorious service accomplish and not name have.
clothes support 10,000 things and not act as master, always without desire can name small.
10,000 thing return herein, but not act as master, can name act as big.
use (because of) its end (death, whole, eventually) not self act as big,
hence can accomplish its big

Prettified as little as possible:
The great way inundates the same, left or right.
All depends on it for existence and it never declines,
It accomplishes its meritorious service anonymously.
It supports all yet without acting as master,
It always is without desire and so seems small.
All return to it, yet by not acting as master, it can be called great.
Because of its ultimate non-self, it becomes great.
Hence it can accomplish greatness.

brandiosity

That reading reminds me of one i found in a book that is something like this: The soil provides all of the nutrients for all of the flowers yet takes no credit for this.

It does all this by silently sitting below them out of view not taking any credit for it.

It does all of this by doing nothing