The past few evenings I read the Dao De Jing as translated by
Roger T. Ames and David L. Hall. Rozann put it in my stocking this past Christmas, it
is not the type of book I would normally pick to read. Philosophy in general is obsolete. However Rozann is traveling this week, and the books I have been reading I managed to leave behind in the Santa Clara office. So I needed to do something during my off hours this WW -- one thought from each chapter:
Chapter 1:
The
nameless is the fetal beginnings of everything that is happening,
While
that which is named is their mother.
Google
was a backrub in 1996.
Chapter 2:
As
soon as everyone in the world knows that the beautiful are beautiful,
There is already ugliness.
The smuts we are, we can't help but to put things in boxes, and then label the box before filing. It is too hard not to.
Chapter 3:
Not prizing property that is hard
to come by
Will save them [others] from becoming
thieves.
The Dao De Jing was writing in the
Iron Age as was the Hebrew Bible; these
were horrible times in human history. It
was a very dark time after successes of humanity in the Bronze Age were lost. Mothers didn’t expect their kids to make it
to adulthood. If you had something good,
you were best to keep it to yourself.
Chapter 4:
I do not know whose progeny it is;
It prefigures the ancestral gods.
I like this idea; we think of 600BCE as the ancients. It is obvious from this phrase the Chinese
in 600BCE had their own concept of
ancients to them. And it makes me consider those who will live on Earth
in the year 4000CE will look at us as their ancients.
Chapter 5:
The
heavens and the Earth are not partial to
institutionalized morality.
This phrase stands on its own; it
did then, it does now.
Chapter 6:
The life-force of the valley never dies.
They didn’t understand (or even care as far as I can tell from the reading)
what happens when the Sun runs out of hydrogen. I suppose I don’t care either, as it is so
far off, but we do know now that we live in a special time, a time where we
have a visible universe. Billions of
years from now the universe grow dark, and the life-force will die. Iron Age ignorance bliss it seems.
Chapter 7:
The
reason the world is able to be lasting
and enduring
Is
because it does not live for itself
This it is able
to be long-lived.
This reads like complete garbage, what a philosopher from Sedona would tell you today if you
paid them to read the lines in your hand.
Chapter 8:
The highest efficacy is like water,
It is because water benefits everything.
Good
thought for thinking inward – and outward.
Chapter 9:
It is better to desist
Then
to try to hold it upright and fill it to the brim.
Many things come to mind when
digesting this thought, most of them will be smarter than my comment to follow;
but hey, let’s face the music and dance tonight while the moon is still out –
tell me the rest tomorrow.
Chapter 10:
Are
you able to become a newborn babe?
No, Nix, Go fish.
Chapter 11:
This chapter is 100% philosophical
rubbish, nothing worth quoting.
Chapter 12:
The five flavors destroy the palate.
I am sure this is an early version
of Matthew’s “no one can serve two masters”.
But if the author were to watch
the food network in 2016, different words would have been used.
Chapter 13:
. .
whenever favor is bestowed, both gaining
it and losing it should be cause for alarm.
All primates are sentient social
beings who will come into favor and drop out of favor. To not do so would be as expected as it would
be for teenagers to abstain from sex.
But, I would agree, it is good to keep track of when favors come and go;
smart.
Chapter 14:
Groping and yet not getting it
We thus call it “intangible.”
The author never met Jake
Plumer.
Chapter 15:
Muddy water, when stilled, slowly becomes clear;
Something settled, when agitated, slowly comes to life.
Like ten chapters earlier; This phrase
stands on its own; it did then, it does now.
Chapter 16:
Using
common sense is to be accommodating.
Common
sense of any given time period, in general, turns out to be proven wrong in the
next period. Those who employ common sense
rarely if ever improve living standards or human knowledge. So yes, when we engage in common sense we do so to
accommodate the surrounding contemporary culture.
Chapter 17:
With
the most excellent rulers, their subjects
only know that they are there,
The next best are the rulers they
love and praise,
Next
the rulers they hold in awe,
And the worst are the rulers they
disparage.
Written as well as any modern day
Libertarian Atheist would write it. Note:
The third and fourth level are the stories of the Jewish Bible and the Qur’an’s
God.
Chapter 18:
It
is when wisdom and erudition arise
That
great duplicity appears.
This
seems to have been written under
the influence of ancient Chinese honey wines.
It would not be surprising that the authors wrote both day and night,
and some nights the hawthorn may have come into play.
Chapter 19:
Cut off sagacity and get rid of wisdom.
This
was, in my current judgment, written about two days after recovering
from the honey consumed when writing Chapter 18.
Chapter 20:
The author
was on a rampage in chapter 20:
Cut off learning and there will be nothing to more to worry about.
How much difference is there really between a polite “yes” and an
emphatic “no!” ?
Those who people
fear
Cannot but also fear
other.
So indefinite! Does this humbuggery ever come to an end!
As with Chapters 5 and 15, Chapter
20 is self-evident in modern time. And
yes it comes to an end. If anyone read
this far and tells me, I’ll add my commentary on the other 61
chapters of the Dao De Jing. Else I’ll finish
a glass of modern day honey and call it a night. Cheers.
