Lao Tzu: Tao Te Ching Read Free Page A

must be named ,
let its name be Great.
Greatness means going on ,
going on means going far,
and going far means turning back.
    So they say: “The Way is great ,
heaven is great,
earth is great,
and humankind is great;
four greatnesses in the world,
and humanity is one of them.”
    People follow earth ,
earth follows heaven,
heaven follows the Way,
the Way follows what is.
    ----
    I’d like to call the “something” of the first line a lump—an
unshaped, undifferentiated lump, chaos, before the
Word, before Form, before Change. Inside it is time, space,
everything; in the womb of the Way.
    The last words of the
chapter, tzu jan , I render
as “what is.” I was tempted to say, “The Way follows itself,” because the Way
is the way things are; but that would reduce the significance of the words.
They remind us not to see the Way as a sovereignty or
a domination, all creative, all yang. The Way itself is a follower. Though it
is before everything, it follows what is.

26 - Power of the heavy
    Heavy is the root of light.
Still is the master of moving.
    So wise souls make their daily march
with the heavy baggage wagon.
    Only when safe
in a solid, quiet house
do they lay care aside.
    How can a lord of ten thousand chariots
let his own person
weigh less in the balance than his land?
Lightness will lose him his foundation ,
movement will lose him his mastery.
    ----
    I take heaviness to be the root matters of daily life, the
baggage we bodily beings have to carry, such as food, drink, shelter, safety.
If you go charging too far ahead of the baggage wagon you may be cut off from
it; if you treat your body as unimportant you risk insanity or inanity.
    The first two lines
would make a nice motto for the practice of T’ai Chi.
     

 
27 - Skill
    Good walkers leave no track.
Good talkers don’t stammer.
Good counters don’t use their fingers.
The best door’s unlocked and unopened.
The best knot’s not in a rope and can’t be untied.
    So wise souls are good at caring for people ,
never turning their back on anyone.
They’re good at looking after things ,
never turning their back on anything.
There’s a light hidden here.
    Good people teach people who aren’t good yet ;
the less good are the makings of the good.
Anyone who doesn’t respect a teacher
or cherish a student
may be clever, but has gone astray.
There’s a deep mystery here.
    ----
    The hidden light and the deep mystery seem to be signals,
saying “think about this”—about care for what seems unimportant. In a teacher’s parental care for the insignificant student, and in
a society’s respect for mothers, teachers, and other obscure people who
educate, there is indeed illumination and a profoundly human mystery. Having
replaced instinct with language, society, and culture, we are the only species
that depends on teaching and learning. We aren’t human without them. In them is
true power. But are they the occupations of the rich and mighty?

 
28 - Turning back
    Knowing man
and staying woman ,
be the riverbed of the world.
Being the world’s riverbed
of eternal unfailing power
is to go back again to be newborn.
    Knowing light
and staying dark ,
be a pattern to the world.
Being the world’s pattern
of eternal unerring power
is to go back again to boundlessness.
    Knowing glory
and staying modest ,
be the valley of the world.
Being the world’s valley
of eternal inexhaustible power
is to go back again to the natural.
    Natural wood is cut up
and made into useful things.
Wise souls are used
to make into leaders.
Just so, a great carving
is done without cutting.
    ----
    The simplicity of Lao Tzu’s language can present an almost
impenetrable density of meaning. The reversals and paradoxes in this great poem
are the oppositions of the yin and yang—male/female, light/dark,
glory/modesty—but the “knowing and being” of them, the balancing act, results
in neither stasis nor synthesis. The riverbed in which power runs leads back,
the patterns of