Read Online Lao Tzu: Tao Te Ching by Ursula K. Le Guin, Laozi, Jerome P. Seaton - Free Book Online Page A
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people ,
A small one needs more room.
Each can get what it needs ,
but the big one needs to lie low.
Because the Ma wang tui texts are older, one
longs to see them as more authentic, less corrupt. But though they are
invaluable in offering variant readings, some of the variants may themselves be
corruptions. In this chapter, the Ma wang tui reads "Small
countries, submitting to a great one, are dominated," and in the next
verse, "Some by lying low stay on top, but some by lying low stay on the bottom."
Both versions are truisms, but the Ma wang tui version isn't even a Taoistic truism.
Chapter 62
The first and last verses hang together; the two middle
verses are difficult and rather incoherent. Waley says the enigmatic second verse refers to sophists and sages who went about
selling their "fine words" to the highest bidder, like our pop gurus
and TV pundits.
Chapter 64
I think the advice about being careful at the end of an undertaking
was added, perhaps to balance the advice that the right time to act is before
the beginning. It confuses the argument a bit, and I put it in parentheses.
The line I give as "tum back to what people
overlooked" is rendered by Lafargue as
"turns back to the place all others have gone on from"; Feng -English, "brings men back to what they have
lost"; Henricks , "returns to what the
masses have passed by"; Waley , "turning all
men back to the things they have left behind." Each version brings out a
different color in the line, like different lights on an opal.
Chapter 65
A dictator and his censors might all too easily cite from
this chapter. A democrat might agree that the more people know, the harder they
are for a ruler to govern—since the more they know, the better they are at
governing themselves. Anyone might agree that an intellectual agenda pursued
without reality-checking is indeed a curse upon the land. From the divine right
of kings through the deadly teachings of Hitler and Mao to the mumbojumbo of economists, government by theory has done endless
ill. But why is Lao Tzu's alternative to it a people kept in ignorance? What
kind of ignorance? Ignorance of what? Lao Tzu may be signalling us to ask such questions when he speaks of
"understanding these things."
Chapter 69
Waley is my guide to the
interpretation of the second verse, but I make very free with the last two
lines of it. If they aren't a rather vapid statement that one should never
underestimate one's foe, they must follow from what went before and lead to the
extraordinary last verse. It all comes down to the last line and the word shwai . Carus translates it as "the weaker [the more
compassionate]," and Bynner uses the word
"compassion." Waley translates it as
"he who does not delight in war," Henricks as "the one who feels grief," Gibbs-Cheng as "the one stung by
grief," Feng -English as "the
underdog," Lafargue as "the one in mourning."
A man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.
Chapter 71
I follow Henricks in choosing the Ma wang tui text, which has a double negative in the second line.
Most other texts have "not knowing knowing is
sickness."
Chapter 72
I take the liberty of reading this chapter as a description
of what we, we ordinary people, should fear. The usual reading is in the
manual-for-princes mode. In that case "what should be feared" is the
ruler, the rightful authority, and the advice that follows is evidently
directed to that ruler. It's certainly what 'William Blake would have told the
oligarchs of the Industrial Revolution, who still control our lives:
When people don't fear what should
be feared
they are in fearful danger.
Don't make them live in narrow houses ,
don't force them to do stupid work.
When they're not made stupid
they won't act stupidly.
Chapter 74
I follow the Ma wang tui text, but make very
free with the word Henricks renders as "constant
[in their behavior]." If I understand Henricks '
version, it says that if people were consistent in behaving normally and in
fearing death,
A small one needs more room.
Each can get what it needs ,
but the big one needs to lie low.
Because the Ma wang tui texts are older, one
longs to see them as more authentic, less corrupt. But though they are
invaluable in offering variant readings, some of the variants may themselves be
corruptions. In this chapter, the Ma wang tui reads "Small
countries, submitting to a great one, are dominated," and in the next
verse, "Some by lying low stay on top, but some by lying low stay on the bottom."
Both versions are truisms, but the Ma wang tui version isn't even a Taoistic truism.
Chapter 62
The first and last verses hang together; the two middle
verses are difficult and rather incoherent. Waley says the enigmatic second verse refers to sophists and sages who went about
selling their "fine words" to the highest bidder, like our pop gurus
and TV pundits.
Chapter 64
I think the advice about being careful at the end of an undertaking
was added, perhaps to balance the advice that the right time to act is before
the beginning. It confuses the argument a bit, and I put it in parentheses.
The line I give as "tum back to what people
overlooked" is rendered by Lafargue as
"turns back to the place all others have gone on from"; Feng -English, "brings men back to what they have
lost"; Henricks , "returns to what the
masses have passed by"; Waley , "turning all
men back to the things they have left behind." Each version brings out a
different color in the line, like different lights on an opal.
Chapter 65
A dictator and his censors might all too easily cite from
this chapter. A democrat might agree that the more people know, the harder they
are for a ruler to govern—since the more they know, the better they are at
governing themselves. Anyone might agree that an intellectual agenda pursued
without reality-checking is indeed a curse upon the land. From the divine right
of kings through the deadly teachings of Hitler and Mao to the mumbojumbo of economists, government by theory has done endless
ill. But why is Lao Tzu's alternative to it a people kept in ignorance? What
kind of ignorance? Ignorance of what? Lao Tzu may be signalling us to ask such questions when he speaks of
"understanding these things."
Chapter 69
Waley is my guide to the
interpretation of the second verse, but I make very free with the last two
lines of it. If they aren't a rather vapid statement that one should never
underestimate one's foe, they must follow from what went before and lead to the
extraordinary last verse. It all comes down to the last line and the word shwai . Carus translates it as "the weaker [the more
compassionate]," and Bynner uses the word
"compassion." Waley translates it as
"he who does not delight in war," Henricks as "the one who feels grief," Gibbs-Cheng as "the one stung by
grief," Feng -English as "the
underdog," Lafargue as "the one in mourning."
A man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.
Chapter 71
I follow Henricks in choosing the Ma wang tui text, which has a double negative in the second line.
Most other texts have "not knowing knowing is
sickness."
Chapter 72
I take the liberty of reading this chapter as a description
of what we, we ordinary people, should fear. The usual reading is in the
manual-for-princes mode. In that case "what should be feared" is the
ruler, the rightful authority, and the advice that follows is evidently
directed to that ruler. It's certainly what 'William Blake would have told the
oligarchs of the Industrial Revolution, who still control our lives:
When people don't fear what should
be feared
they are in fearful danger.
Don't make them live in narrow houses ,
don't force them to do stupid work.
When they're not made stupid
they won't act stupidly.
Chapter 74
I follow the Ma wang tui text, but make very
free with the word Henricks renders as "constant
[in their behavior]." If I understand Henricks '
version, it says that if people were consistent in behaving normally and in
fearing death,
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