Tao Te Ching
Tao Te Ching
By Lao Tzu
Although much can be forgiven because of how early this translation was done, not only does it seem to only focus on the words without understanding the sense, but sometimes it even seems to completely misunderstanding the words themselves; A Christian missionary to China, the translator’s commentaries often reflect something personal rather than anything Lao Tzu’s symbolism points toward. For example, he compares Lao Tzu saying, “Always without desire we must be found if its deep mystery we would sound” to St. John saying in the Bible, “He that liveth not, knoweth not God; for God is love.” Possibly worse, he universalizes his misunderstandings. For example after saying that for Lao Tzu government should be “unfavorable to the spread of knowledge,” he goes on to say that this is a “uniform teaching of Lao Tzu… and of all Taoist writers.” This was probably a strong stepping stone in the scholarly process of the Tao Te Ching coming into the English language but doesn’t have much to offer the modern reader.
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