Tao Te Ching

The Power of Goodness, the Wisdom Beyond Words
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Tao Te Ching, a new translation and commentary

By Ralph Alan Dale

Because the Tao Te Ching uncovers the meaning buried beneath the words, new translations adapted to cultural and linguistic changes become more and more relevant as social and technological changes proliferate. Dale's presentation helps bring Lao Tzu's wisdom into the modern idiom. As he says himself, "Long years of meditation on the Tao Te Ching have revealed to me its highly organic nature, each chapter being connected with others to form an organic whole." He avoids the view that some Lao Tzu followers fall into, the Luddite attitude toward technology. He doesn't minimize the negative consequences but points toward a reconciling hope of blending integrity and wisdom with technological knowledge, challenges of the modern world with visions of world peace and integrity.

Both the quality of the translations and insightfulness of the commentaries seems mixed, possibly based on Dale's level of insight into each particular chapter.

Quotes from Tao Te Ching, a new translation and commentary

“21st century technology makes have and have-not inequities, as well as their rationales, anachronistic.”

Chapters:

Themes: Poverty Equality

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“Every gross part of our anatomy has originated in various countries throughout the world, some in ancient times some very recently.”

Chapters:

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“If beauty will no longer be separable from life, then we may expect that, eventually, there will no longer be concert halls and museums, since the music and art of life will be inherent in all the sounds, movements, and patterns of ordinary life”

Chapters:

Themes: Beauty

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“In the realm of art, the Great Integrity [the Tao] implies the 'artistification' of life and the gradual disappearance of our old age are 'closets' such as museums and performance halls.”

Chapters:

Themes: Art

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“In the realm of religion, we can look forward to ecumenical dissolution of sects, dogmas, and superstitions since they create a tiro mortis of the mind, emotions and spirit.”

Chapters:

Themes: Religion

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“It is the paradox of every poet to have to transcend the logical function of language through language... Because paradox is the principal mode of Lao Tzu's thought processes, it is the nature of Chinese language, especially ancient Chinese, to be poetic.”

Chapters:

Themes: Poetry Paradox

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“Lao Tzu's ancient philosophy provides a window through which we can acquire such a perspective—one that can intellectually catapult us beyond the limitations and toxins of our everyday lives.”

Chapters:

Themes: Taoism

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“No part of us is unrelated to other parts, even down to the single cell. Every cell probably knows the whole of us. There is a new consciousness implied in these premises; namely, that reality is a complex, interrelated and integral structure, including our own body-mind-emotions-spirit, as well as our relationship to others and to our environment.”

Chapters:

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“Once our technology is no longer polluting our environment and used primarily for killing people, it can be used to create an economy of abundance. Such an economy no longer requires us to be individual, group, race, national, ethnic, religious or gender enemies of each other because there will be plenty of everything for every one of us on the planet. Given our present technology, starvation and deprivation are artificially maintained.”

Chapters:

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“Our present linearly and hierarchically structured languages are likely to transform into a music-language, capable of communicating subtle differentiations and simultaneities of experience, reasoning and feeling.”

Chapters:

Themes: Music

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“This verse celebrates the relativity of reality, thereby aligning itself with modern science, especially Einstein's theory of relativity.”

Chapters: 2. The Wordless Teachings

Themes: Reality Science

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“We are at war with ourselves, with the environment, and with others. It is a matter of overcoming the old ways of thinking and the old premises of being, including our economic and political structures. The old competitive market economy and the old political parties, representing special selfish interests, will give way to a co-operative global community.”

Chapters:

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“What is implied here is nothing less than the healing of the split between the two hemispheres of our brain which have become separated, alienated and at war with each other during the past few thousand years... This verse welcomes the disappearance of all boundaries among art, science, and religion as the walls and premises of every discipline dissolve into a higher consciousness”

Chapters: 1. The Unnamed

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“Wholeness, rather than fragmentation, is the basic nature of reality... In effect, the fragmentation expressed in conventional medicine and in our social relations may be a distortion of nature, a false premise which has permeated our lives.”

Chapters:

Themes: One Taste Oneness

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