Thoughts on the Tao Te Ching 31

Poem 31

Weapons are the tools of violence;

all decent men detest them.

Weapons are the tools of fear;

a decent man will avoid them

except in the direst necessity

and, if compelled, will use them

only with the utmost restraint.

Peace is his highest value.

If the peace has been shattered,

how can he be content?

His enemies are not demons,

but human beings like himself.

He doesn't wish them personal harm.

Nor does he rejoice in victory.

How could he rejoice in victory

and delight in the slaughter of men?

He enters a battle gravely,

with sorrow and with great compassion,

as if he were attending a funeral.

Commentary

I have mentioned this before, but it bears repeating, that the Tao Te Ching is some 2,500 years old dating back roughly to the sixth century B.C.  It represents a programme for living. In fact, the word "Tao" means "way" and the whole phrase "Tao Te Ching" means "The Classic of the Way of Virtues."   Jesus, the founder of Christianity, also proclaimed that he was "the Way, the Truth and the light!"  Therefore, it's nothing new to state that all religious founders suggest a programme or a way for living.  Too often, though, their followers who mostly construct the "Church" or "organization" that their founder perhaps did not visualise, often lose sight of the original basic way. 

Taormina, 2006 - Peace reigns

It is very interesting to see that Taoism is from the very beginning against the use of weapons.  The same can not be said for the histories and indeed the holy books of many of the world religions, but that is an idea for a post for another blog entirely.  Our motivation in this blog is neither didactic nor point scoring.  One would feel instinctively that the first two lines in the above poem would make a good poster for Barack Obama in his campaign to have stricter gun control laws in the USA.

As a teacher of some 36 years service, I have long been convinced that fear is a poor motivation in learning, period!  One would want to be particularly obtuse not to realise this immediately.  To say that weapons are "tools of fear" is, perhaps also, to state the obvious. 

Warring nations are adept at demonising the enemy and canonising their own heroes.  They do it to engender hate and all possible negative emotions towards the enemy.  To realise that the enemy soldiers, or indeed enemy civilians, are only all too human like ourselves is something these warring nations seek to suppress.  After all, it's particularly hard to kill, or even be mean to, people who are all too much like ourselves.  Hitler and Stalin were adept at canonising and demonising as they knew well how to get the emotions of a people going - how to whip up hatred for others especially when it was needed.  Dehumanising others is the way to excite the baser emotions against them.  Therefore, the opposite is most especially true - humanise others and we promote peace.

Bridge Building is better than War - Dusseldorf, December, 2006

Therefore, as the year 2016 is approaching in a few days time, let us decide to humanise all people we meet as best we can; to humanise even those we have not met for a long time - perhaps even people we have fallen out with; to humanise all the African refugees who are fleeing their very extinction in their own countries; to humanise as best we can even the lowliest of our brothers and sisters.  Then, now that the thought strikes me - can we even humanise those who have a very right wing gun-toting belief?  If we can so do, can we talk civilly with them?  Or are we in a weakened position de facto from the very beginning of our conversation.

They say that peace is the work of justice.  Therefore, maybe we can seek to be more just in our living in 2016.  The above poem needs to be reflected upon.  I'm not totally convinced that the policy of pacifism ever really works - if it did Neville Chamberlain would have convinced Hitler and there would have been no WW II.  Likewise, had there been no Churchill the Third Reich would most certainly still be in power.  So naive pacifism simply gets nowhere.  I believe the Taoist poet intuitively knew this, and, therefore, he recommends that the true warrior enter battle "gravely, with sorrow and with great compassion, as if he were attending a funeral."

Thights on the Tao Te Ching 30

Poem 30

Whoever relies on the Tao in governing men

doesn't try to force issues

or defeat enemies by force of arms.

For every force there is a counterforce.

Violence, even well intentioned,

always rebounds upon oneself.

The Master does his job

and then stops.

He understands that the universe

is forever out of control,

and that trying to dominate events

goes against the current of the Tao.

Because he believes in himself,

he doesn't try to convince others.

Because he is content with himself,

he doesn't need others' approval.

Because he accepts himself,

the whole world accepts him.

Commentary

In our last post we commented that all control is self-control.  It is surely also a parallel truism to observe that all acceptance is self-acceptance and another to opine that all love springs from authentic self-love.  One can run oneself ragged helping others, even work oneself into nervous exhaustion.  It is when, paradoxically, one really authentically looks after one's self that one can be truly caring of others.

Evergreen Tree: Newbridge House

Once again, I must confess that the above Taoist poem is a little too negative for me, and I believe it recommends a certain passivity and fatalism that sticks in the throat of us moderns.  However, there is a certain wisdom is the advice that it is generally better not to force an issue, not to push things beyond breaking point with others.  Without a shadow of a doubt, such pushing leads all too inevitably to war, and we have far too many examples of these wars in today's world.  It is also a truism to comment that violence leads inevitably to more violence and thence it spirals way out of control.

Once again, I invite the willing reader to read the above poem reflectively and let some word, phrase or line offer itself as a mantra for a short meditation.

In this Season of Seasons, this Season of Peace and Justice, I wish all the readers of these few thoughts, peace in their own lives and those of their families.  Namaste, friends.

 

Thoughts on the Tao Te Ching 29

Poem 29

Do you want to improve the world?

I don't think it can be done.

The world is sacred.

It can't be improved.

If you tamper with it, you'll ruin it.

If you treat it like an object, you'll lose it.

There is a time for being ahead,

a time for being behind;

a time for being in motion,

a time for being at rest;

a time for being vigorous,

a time for being exhausted;

a time for being safe,

a time for being in danger.

The Master sees things as they are,

without trying to control them.

She lets them go their own way,

and resides at the center of the circle.

Commentary

Yellow Poppy

Having lived in this world for almost 58 years now, I have in the past been mostly annoyed and angry at people who cannot resist the urge to take control of others, though mostly I am more amused at their antics in the last number of years.  Life has taught me that I simply cannot control any other human being, much less the world.  We are such insignificant ants on the anthill called the Earth, a mere individual among about 7.3 billion human beings. And yet some of us think we are so important that we actually dare to attempt to control others.  I remember reading in one of Dr Tony Humphrey's books the succinct and wise statement: "All control is self-control!" There is much wisdom in that - indeed, there is much Zen in it, or even, dare I say it, much Tao!  As a young teacher I often went astray by trying to control what I simply could not control.  We can only exert influence over whatever little patch of ground that we alone are in charge of.  I learnt from other more experienced teachers how to exercise control within my own classroom and how to give instructions to adolescents without their sounding like being commands inviting opposition.  

It is indeed a truism to say that none of us can change the world, and we know that working together, yet again like ants on an anthill, but with all our wonderful brain power, we can achieve much material change for the good of humankind.  I think the above poem is somewhat pessimistic about life in a way, though one can understand such an attitude given that the poem was written over 2,000 years ago when no one could change much about an inevitably hostile world and where human lifespan was very short indeed.

Much spirituality essentially boils down to working on our egotism.  Just as the sun certainly does not revolve around the Earth, the world certainly does not revolve around any one individual.  There is nothing as bad as encountering people who are egotistical and self-centered.  St John the Evangelist put this in a very Christian way - as he, needless to say, saw our relationship with Jesus Christ as being of paramount importance - "He must increase and I must decrease" or as it is also translated, "He must become greater, I must become less." (John 3:30)  In other words we can translate this overtly Christian exhortation as a recommendation to bring our egos under control.

Malahide at sunset

Christmas Day is a special one for all Christians.  Even if you are of another faith or even none, you can still rejoice in the power of the simple yet wonderful myth or story, that whatever power is behind the universe (some dare call this power God) deigned take human form in the shape of a simple little infant.  This doctrine is known as that of the Incarnation, literally the en-fleshing of the Godhead in human form.  If anything, the heart of the meaning of this myth is that all of creation and especially humankind are shot through with a value that is beyond human reckoning.  This, then, I believe, is what it means to say that something is sacred.  The Earth and all it contains is sacred, that is, of priceless value. Christians believe, then, that everything in creation, especially humanity as the guardians of the goods of the Earth, is sacred.

The above poem shares some of this Christian insight into the sacredness of the world.  I admit it sounds somewhat negative to our modern ears, but I remind the reader again that this verse was written over 2000 years ago when people were simpler and fatalism loomed large in all cultures.

I need hardly remind the readers of this blog that the third stanza above is remarkably like the more famous stanzas from Ecclesiastes 3 from the Old Testament: "There is a time for everything, // And a season for every activity under the heavens" etc.  Once again the Taoist and Biblical writers are ad idem  with their enthusiasm to pile polar opposites one on top of another.  I have mentioned over and over again in these posts that spiritual writers of every hue have a predilection for the balancing of polar opposites and for keeping the healthy tension between both poles.  One could do worse than read Taoist Poem 29 in conjunction with Ecclesiastes 3.

My prayer for anyone reading these rather short and hurried reflections is that we may learn to let go of the restrictions of the ego, to let go of the urge to control others, to learn to accept what we cannot change and at the end of the day to learn to live peacefully with ourselves and others.  After all, we are what we are and we must learn to love ourselves, forgive ourselves and be compassionate to ourselves as well as to others.  That is no easy task, but it sure is one essential one if we are to steer the bark of self through the choppy waters of life.

Namaste, friends and a very Happy Christmas. 

Thoughts on the Tao Te Ching 28

Poem 28

Know the male,

yet keep to the female:

receive the world in your arms.

If you receive the world,

the Tao will never leave you

and you will be like a little child.

Know the white,

yet keep to the black:

be a pattern for the world.

If you are a pattern for the world,

the Tao will be strong inside you

and there will be nothing you can't do.

Know the personal,

yet keep to the impersonal:

accept the world as it is.

If you accept the world,

the Tao will be luminous inside you

and you will return to your primal self.

The world is formed from the void,

like utensils from a block of wood.

The Master knows the utensils,

yet keeps to the the block:

thus she can use all things.

Commentary

Old, partially rotted wood, Newbridge House, North County Dublin

Once again we find the Taoist balance of opposites most apparent in this short poem. Modern popular psychology and psychotherapy speak about men needing to integrate their feminine side and about women needing to integrate their masculine side.  The late great Professor Carl Gustav Jung would have certainly popularised that idea.  There is indeed much sound argument to support the fact that males and females contain a "seed" of the opposite sex to speak metaphorically.  In the human psyche the Mother archetype looms large, is almost all encompassing.  We speak of Mother Earth, the Motherland and call almost everything we hold dear by the feminine pronoun.  "She's a lovely little boat/car/bicycle or whatever..." I read somewhere that Jung made much of the fact that Nazi Germany spoke of the Fatherland and that this archetype was the main common psychological preoccupation of that fascist regime.  There is possible more than a grain of truth in that observation.

Our Taoist author advises the pilgrim on his/her journey to self-knowledge "to know the male" yet to "keep to the female."  Perhaps one could do worse than suggesting that here in this poem the male could represent the head (intellect/mind/the rational) whereas the female could represent the heart (feelings/emotions/intuition/the non-rational).  A blend of both is needed.  In other words, the call is to an integration of opposites yet again as a way to the Truth.

Another quality often associated with femininity is that of openness and receptivity - an openness like that of flowers blossoming into the rays of the sun.  In like manner, our poet philosopher is inviting us to be open and receptive to everything in the world, all objects, all animals. indeed to all beings, not just the human ones.

The Réalt na Mara (Star of the Sea) monument on East pier, Howth

Again, the poet uses the images of black and white.  He calls upon us to know the white (the masculinity and the possibility of growth) and yet to keep to the deep mystery of the black (femininity and fertility).  In such a way, we become a pattern for the world.  In being so whole and open - in other words, being so wholly open or so openly whole, we become patterns for the world and will attract all beings to us in our acceptance of them.  All of this means that we have to accept the world largely as it is, because, truly, we can change no one but ourselves.  It is in changing ourselves that we can change the world almost in spite of our best efforts.   In accepting the world, the Tao begins to live inside us.  Now, this is not a call to passivity or to the state of inertia where we do nothing.  It is a call to radically look inside ourselves, change what we can change and accept what we cannot.  From there on we are called to be compassionate to self, others and to the world.  In this way, we change ourselves and, in the course of doing that, change the world for the better.  Again, here we are right in the very heart of enigma and paradox.

By way of conclusion, I invite the reader to read over the above poem slowly and meditatively and to let any line, phrase or word suggest itself as a possible mantra for a five or ten minute slot of meditation.

Thoughts on the Tao Te Ching 27

Poem 27

A good traveler has no fixed plans

and is not intent upon arriving.
A good artist lets his intuition

lead him wherever it wants.

A good scientist has freed himself of concepts

and keeps his mind open to what is.

Thus the Master is available to all people
and doesn't reject anyone.

He is ready to use all situations

and doesn't waste anything.

This is called embodying the light.

What is a good man but a bad man's teacher?

What is a bad man but a good man's job?

If you don't understand this, you will get lost,

however intelligent you are.

It is the great secret.

Commentary

Skeleton of a coracle, Dingle Interpretative Centre - 

Another staple recommendation, indeed tenet, of anyone involved in the spiritual quest from whatever religious background is surely that the journey itself is more important than the destination. Today pilgrimage is becoming important once more as many people discover anew the spiritual quest through making a journey.  Accordingly, even here in Ireland, the Camino pilgrimage to Santiago or the town or Cathedral Church of St James in Catalonia, Spain. The physical journey is a solid outward sign or symbol of the inward journey of the self, or soul indeed.The greatest story of pilgrimage was perhaps written in verse by the famous Geoffrey Chaucer (1343 - 1400), the text of which most of us studied at some stage in our academic career, or at least read excerpts from.

We know these stories as The Canterbury Tales which Chaucer began working 0n from 1386 onwards. They recount, in verse mostly, the stories told by way of a friendly contest between a group of pilgrims as they travel together on a journey from London to Canterbury in order to visit the shrine of St Thomas Becket at Canterbury Cathedral.  The prize for the winner is simple indeed: a free meal at the Tabard Inn in Southwark.  Chaucer's take on the idea of pilgrimage is humorous, a tad raunchy in parts, but for all that very appreciative of the importance of pilgrimage in the social life of the people among whom he lived at the time. Many other books have recounted the importance of pilgrimage and have pointed  out that life is a journey in many senses: in the physical sense as we grow up and move from one phase to another in our lives and often travel about the world in so doing; in the psychological sense as we journey to get to know ourselves; in the spiritual sense as we seek to make sense and meaning of our lives in an often inimical world. John Bunyan's (1628–1688) Pilgrim's Progress (1678) is a good example of a more serious presentation of pilgrimage in the spiritual life from an evangelical Protestant point of view.  It is a wonderfully profound read written in the simplest and most direct of language.

Oceanic Tapesty Ionad an Bhlascaoid - Kerry

Again, the verses of the above poem are full of paradoxical writing.  Setting up oppositional points of view is a preferred method of our author, and indeed one of the methods mostly used by writers of spirituality or mystical theology in any tradition.  It is important, indeed, to plan out any journey we wish to undertake as well as we can, though it is often wonderful to take a few diversions on our way here and there along our path - diversions that make our travelling far more interesting.  However, our Taoist writer does not mean just doing that as he suggests that we have no fixed plans at all.  That advice is ridiculous in worldly terms, though not in a deeper spiritual sense.  Indeed, we can make the greatest of plans in our lives and then have them ruined totally by accident or by chance. These unexpected happenings, even tragedies, do befall us as we make our journey.  Perhaps, the author is getting at the truth of that as it unfolds in our lives, that is, by making his exaggerated demands on us so that we don't become too ambitious and ego-driven to the extent that we lose a healthy intuition about what really matters in life - loving and being loved by others and so on.

John Bunyan (1628 - 1688)

Inspiration and intuition are undoubtedly very important in art.  Of course, so is talent and hard work to achieve a certain mastery in it.  The hard work does pay off as the more the artist practises the more s/he is open to being inspired and being intuitive.  Our Taoist author sees the scientist as being open to inspiration and not being too tied down by traditional concepts.  Openness to the new is the order of imagination.

Likewise, the Master of meditation is open to everyone and in totally non-judgemental and accepts everyone as they are in an unprejudiced and unbiased fashion.  All situations he finds himself in is looked upon as "grist for the spiritual mill."  

In the final stanza of the above poem our Taoist writer shows that there is really very little difference between the good and the bad man in a sense as we all are made up of good points and bad points. The so-called good people just manage to control their baser instincts and more evil desires better than the so-called bad people do.  That reminds me of the old moral poem we learnt as children: "There is so much good in the worst of us// And so much bad in the best of us// that it hardly behooves any of us//To talk about the rest of us." (Edward Wallace Hoch)  And indeed, here we must agree vehemently with our Taoist poet that this piece of wisdom can guide us well through life: in our parenting of children, in our teaching of children, in our leadership of others: in short, in how we greet others as being as important as we ourselves are in the overall scheme of things.

Finally, as is my usual habit in ending these short posts on the Tao Te Ching, I invite the reader to go read slowly over the above poem and let whatever line, phrase or word offer itself to you as a possible mantra for a short five minute meditation.

Thoughts on the Tao Te Ching 26

Poem 26

The heavy is the root of the light.

The unmoved is the source of all movement.

Thus the Master travels all day

without leaving home.

However splendid the views,

she stays serenely in herself.

Why should the lord of the country

flit about like a fool?

If you let yourself be blown to and fro,

you lose touch with your root.

If you let restlessness move you,

you lose touch with who you are.

Rocks on Donabate Beach

Commentary

As we have outlined many times before in these pages, spiritual writers like to proceed by way of pardox, by setting up contradictions to make the reader or aspiring disciple think, ponder, meditate and contemplate.  Spirituality engages all faculties, not just that of the intellect.  It takes into account all the dimensions of the human being - intellect, heart, feelings, the unconscious, the non-rational and the irrational at times.  The last two lines make me ponder and wonder and they are worth re-quoting even at this close juncture to their former mention:

If you let restlessness move you,

you lose touch with who you are

These lines in the third stanza of the 26th poem brings the early philosopher and theologian St Augustine of Hippo to my mind.  Augustine (354 - 430 A.D.) often described himself as a restless seeker more so than a systematic and profound thinker.  He tells us in his Confessions that he restlessly sought out the truth (or the Good or God) behind the so-called world of the senses.  He declared that he had sought God everywhere, in his many travels around the then known world and in his relationships - some of them failures in worldly terms - and studies.  He tells us that he finally found God in the stillness of his own heart - within himself rather than in the world without. Those Augustinian thoughts seem to contradict outright what the Taoist poet is getting at. Once again, the contradiction is only apparent at one level.  I constantly refer to the predilection of spiritual writers with the healthy tension of opposites.  We have it here, both in Augustine and the Taoist poet. Augustine realised finally that truth or the Good or God could really only be found within his inner self, or heart or soul. So restlessness led Augustine to find rest for his weary soul within his own soul or heart through prayer of meditation, a process of contemplation or meditation he called "interiority" or the "interior way."  In this sense, he is actually in agreement with the Taoist author.

Icon of St Augustine of Hippo

In ways, even if we do not travel in a physical sense, we can travel in our inner selves or minds.  If we are seekers of peace, we shall certainly only find it within ourselves after much meditation and facing and integrating our own individual shadow as Carl Gustav Jung recommends. 

If we are overwhelmed by the weather, it is often good to recall that it is the inner weather of our minds that is the most important thing in anyone's life.  Then, no matter where we go, we will not need to complain about the outer weather.  A good traveller is one who is "at home" in his or her own mind, comfortable with themselves, happy with the lives with which they have been gifted.  In this sense, then, a good traveller never gets homesick.  Let us now add to the above paradoxes by suggesting that a person who stays at home because of some anxiety or depression or other mental problem can be a very restless traveller in his/her own mind.  In fact, they simply are not "at home" with themselves - and this is a very painful mental disequilibrium.

Once again, I invite any reader of the above lines to read over the above Taoist poem and let a word, phrase or line vibrate like a mantra in their minds for at least five minutes of peace and restfulness. 

Thoughts on the Tao Te ching 25

Poem 25

There was something formless and perfect

before the universe was born.

It is serene. Empty.

Solitary. Unchanging.

Infinite. Eternally present.

It is the mother of the universe.

For lack of a better name,

I call it the Tao.

It flows through all things,

inside and outside, and returns

to the origin of all things.

The Tao is great.

The universe is great.

Earth is great.

Man is great.

These are the four great powers.

Man follows the earth.

Earth follows the universe.

The universe follows the Tao.

The Tao follows only itself.

Commentary

Who knows what came before the beginning of the universe?  In these big questions theoretical physics, philosophical theology and spirituality-meditation are paradoxically similar or parallel.  In psalm 110 we read:

A prince from the day of your birth 

on the holy mountains;
from the womb before the dawn I begot you.

According to Christian tradition this psalm foretells the birth of Jesus which, according to the psalmist, was preordained from before the beginning of the universe or from before the initiation of time.  In other words, this psalm like the Taoist poem attempts to describe the mystery of the origins of the universe.  The Taoism poet puts it in equally paradoxical and poetic terms:

There was something formless and perfect

before the universe was born.

Alexander Vilenkin contends that the Big Bang wasn't a one-off event, but merely one of a series of big bangs creating an endless number of bubble universes.  In this model, there is neither a single Big Bang nor a single beginning.  Instead the universe continually goes through oscillating cycles of expansion, contraction, collapse and expansion anew. (See HERE) 

Of the above three accounts, one could contend that The Taoist poet offers us a Taoist take or Taoist myth of creation; that the Biblical author offers us a Jewish take or Jewish myth of creation and finally that Alexander Vilenkin offers us a scientific take or scientific myth of creation.  Here, obviously, I am using myth in a particular sense and certainly not in its usual sense of an unfounded or false notion or contention.  I am using the word "myth" in the sense that humankind always needs to propose a meaning and an explanation for the existence of the world in which he lives as well as a meaning for his own life.  Fair enough, the first two accounts may be pre-scientific, allegorical or metaphorical or even literal efforts at explaining existence in ancient times - however, they are legitimate efforts even if somewhat fanciful.  I use the term "scientific myth" in a similar way, that is, as a modern presentation of the meaning and significance of life in the twenty-first century which will itself appear more than a little pre-scientific to thirtieth century humankind.  Myth for me represents any valid and authentic attempt at explaining the meaning of life in any particular culture at any particular time, in any particular context.  Now re-read the first stanza of our Taoist poem above. 

There was something formless and perfect

before the universe was born.

It is serene. Empty.

Solitary. Unchanging.

Infinite. Eternally present.

It is the mother of the universe.

For lack of a better name,
I call it the Tao.

One of the best attempts to link theoretical physics and spirituality/meditation is surely that of Dr Fritjof Capra's classic The Tao of Physics (1975) wherein Dr Capra argued that Theoretical Physics could be reconciled with Eastern Mysticism.  Near the end of this book, the author summed up his motivation in the following words: "Science does not need mysticism and mysticism does not need science, but man needs both."

The interpretation of a literary text is a complex process that involves much learning and not a little intuition.  A good reader of a text is aware of its many layers: literal, allegorical, metaphorical, poetic, aesthetic, historical, linguistic and structural and so on and so forth.  It is when the reader insists on reading the text at any one level solely that problems emerge.  As we have seen from the recent horrific massacres wrought by a fundamentalism of one kind, literalism can lead to sheer terrorism. Needless to say, fundamentalism in "-isms" of all kinds from fascism to communism to scientism can and will lead to the same bloody conclusion.

Finally, let us read the above poem reflectively letting a word or phrase suggest itself to us as a mantra for a five or ten minutes reflection.

Namaste, friends.