TAO TE CHING - a study and UNDERSTANDING

[zenzero]

Friends,
From today an attempt will be made to study and discuss TAO TE CHING.
The smallest book having the deepest meaning of life. Understanding the 81 stanzas written by Lao Tzu itself one can rediscover the truth and live in paradise forever, which is our birth right.
The story of Loa Tzu writing Tao is also a very beautiful story in the history of human consciousness. It is said that Lao Tsu had achieved to truth and knew the futility of telling it to anyone but everyone including the emperor of the land [china] knew about his achievement Lao Tzu wanted to spend the rest of his lives meditating in the Himalayas. When he was on his way the emperor came to know about it and he immediately ordered his royal guards to catch him at the border and order his custom officials there to see that unless he writes down what he knows he will not be allowed to pass like paying customs duty on what he is carrying, 'knowledge.'

The result was TAO TE CHING.

Today we will take up the first stanza and the understanding here is mentioned below in red letters and within brackets. We shall go to the next when most doubts are cleared and most come to a similar UNDERSTANDING..

All readers are welcome to respond but not react and only in relation to the matter discussed so that we remain focused and proceed with a unanimous UNDERSTANDING.

1

The Tao that can be told
is not the eternal Tao
The name that can be named
is not the eternal Name.
[Truth or TAO cannot be told it is experienced but that experience is unique as the individual does not remain an individual an ' I ' but becomes a part of the universal. The individual merges and becomes ONE.
Truth cannot be put into words and so cannot be spoken of and once something is said about it it does not remain the truth]


The unnamable is the eternally real.
Naming is the origin
of all particular things.
[TRUTH is eternal and cannot be named as naming it means the minds picturising it as a thing as is minds nature. No doubt we have thousands and thousands of gods each couloured according to the makers mind]


Free from desire, you realize the mystery.
Caught in desire, you see only the manifestations.
[One can realize the truth by been free from desires; desires come from the mind and caught in the mind the mind will only give one its manifestations only and not the real picture. as explained above about the nature of the mind]


Yet mystery and manifestations
arise from the same source.
This source is called darkness.
[Yet to realize the mystery as well as the root of all manifestations are but one, the mind/darkness/Satan. The mind is the key for all understandings. One has to realise truth through this same mind, there is no other WAY the doorway is the one and only the mind.]


Darkness within darkness.
The gateway to all understanding.
[The gateway to realize truth is through this darkness; darkness upon darkness is the levels of the mind. The consciousness has to travel through the darker levels of sub-conscious, unconscious and Id. At the end of those layers light will enter and darkness will no loner be remain]

 

[Hema]

Darkness within darkness.
The gateway to all understanding.
[The gateway to realize truth is through this darkness; darkness upon darkness is the levels of the mind. The consciousness has to travel through the darker levels of sub-conscious, unconscious and Id. At the end of those layers light will enter and darkness will no loner be remain]

Is this similar to the opening of the chakras to achieve enlightenment?

 

[Gentoo]

Is this similar to the opening of the chakras to achieve enlightenment?

As I understand it, sorta. I can see that as relating to the chakras, in that to be fully "awakened" one must confront the darker sides of the self (all aspects of the self) and overcome them.

 

[zenzero]

Friend,
Suggest try and understanding the lines instead of again allowing the mind to picturise. That is the biggest frontier as one has to overcome mind itself through which one can realise the truth. The nature of mind itself is such that it uses pictures to understand but actaully understanding comes when the mind is at rest and the understanding comes by itself without any effort.
Chakra and mind are different.
Mind has differnt layers which as mentioned are concious, unconcious, sub-concious and id.
As mind is akin to darkness the layers are darkness within darkness.
One has to be concious all the time and slowly the conciousness will clear all those layers of darkness and light/conciousness will remain.
As this conciousness travels the effect is the kundulini rising upwards through the chakras. Conciousness itself is ONE whereas if one goes by focusing on the chakras the duality may remain the self and the chakra.
from the begining if the self is not taken into account the begining of the jouney is an end in itself.
Love & rgds

 

[Scarlett Wampus]

The text in red seems about as useful an interpretation of the first chapter as I've seen. Slight contention in that I think "darkness within darkness" is suggesting that the layers of mind or whatever have no end. Subtle but important distinction between Buddhist notions of enlightenment and Taoist there.

 

[PureX]

I'm up for this thread, but it will have to wait until I get some errands done, today ... later.

 

[zenzero]

Scarlett,
That darkness is the mind is the understanding here.
If you have read or could bring out another aspect which has not come to the concious level; would be ahealthy sharing experince.
Simalarly all those travellers on any path/way could express their own understanding as we go along.
However we wait for PURE X to join in and further if any others have the no-mind to do so.
Love & rgds

 

[giant space amoeba]

A problem with the Tao Te Ching is that i find it very difficult to read. I prefer plain and simple texts but i have owned a copy (lent it to a freind and havent got it back!)and tried to understand but can only go so far (i have a small reading difficulty and find it hard to concentrate). Somebody has recommended the Tao of Pooh to make it easier, you think that would really help or do you recomend something else?

It's all very cryptic to me :help:

 

[ChrisP]

Atomic Amoeba,

Click the link in my signature (Tao) and use the dropdown at the top to get to the S Mitchell translation.

It's a good place to start that won't leave your mind reeling from mystical incomprehensibilities.

I've never read the Tao of Pooh, but anything that has it's own t-shirt... follow my thinking?

PS. The lurker awakes... Hi guys *nods at Ollie and PureX*. I'll follow this thread in silence.

In truth I think analysis of the Tao te Ching is useless. Humans are incapable of true objectivity in their analytical state, and also Tao is a concept based upon understanding of current circumstance and the flow of such in any direction

Thankyou, please come again

 

[Scarlett Wampus]

A problem with the Tao Te Ching is that i find it very difficult to read. I prefer plain and simple texts but i have owned a copy (lent it to a freind and havent got it back!)and tried to understand but can only go so far (i have a small reading difficulty and find it hard to concentrate). Somebody has recommended the Tao of Pooh to make it easier, you think that would really help or do you recomend something else?

It's all very cryptic to me :help:

Tao of Pooh. Meh. Its ok, its just a bit sterile in my opinion.

You could try this: Instead of trying to find the right interpretation of it, read the Tao Te Ching lightly. Let the words wash over you without bothering to figure out what they're meant to mean. I mean really, its more prose than it is precise philosophical treatise. I think its meant to be that way, its meant to appeal to feelings more than thoughts.

 

[Scarlett Wampus]

PS. The lurker awakes... Hi guys *nods at Ollie and PureX*. I'll follow this thread in silence.

In truth I think analysis of the Tao te Ching is useless. Humans are incapable of true objectivity in their analytical state, and also Tao is a concept based upon understanding of current circumstance and the flow of such in any direction

Hi!

If your analysis is that analysis is useless my analysis is that that's an insightful analysis. i.e. its good to have your take on all this.

 

[giant space amoeba]

Atomic Amoeba,

Click the link in my signature (Tao) and use the dropdown at the top to get to the S Mitchell translation.

It's a good place to start that won't leave your mind reeling from mystical incomprehensibilities.

thanks im reading now

 

[giant space amoeba]

I mean really, its more prose than it is precise philosophical treatise. I think its meant to be that way, its meant to appeal to feelings more than thoughts.

that might be why i dont get it properly.

though reading this simple english version im getting it in my own way.

when i read it a while back and then talked about it on forums i was told i didnt understand. I did get my own understanding from it though. Like the concept of yin yand yang... something that i think anyone can get really

 

[Scarlett Wampus]

when i read it a while back and then talked about it on forums i was told i didnt understand. I did get my own understanding from it though. Like the concept of yin yand yang... something that i think anyone can get really

Heh, well believe me AA, no one on this forum will do you any better when it comes to understanding it. There is a paradox at the centre of Taoist philosophy, a paradox that seems unresolvable: If you are on the right track, you have failed to understand it. If you understand you have failed, you are on the right track.

To all the world following the Tao, this Way, is a pointless endeavour. Nevertheless if you persist remarkable things can happen. And you never see them coming.

 

[PureX]

Instead of trying to find the right interpretation of it, read the Tao Te Ching lightly. Let the words wash over you without bothering to figure out what they're meant to mean. I mean really, its more prose than it is precise philosophical treatise. I think its meant to be that way, its meant to appeal to feelings more than thoughts.

Amen.

The language that it was written in is more a series of pictograms than it is symbols representing sounds, like what we're used to. In such a visual-oriented text, ideas are conveyed as much by the "ambiance of a scene" as by anything else. The best place I know of to really see this at work is in the I Ching, where each "revelation" comes with a set of images to help the user understand the oracle's message.

When Lao Tzu wrote the Tao te Ching he was composing "poems" using a pictographic text. So you can imagine that for the people in that time and place, "reading" it was indeed more like looking at a collection of images, and then letting their "significance" float around in the mind until they coalesced into a more fuller awareness of the nature of one's own existence.

I first read the Tao te Ching when I was in college, and did not understand it at all. I got angry at it because it seemed to me that every line directly contradicted the preceding line. Which they mostly did. I was simply not able, intellectually, to allow these lines to "cancel each other out", leaving that empty space for the truth (reality) to emerge into.

I read it again probably ten years later and that time I could sense that there was some real clarity or reality in it, but I still was looking for a collection of "answers" and so could not find them, and was left intrigues, but frustrated.

Finally, I read it again about ten years ago, and I laughed and laughed as I remember my past attempts. This time it was like sitting on a high mountain and breathing in the cold clear air and the bright sunlight. I finally realized that it wasn't "telling me" anything. It was merely allowing me the opportunity to quit thinking, and quit trying to "figure it out" and to just be.

When a superior man hears of the Tao,
he immediately begins to embody it.
When an average man hears of the Tao,
he half believes it, half doubts it.
When a foolish man hears of the Tao,
he laughs out loud.
If he didn't laugh,
it wouldn't be the Tao.

Thus it is said:
The path into the light seems dark,
the path forward seems to go back,
the direct path seems long,
true power seems weak,
true purity seems tarnished,
true steadfastness seems changeable,
true clarity seems obscure,
the greatest art seems unsophisticated,
the greatest love seems indifferent,
the greatest wisdom seems childish.

The Tao is nowhere to be found.
Yet it nourishes and completes all things.
- from the Tao Te Ching​

 

[PureX]

that might be why i dont get it properly.

though reading this simple english version im getting it in my own way.

when i read it a while back and then talked about it on forums i was told i didnt understand. I did get my own understanding from it though. Like the concept of yin yand yang... something that i think anyone can get really

One of the things about the "yin and yang" idea, to me, is that so many cultures have some significant version of it.

The eskimos, as I recall, had something like "bird" people and "fish" people, bird villages and fish villages, bird territories and fish territories. And ultimately died and went to a bird afterlife or a fish afterlife. They saw birds and fish and representing opposing, yet interdependant forces of nature, and these opposing yet interdependant natures permeated all aspects of life as they saw it, and so of death as well, they supposed.

The Australian Aboriginals saw a similar natural division of the life-force, represented by snakes and lizards (I think it was these animals), and they even understood the relative changeability of such forces. For example, according to Aboriginal culture, Bill and Bob, whenever they meet, tend to represent opposing natures; Bill as the snake-nature, and Bob as the lizard nature. Yet whenever Bill meets Mike, who is also a snake nature, with Mike, Bill becomes a lizard nature. Yet when Bill meets Mary, who is also a snake nature, Bill will remain a snake nature, too. And occasionally when Bill meets Bob, their natures are reversed, and bill is the lizard nature while Bib is the snake nature.

The point is that the Aboriginals understood that "yin" and "yang" are both relative and dynamic. We can be either, or, simaltaneously, depending upon what we are relating ourselves to, and when. And likewise for those things being related to us.

 

[zenzero]

Friends,
Once again we have to understand Lao Tzu pointing the finger to the moon. here it is found some either watching the finger and some watching the moon.
Lao Tzu had realised Truth and knew the both the Way and the goal are the same; the MIND.
For that very reason he had mentioned in his first stanza itself about it.
That truth once put in words does not remain so and that the key to realisation and the manifestations of truth are both happening wirh the MIND as the key.
The path is taking conciousness through all the dark levels of the mind.
Every being in this universe lives in harmony which is the garden of eden; no need to change anything, ecerything is perfect as it is. The chatterings of the minds here are all perfect if understood but if the mind does not understand that then one is thrown out of the garden and the person suffers.
This garden of eden is available to each individual HERE-NOW provided that attempt to silence the mind is there or atleast an attampt to just observe in silence. The chattering of minds, only digresses one from the objective. If something is not understood, it does not matter if one accpts it silently and tries and remain alert in silence to go deeper into it. This silence observation leads to meditation and in that meditative state suddenly lights the individual. Only the initial spark is needed, then nature will take its course or the light will give on burning brighter and brighter .

Once again friends, an attmpt is made which had been made by various masters to point to the moon another attempt in a more direct manner is made here to point towards the mind.
Silencing it is the final frontier top cross from where everything is harmonious, paradise.

The second stanza with the understanding is given today; please approach it with a silent mind a meditative mind as all chatters/noises of the mind will always result in not understanding or a disturbed understanding.

A story goes this way:
A disiple went to his master after years of meditating on god. The master asks: did you see god. The disiple replied, yes. The master slapped him and sent him for another year of meditaion and this time the disiple says No. The mastyer slaps him again and send him for another year of meditation. This time the disiple is very very calm, silent in apperance and when the master asks the question the disiple slaps the master. The master says YES thats the answere I was looking for. Means to say the question itself is wrong. There is no God as nothingness is to be realised not to be got or seen. Anything or all that is seen is by the mind only.

Let us enter these pointers in silence as these too are a sacred temple to meditate.

2

When people see some things as beautiful,
other things become ugly.
When people see some things as good,
other things become bad.


[The nature of mind is such that it always takes sides. And in taking sides the opposite is created. When one utters the word Beautiful automatically has created Ugly as one can say Beautiful as surely there is something called Ugly? Similarly good/bad. All such terms are relative to each other]

Being and non-being create each other.
Difficult and easy support each other.
Long and short define each other.
High and low depend on each other.
Before and after follow each other.


[ again the laws of opposites have been defined or how the opposites are related to each other]

Therefore the Master
acts without doing anything
and teaches without saying anything.
Things arise and she lets them come;
things disappear and she lets them go.
She has but doesn't possess,
acts but doesn't expect.
When her work is done, she forgets it.
That is why it lasts forever.

[The individual who has mastered his own mind acts without doing anything means the mind is not attached in the act. The transmission happens in silence without using words which will make truth false. The master allows the things to happen on its own as they are but natural what goes up will come down etc. Whatever things the master has is without possessing or being attached that they are mine or they belong to me. No such feelings are there. The master does things without any expectations as expectations gives rise from desires and the master does not desire as they are mind rooted. Whatever the master has to do, he just does it and since that becomes the past does not try to hang on to it remaining in the present at all times.]

 

[zenzero]

Friends,
Time is no doubt without begining or end.
The goal can be reached by both the WAYS and both are equally perfect.
One the evolutionary process; wherein each creation goes through the whole process of evolution and by slowly completeing his desires slowly evolves to reach the goal on its own accord.
The other is Revolution; wherein the individual understand sthe whole creation as just a MAYA/illusion and all desires coming from the mind and the futulity of it all and sets forth to reach the goal and merge with the source.
If by reading and discussing the goal could have been achived then all priests in the temples/ churches/mosques etc. would have realised the truth in large numbers they would have achieved salvation; reality is just the opposite. Till the realisation is not there that even intellectuals go on missing the point that the mind is both the cause and source of all problems and also the solution. Except the solution is by making the mind calm. The mind has to be used for various purposes and then the master calls for his servives but not the other way round that the mind goes on his business all the time; making the person living in a dreamland/ maya land/ an illusionary world.
Time to wake up / awaken to this fact and do something about it.
We humans have been around for a long, long time to understand this simple fact.
Once an man went on his morning walk in his village was passing a hut when he heard the mother waking up his son: Son, wake up, its time; you have been sleeping for long. This simple one line was enough for this man to ignite such a spark in him that he kept walking out of his village and went to the mountainbs to meditate and finally woke up totally. ofcourse his family found about his whereabout much later by the time he was given up as missing.
Similarly friends; wake up, shake yourself fromthis stupor approach life prayerfully, meditatively. The smartness of the mind does not smarten the owner he his kept tethered to this illusionary world for lives to come.
"WELL BEGUN IS HALF DONE' -
Evryday every moment is an opportunity; one has been missing lives on endd; now is the time to clean out the cobwebs from the mind and make a begining.
Hear the birds chirping, watch nature deeply; its all around you and you are part of it all. Just that realisation and the jouney begins.
Love & rgds

 

[ChrisP]

The other is Revolution; wherein the individual understand sthe whole creation as just a MAYA/illusion and all desires coming from the mind and the futulity of it all and sets forth to reach the goal and merge with the source.

Please elaborate? Specific interest in concept of Maya/Illusion.

Thanks
Chris

 

[zenzero]

Friend Chris,
Let us approach the question is this manner:
When a child is born; He is in harmony with nature because he is not trained to use the mind. The same reason Jesus talked about children getting place in heaven.
Heaven he never meant to be a differnet place outside earth or elsewhere.
He meant was be child like be not be directed by the mind be in a state of meditation then automatically your mind is still/quite and at such times man is in harmony/ in nature/ in the garden of eden.
Children are taught the use of the mind by adults who train the child to become adults in reality taking them away from nature / heaven /garden of eden.
The other approach would be that all matter whatever we see or do not see which can also be termed forms and no-forms are not what they appear scientifically when analysed they are seen as atoms [protons, neutrons] or electricity moving at high speed. Also we know matter/energy is neither created nor destroyed but it only changes forms. The interesting part is that by scientific studies in this change of form there is a jump and the same gap is found in the process of evolution.
This gap has been understood by meditators as a space where there it is NOTHINGNESS and that all forms, no forms comes out of nothingness [WU CHI}
and goes back to that source of nothingness.
Means to say that what we see is only illusory or MAYA. They are not real.
Religion has studied the same things meditatively. When one is in meditation the ego/mind drops or becomes in active at that moment the individual is no more an individual he becomes a part of the whole the source which is that state of nothingness.
As most though born as a part of the whole slowly by following the mind becomes islands of egos and lose all connection with the whole. To get back to that stram to again become the flow where he is only a small part of the whole where the whole PLAY of creation is known, where the timelessness is known where the life having no begining or end is known. The knowing is such that since the individual is no more there; he cannot come back and explain or tell that experience as that is what Lao Tzu has in his first stanza explained that when thr truth is put in words the mind will make it into an object and it does not remain as the truth it is falsified.

Friend Chris, unless you become meditative, unless you surrender your mind/egothis play of creation or MAYA / illusion will not be fully understood. Yes one can take that jump by believing in that and following it.
The mind being the satan as he is does not allow that too easily its tentecales are very very large and deep and gives the person that hallucination that he is in heaven already whienever he wants too. See, people who drink, take drugs, indulge in sex without any feelings of love. But they are all very momentary as the next moment reality awakens him and tells him, 'Sonny boy, you got to go home. or go to office, etc.etc.'
If there are still any points that requires further clarifications; do not hesitate to ask as many times. Request attempt to approach the answere with an open mind or mind without prejudice, without taking any sides or not allowing the mind to create any pictures. You allow growth/understanding to ocme on its own; just go over the lines with an approach that one does not know what it means at the moment; does not matter. I'm in no hurry. Let it come when it may. I will wait lives on end till it comes BUT remember to pursue it in that spirit and slowly and surely it will grow on you the understanding will begin to settle as you have given notice to your mind and slowly he with draws on its own accord as you are no more given him food for thoughts. The mind slowly dies without food [metaphorically] and you become free for the first time and slowly that becomes freedom for ever and ever from the cycles of birth and death.
Love & rgds