![]() Wang Bi's commentaries, following each statement, flesh out the text so that it speaks to the modern Western reader as it has to Asians for more than seventeen centuries. Although the Tao-te Ching was originally designed to provide advice to the ruler, the Chinese regard its teachings as living and self-cultivation tools applicable to anyone. The text consists of eighty-one short, aphoristic sections presenting a complete view of how the sage rules in accordance with the spontaneous ways of the natural world. Lynn's introduction explores the centrality of Wang's commentaries in Chinese thought, the position of the Tao-te Ching in East Asian tradition, Wang's short but brilliant life, and the era in which he lived. Like his I Ching, this volume includes the interpretive commentary of the third-century scholar Wang Bi (226-249), who wrote the first and most sophisticated commentary on the Tao-te Ching. Richard John Lynn, whose recent translation of the I Ching was hailed by the Times Literary Supplement as "the best I Ching that has so far appeared," presents here another fine translation. As Taoism emerges as one of the East Asian philosophies most interesting to Westerners, an accessible new edition of this great work-written for English-language readers, yet rendered with an eye toward Chinese understanding-has been much needed by scholars and general readers. The image of the straw dogs is again used to criticise Confucianism, as the Zhuangzi goes on to compare Confucius, in his insistence upon the ancient rites, to a fool who attempts to reconstitute the trampled straw dogs, "replace them in the box or basket", and "wrap them up with embroidered cloths".The essential Taoist book and one of a triad that make up the most influential religious and philosophical writings of Chinese tradition, the Tao-te Ching is the subject of hundreds of new interpretive studies each year. After they have been set forth, however, passers-by trample on their heads and backs, and the grass-cutters take and burn them in cooking. And when the ceremony is over, we throw them into the street, but not because we hate them." Zhuangzi Īnother Taoist text, the Zhuangzi provides a more detailed description for the treatment of the straw dogs in its 14th chapter, "The Turnings of Heaven": īefore the grass-dogs are set forth (at the sacrifice), they are deposited in a box or basket, and wrapt up with elegantly embroidered cloths, while the representative of the dead and the officer of prayer prepare themselves by fasting to present them. We dress them up and put them on the altar, but not because we love them. We do the same when we make straw dogs to use in sacrifices. They do not kill living things out of cruelty or give them birth out of kindness. (38) The Master arrives without leaving, sees the light without looking, achieves without doing a thing. The ordinary man is always doing things, yet many more are left to be done. (37) The Master does nothing, yet he leaves nothing undone. ![]() ![]() Su Zhe's commentary on the verse explains: "Heaven and Earth are not partial. The Tao never does anything, yet through it all things are done. This verse is usually interpreted as an expression of the Taoist rejection of the principle of ren ( 仁), one of the Five Constant Virtues in Confucianism, variously translated as "humanity", "benevolence", "partiality", or "kind acts". However, some translators prefer to interpret this phrase as two separate words, "straw" ( 芻) and "dogs" ( 狗), rather than together, as "straw dogs" ( 芻狗). ![]()
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