This blog is an interpretation of the Tao te Ching "Tao Virtue Book" which is attributed to Laozi "Lao Tze" a Chinese philosopher who lived circa 600 b.c.





Please remember always that this is the description of the Tao and not the experience of the living Tao. Hopefully, this blog will not serve as analysis or commentary but as a window into the Tao. You are encouraged to disagree with this interpretation, involve yourself in self-study, and ultimately leave all concepts behind and so experience the living Tao.





Wednesday, March 7, 2012

Chapter 47: Seeing Within

For this chapter we will use Susuki's translation:

"Without passing out of the gate The world's course I prognosticate. Without peeping through the window
The heavenly Reason I contemplate. The further one goes, The less one knows."

Therefore the holy man does not travel, and yet he has knowledge. He does not see things, and yet he defines them. He does not labor, and yet he completes.

Tao te Ching Chapter 47


Interpretation:

Since the Daoist seeks to understand the world and life from the place before form, they need not trave to seek knowledge, by looking within, he can seek the structures and forms that lie beneath for.  If you look to the place before yen and yan, before light and dark, you look also to the place before here and there.  From this place before, all forms that rise from the Tao seem natural and understandable without study or intellectual understanding.

Stanza one observes that the knowledge of the dao comes from still contemplation not movement.  The last stanza, "the further one goes, the less one knows."  Can be interpreted to mean any movement, study, thought, away from still contemplation.

The second stanza tells us the benefits of seeking this stillness.  Internal knowledge, understanding, and wu wei, completion through non-action.  
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