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1: Knowing Tao
The Tao1 that can be explained is not the eternal Tao. The name that can be named is not the eternal Name.2
The Unnameable is the eternally real.3 The Nameable is the origin heaven and earth.4
Free from desire you realize the mystery. Maintain some desire so to see the manifestations.
Yet mystery and manifestations arise from the same source. This source is called darkness.
Darkness within darkness. The gateway to all understanding.5
2: Self Cultivation
When people see some things as beautiful other things become ugly. When people see some things as good, other things become bad.
Being and non-being condition each other6. Difficult and easy give rise to each other. Long and short define each other. High and low depend on each other. Before and after follow each other.
Therefore the master 7 acts non-assertively, and teaches without saying anything. 8 Things arise and she lets them come; things disappear and she lets them go. She has but does not possess, acts but does not desire results.9 When her work is done, she forgets it. That is why the credits last forever.
3: Emanating Peace
If you over-esteem the worthy, people contend it. If you overvalue possessions, people begin to steal.10
The master leads by emptying people’s minds and filling their cores, by weakening their ambition and toughening their resolve. He helps people lose everything they know, everything they desire, and creates confusion in those who think that they know.11
Practice non-interference, and everything will fall into place.12
4: Non-Existent Source
The Tao is like a well: used but never used up.13 It is like the eternal void: fountain of infinite possibilities.14
It blunts the sharp and unravels the tangled; harmonises with the light; mingles with the dust.15
It is hidden but always present, calm like a deep pool. I don’t know who gave birth to it. It is older than our understanding of God.
5: The Value of Hollowness
The Tao does not take sides; it gives birth to both good and evil. Material things are like incense sticks, burned in worship but discarded ashes.
The master does not take sides; she welcomes both saints and sinners.16
The Tao is like a bellows: it is hollow yet infinitely capable 17. The more you use it the more it gives forth 18; the more you talk of it the less you understand.
Hold on to the centre.
6: God the Mother
From the heart of the Eternal Void the Tao is called the Great Mysterious Mother: hollow yet inexhaustible, she gives birth to infinite worlds.19
It’s spiralling-continuous flow is always present within you. You can use it any way you want.20
7: Faint Light
The Tao is infinite, eternal. Why is it eternal? It was never born; thus it can never die. Why is it infinite? It has no desires for itself; thus it is present for all beings.
The master stays behind; that is why she is ahead. She is detached from all things; that is why she is one with them. Because she has let go of her self concern, she is perfectly fulfilled.21
8: The Nature of Yielding
The supreme person is like water, which nourishes all things without effort.22 It is content with the low places that people despise.23 Thus it is like the Tao.
In dwelling, live close to the ground.24 In thinking keep to the simple. In conflict, be fair and generous. In governing, don’t try to control. In work, enjoy what you do. In family life be completely present.
When you are content to be simply yourself and don’t compare or compete, everybody will respect you.
9: Practice of Serenity
Filling your cup until it overflows is not as good as stopping in time. Keep sharpening your knife and it will blunt. Fill your heart with treasures of gold and jade, and it will certainly be robbed?25
Being highly esteemed, and proud, brings much trouble. Being concerned about people’s approval you become their prisoner.
Do your work, then step back.26 This is the Way.
10: You can do it
In harmonizing your male and female27 to embrace the One, can you coax your mind from its wandering and keep to the Way.
In tenderly tuning your breath, can you become supple as a newborn babe28?
In polishing your mystic mirror, can you purify it to see nothing but the light?29
In loving and leading the people, can you do it without imposing your will?30 Can you deal with the most vital matters by letting events take their course?
Can you step back from your own mind and thus understand all things? When your light shines forth, can you ignore it with equanimity?
Can you practice non-interference? When the Gate of Heaven opens and closes, can you play the part of the Female?
Giving birth and nourishing, having without possessing, acting with no desire of the fruits31, leading and not trying to control: this is called the supreme Mystic Virtue.
11: Servility of Non-being
Thirty spokes join together in a wheel, but it is the centre hole that makes the wagon move.
We shape clay into a pot, but it is the emptiness inside that holds whatever we want.
We hammer wood for a house, but if is the inner space that makes it livable.
Therefore, being is what we have, but non-being is what we use.32
12: Know your Senses
Colours blind the eye. Sounds deafen the ear. Flavours numb the taste.
Seeking to satisfy our desire for thrills leads us to do crazy things.33
The master therefore observes the world but trusts his inner vision, caring for his belly and not his eye.34 Things come and go. Sanity is keeping the heart open as the sky.35
13: Embracing Shame
Success is as dangerous as failure. Hope is as hollow as fear.
What does it mean that success is as dangerous as failure? Whether you go up the ladder or down it, your position is shaky.
When you stand with your two feet on the ground, you will always keep your balance.
What does it mean that hope is as hollow as fear? Hope and fear are both apparitions that arise from thinking of the self. When we do not regard the self as if so important, what do we have to fear?
See the world as your self. Have faith in the way things are. Love the world as your self; then you can be entrusted to care for all things.36
14: The Mysteries
When you look at it but cannot see it. When you listen to it but cannot hear it. When you reach for it but cannot grasp it. It is the One.
It is neither bright on appearing or dark on disappearing, it merely is. It flows from the void and returns again to it.
Form that includes all forms, Image without an image, subtle beyond all conception, it is the everlasting essence of all.
Approach it and there is no beginning; follow it and there is no end. You can not know it, but you can be in it. Taking hold of the One from ever past uproots the problems of the present. Knowing the ancient origins of self; is the essence of wisdom.37
15: Masterly Virtue
The ancient masters were profound and subtle. Their wisdom unfathomable. Since they were incomprehensible; all we can describe about them is in the simplicity of their appearance.
They were careful as one crossing an iced-over stream. Alert as a warrior in enemy territory. Courteous as a guest. Fluid as melting ice. Unpretentious and shapeable as a block of wood. Receptive as a valley. Murky, like turbid water.
Do you have the patience to wait for your mud to settle? Can you remain unmoving until clarity arises, and an impulse gradually leads to life?
The master does not seek the limits.38 Not seeking, not expecting, she is present, and not weary - welcoming all things.
16: Return to the Essence
Empty your mind to the extreme. Maintain unmoving in your own being. Be aware of the turmoil of beings, but contemplate their cyclic return.39
Each separate being in the universe returns to the common source, however luxurious they now seem. Returning to the source is serenity.40
Serenity is renewal of life in harmony with the Infinite. Know the source and enlightenment comes, know it not and you stumble in confusion and sorrow.
When you know your source, you naturally become impartial, tolerant, uninvolved, amused, kindhearted as a grandmother, dignified as a king.
Being a master one can attain the Divine, merging with the Tao, becoming immortal and imperishable after the demise of the body.41
17: Attitude of Simplicity
When the master governs, the people are hardly aware that he exists.42 Next best is a leader who is loved and praised. Next, one who is feared. The worst is one who is despised.
If you do not have faith, you can not inspire faith.43
The master is wary and treasures words. When his work is done, the people say, “We did it, out of free will, all by ourselves!"
18: Hedonistic circle
When the great Tao is forgotten, goodness and piety appear.
When intellectualism arise, hypocrisy appears.
When there is no peace in the family, filial piety begins.
When the country falls into chaos, patriotism is born and good leaders appear.44
19: Innocence
Discard holiness and wisdom, and people will be a hundred times happier.
Discard morality and justice, and people will do the right thing.
Discard industry and profit, and there will be no thieves.
These three are not good enough for culture. Add simplicity, reduce selfishness, and decrease desires – remain in the centre and let things take their course.45
20: Apart from the Crowd
Discard pretentious learning, and end your problems. What difference between an abrupt ‘Yes’ and a learned ‘Yea’? What difference between success and failure?
Must you value what others value, avoid what others avoid? How ridiculous! Where will it lead?
Other people are excited, as though they are at a parade. I alone don’t care, I alone am emotionless, like an infant before it can smile.
Other people have what they need; I alone possess nothing. Wandering aimlessly, I look like a homeless tramp46. I am like an idiot, my mind is so empty. So dull I feel.
Other people are bright; I alone am gloomy in despair. Other people are smart and confidant; I alone feel disgusted and depressed. I drift like a wave on the ocean, blown around as aimless as the wind. Other people have a worthy employment ; I alone am worthless.
I am different from ordinary people, I drink from the Great Mother’s breasts.
21: Hollow Soul
Ultimate Virtue is in essence in the nature of the Tao. The master keeps her mind always at one with the Tao; that is what gives her her radiance.
The Tao is a pulsating reality, it is grasped as it seems to come and go. Evasive and elusive it is, yet it manifests itself. Dreamily vague yet it takes on concrete form.
Within it lies true reality; the true omnipresent essence of life, witnessing to the Creator.
How can the master’s mind be at one with it? How can she know the way of the Creator? How can the dreamy dusk enlighten her? Because she looks inside herself and is filled with Its vitality.
22: Power of Humility
If you want not to break, then bend. If you want to be straight, allow some crookedness. If you want to be filled, become empty. If you want to be renewed, die being used.47 If you want everything, give up everything.48
The master, by residing in the Tao, becomes a model for all beings. Because he does not radiate his own ego, people can see the Light through him. Because he has nothing to prove and nothing to gain, people trust his words. Because he does not radiate his own image, he becomes a mirror to others. Because he has no goal in mind, everything he does succeeds. Because he does not compete, no one can compete with him.
When the ancient masters said, “If you do not want to break, then bend,”49 they were not merely using empty phrases. Bend sincerely. All things come to him who is truly humble.
23: Hollowness and Non-Being
Nature speaks but briefly,50 but in general she remains in serenity. A rainstorm does not last a whole day, and a violent wind blows only a short while. Even heaven and earth do not take ages to express themselves. How much less should a human then speak?51
Express yourself clearly and step back.
If you open yourself to the Tao, you are at one with the Tao52 and you can embody it completely. If you open yourself to insight, you are at one with insight and you can use it completely. If you open yourself to failure, you are at one with failure and you embody it completely.
Open yourself to the Tao, then have faith. A little bit of faith does not evoke faith from other people.53
24: Insufferable Preferences
He who stands on tiptoe totters. He who rushes ahead trips. He who tries to radiate his self is dim. He who justifies himself knows not himself.54 He who seeks power over others is powerless over himself.55 He who feels sorry for himself is stunted.
If you want to imitate the Tao, you will be different.56
25: Symbol of the Great Origin
Something formless and perfect exists, even before heaven and earth.
Serene it is, so quiet.
Alone and unchanging, it pervades all forever.57
Mother of the universes, she may be.58 For lack of a better name59 I call it the Tao, and randomly I label it Great.
Great means everlasting, and all pervasive. All pervasive means flowing through all things, inside and outside, completing the cycle, returning to the origin.60
Therefore the Tao is Great. The universes are great. Earth is great. Humankind is great. These are the four greats.
People imitate the earth. Earth imitates the universes. The universes imitate the Tao. The Tao imitates only itself.61
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Ref: http://wayist.org/eb/index.htm
