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    New Lao Tzu
    New Lao Tzu
    New Lao Tzu
    Ebook204 pages2 hours

    New Lao Tzu

    By Ray Grigg

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    A new interpretation of the Tao Te Ching, this book is a celebration of the Way of Harmony and Balance. Ray Grigg transforms what has been traditionally called the Tao Te Ching, what he calls the Lao Tzu, from the mysterious to the meaningful. He accomplishes this by abandoning the historical convention of a literal reading of the Chinese texts. The result is a poetic expression of ancient wisdom in a language that readers can approach directly. The wisdom of the Lao Tzu rests in its ability to tease confusion into insight that is beyond the confinement of intellectual understanding. Beautifully illustrated with ink drawings by Bill Gaetz, The New Lao Tzu demonstrates that living the wisdom of the Lao Tzu requires more instinct than reason, more intuition than argument.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherTuttle Publishing
    Release dateNov 22, 2011
    ISBN9781462901418
    New Lao Tzu
    Author

    Ray Grigg

    Ray Grigg is the author of six internationally sold books on Taoism and Zen, The Tao of Relationships, The Tao of Being, The Tao of Sailing, Zen Brushpoems, The Tao of Zen, The New Lao Tzu and has been a serious student of Eastern Philosophy for more than 45 years. Prior to writing professionally since 1985, he was a teacher in senior secondary schools of British Columbia, teaching principally English and English literary history but also designing and teaching courses in fine arts, cultural history and comparative world religions. Besides writing books, he contributes a weekly environmental column, Shades of Green, to a Vancouver Island newspaper and also interviews for a local TV channel. He is a former director on the Advisory Council for The Centre For Studies in Religion and Society at the University of Victoria in British Columbia. He continues to give occasional presentations and workshops on Taoism and Zen. His latest interest, following travel, photography, Eastern philosophy, design and sailing, is kayaking. He lives with his wife, a classical musician, in a self-built home on ten acres of forested land on Quadra Island, British Columbia, Canada. A large organic garden and orchard supply much of their food needs. Their pets are the wild birds and animals that share their property.

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      Book preview

      New Lao Tzu - Ray Grigg

      First published in 1995 by Charles E. Tuttle Co., Inc. of Rutland, Vermont and Tokyo, Japan, with editorial offices at 364 Innovation Drive, North Clarendon, VT 05759 U.S.A.

      © 1995 Ray Grigg

      All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any manner or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

      Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

      Grigg, Ray, 1938-

      The new Lao Tzu : a contemporary Tao te ching / Ray

      Grigg.

      p. cm.

      Includes bibliographical references and indexes.

      ISBN 978-1-4629-0141-8

      1. Lao-tzu. Tao te ching. I. Title. 

      00   99   98   97   96   95   1   3   5   7   9   10   8   6   4   2

      All ink paintings are © 1995 Bill Gaetz and are reproduced by kind permission of the artist.

      Design by Jill Winitzer

      Printed in the United States

      CONTENTS

      INTRODUCTION

      About 2,500 years ago, according to legend, Lao Tzu left his native China for India, dismayed with the unsettling changes that were taking place in his country. At its last outpost he hurriedly wrote a summary of his wisdom, left it with the lone gatekeeper, and disappeared forever into the wilderness.

      If this scenario were repeated today in the West, what would Lao Tzu leave behind as the written record of his wisdom so modern readers could be instructed by his insights? The answer to this question has guided the writing of The New Lao Tzu.

      A contemporary version of the old classic would read in substance and spirit like a translation of the original, but in style and detail it would feel modern, perhaps with a slight Chinese accent. The archaic images and metaphors of an historic China would be replaced by ones familiar to the West. Social and political commentaries would reflect present realities.

      The resonant density of the sage's phrasing would still be present, however, the poetry would be more fluid and explicit. The logic of Lao Tzu's arguments would be more linear, and easier to follow, but the teachings would retain their unique measure of profound simplicity. So, in brief, The New Lao Tzu reads more like a loose interpretation than a strict translation.

      Purists may respond with indignation at such treatment of the Lao Tzu. However, scholarly justification already exists for taking liberties with the sage's words. The usual attempts at translating the traditional texts by adhering to the actual order and logic of its Chinese characters have been profoundly unsatisfactory. Indeed, such attempts have made the Lao Tzu almost unreadable. Translators, by necessity, have been compelled to take considerable license with the source material simply because its old Chinese will not translate literally into English. As evidence, merely witness the great differences in the many conscientious efforts.

      The New Lao Tzu, therefore, embraces willingly what translators have admitted reluctantly and employed sparingly. Priority has been given to what is meant rather than what is written, to the spirit of the Lao Tzu's teachings rather than the record of its words. Such an approach offers readers in the West a relevance and a clarity that cannot be reached within the constraints of translation. Liberties have been taken with the words to make the wisdom more accessible.

      The Lao Tzu, in fact, is not as enigmatic as it seems. But translations make it feel foreign and esoteric because they retain too much of the idiom of ancient China. The peculiarities of a uniquely Chinese style of expression make the old classic unnecessarily difficult, and create the impression that its wisdom is somehow remote and obscure.

      This does not mean that The New Lao Tzu makes this wisdom instantly available. But the first, and perhaps the most extraneous level of difficulty has been removed. What remains is the bare and exposed teachings revealed in clear and simple language.

      In China this wisdom is called the Tao. In other places it is given other names. But all those who undertake to search for it experience a similar intellectual and existential crisis as they discover that the same culture that nourishes what they can understand also obstructs what they hope to understand. Indeed, understanding is an impediment that confines insights just as self is a reference that limits knowing. The paradox in Taoism is that the Way can be followed only when it is not understood, and when there is no one to follow it. So the standard measure of progress when searching for its wisdom is a deepening confusion and uncertainty as the impositions of culture and self fall away.

      Although the Lao Tzu contains individual themes that can be understood as concise and coherent notions, the larger challenge of integrating the entire work into an explainable philosophy is impossible. The interconnections of its diverse and contradictory elements will not intellectually fit together. This is evident in translations, and applies equally to this interpretation. Indeed, no amount of effort will succeed in producing a logical and coherent document that will be understood in a wholly rational way.

      The Lao Tzu is a gestalt that resembles the paradoxes of life itself. Any honest and thinking person who attempts to grasp its comprehensive wisdom finally reaches a condition in which all intellectual processes collapse. Out of this initial and profound confusion a unique sensitivity develops, a special feeling for the diverse complexity of things as they manifest themselves from moment to moment in the shifting field of a unified wholeness. The wisdom of the Lao Tzu does not rest in any answers that it offers, but in its ability to tease confusion into an awareness that is beyond the confinement of intellect s understanding.

      Living the wisdom of the Lao Tzu requires more instinct than reason, more intuition than argument. So The New Lao Tzu is more the work of the poet and the artist than the philosopher and the scholar. It was produced primarily by a creative process, one that remains essentially private and inexplicable.

      But this does not excuse accountability. Even the poet's freedom arises from discipline, and the interpreter's liberty must begin with informed preparation. So the scholarly effort that underlies The New Lao Tzu must be shared. For those who are interested, it is offered in the several essays that follow the text.

      THE CHAPTER

      The age and authority of the recently discovered Ma-wang-tui texts require that The New Lao Tzu follow its order of chapters. Unfortunately, this order does not correspond to the one in traditional translations.

      For readers who are accustomed to the traditional designations, those numbers are always cited to the right of the new number, in smaller type. A conversion can usually be made by adding thirty-seven to those chapters from one to forty-four, and by subtracting forty-four from those chapters numbering forty-five to eighty-one. The following table can be used for a precise conversion.

      T

      E

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