allspirit : Message: Tao Te Ching, Chapter 32
Tao Te Ching, Chapter 32
Ursula Le Guin:
The way goes on forever nameless.
Uncut wood, nothing important,
yet nobody under heaven
dare try to carve it.
If rulers and leaders could use it,
the ten thousand things
would gather in homage,
heaven and earth would drop sweet dew,
and people, without being ordered,
would be fair to one another.
To order, to govern,
is to begin naming; when names proliferate
it’s time to stop.
If you know when to stop you’re in no danger.
The Way in the world
is as a stream to a valley, a river to the sea.
The second verse connects the uncut, the
uncarved, the unusable, to the idea of the
unnamed presented in the first chapter:
“name’s the mother of the ten thousand things.”
You have to make order, you have to make
distinctions, but you also have to know when
to stop before you’ve lost the whole in the
multiplicity of parts. The simplicity or
singleness of the Way is that of water,
which always rejoins itself.
Feng/English:
The Tao is forever undefined.
Small though it is in the unformed state,
it cannot be grasped.
If kings and lords could harness it,
The ten thousand things would come together
And gentle rain fall.
Men would need no more instruction and
all things would take their course.
Once the whole is divided, the parts need names.
There are already enough names.
One must know when to stop.
Knowing when to stop averts trouble.
Tao in the world is like a river flowing home
to the sea.
–
Stephen Mitchell:
The Tao can’t be perceived.
Smaller than an electron,
it contains uncountable galaxies.
If powerful men and women
could remain centered in the Tao,
all things would be in harmony.
The world would become a paradise.
All people would be at peace,
and the law would be written in their hearts.
When you have names and forms,
know that they are provisional.
When you have institutions,
know where their functions should end.
Knowing when to stop,
you can avoid any danger.
All things end in the Tao
as rivers flow into the sea.