Thoughts on the Tao Te Ching 14

Poem 14

Look, and it can't be seen.

Listen and it can't be heard.

Reach and it can't be grasped.

Above, it isn't bright.

Below, it isn't dark.

Seamless, unnameable,

it returns to the realm of nothing.

Form that includes all forms,

image without an image,

subtle, beyond all conception.

Approach it and there is no beginning;

follow it and there is no end.

You can't know it, but you can be it,

at ease in your own life.

Just realise where you come from:

this is the essence of wisdom.

Reflections

I have remarked already that the poems of the Tao Te Ching bear some little similarity to the Book of Psalms in the Old Testament.  However, they also contrast with the psalms in one major respect. Take the following quotation about wisdom from Psalm 111:10 for example: “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: a good understanding have all they that do his commandments: his praise endureth forever.”  Notice here that the Psalms are essentially theocentric (or God-centered) in their approach to answering the mystery with which life confronts us, while the Tao Te Ching  is essentially anthropocentric. The last two lines of the final stanza above tells us that the essence of wisdom lies not in the fear of an external power like that of God, but rather in the internal realisation of one's depth of being. This is not surprising given the more psychological or anthropocentric approach of Eastern spirituality.

The above poem is basically describing the elusiveness of the Tao.  It also indicates its ineffability and mystery by using once again that union of opposites, that tension of polarities, that balance of binaries or axis of antinomies to which I have alluded many times in these reflections.  This tension of opposites essentially, then, captures skillfully the elusiveness and ineffability of the Tao. 

Raphael's painting, "The School of Athens." Plato is the bearded central figure

"Image without an image" is paradoxical in the extreme, though it bears some little parallelism with the thought of Plato.  Plato believed that any object was but a physical representation of the abstract idea which was in a sense "more real" that the actual material thing.  For example, a physical table is a representation of the abstract idea of table (the original form). In consequence art was very much a cheap representation as it was merely a copy of a copy of the original image or idea. [Plato's theory of Forms or theory of Ideas asserts that non-material abstract (but substantial) forms (or ideas), and not the material world of change known to us through sensation, possess the highest and most fundamental kind of reality. When used in this sense, the word form or idea is often capitalized.] Image of an image we can all understand as we can a copy of a copy.  However, image without an image is working as it were in the other direction towards the original idea or form which needless to say is totally ineffable and totally indescribable.  Once again, it is worth repeating here that when we are dealing with religious, psychological and spiritual depths we put language under great strain to express them.

Thoughts on the Tao Te Ching 7

Poem 7

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 herself,

she is perfectly fulfilled.

Commentary

The great enigmatic pre-Socratic philosopher Heraclitus (c. 535 - 475 B.C.) springs to mind immediately when I ponder this seventh poem from the Tao Te Ching. He is famous for his insistence that all life is in motion and that everything is change or flux as expressed in his famous line, known to anyone who ever studied philosophy, viz., "you cannot step into the same river twice."  Another famous phrase attributed to him comprises two words only, viz., "panta rhei" = "everything flows."  This latter Heraclitean quotation is mentioned in Plato's Cratylus.

Heraclitus, unknown artist, Sheffield Museum

Heraclitus is also renowned for his enigmatic style and paradoxical expression leading him to be called "Heraclitus the obscure."  Also, his style has been described as "wondrous," that is, in the sense in which Plato has defined the beginnings of philosophy as being in wonder. In this sense much ancient philosophy is spiritual in effect and thrust.  Hence this style of philosophizing has much in common with the spirituality and philosophy set before us in the Tao Te Ching. 

Once again, it is no surprise to learn that Heraclitus was much concerned with what I have termed in these several posts on Taoism the tension of opposites or binaries or polarities. Commentators on Heraclitus call this his predilection for the "unity of opposites," and his most famous statement in this regard is that "the path up and down is one and the same." This idea as we have seen is common to a lot of religious and spiritual traditions.

Now, our poem above is about time vs timelessness as our author mentions both infinity and eternity.  Time may be defined as the measure of change and this is where both the Tao and Heraclitus come in for my commentary here.  What does infinite mean?  All religions speak of their God as being both eternal - always having existed - and infinite - without beginning or end.  The author tells us, then, that the Tao was never born, that it existed always. He/she also describes the notion of infinity in an interesting and unusual way, viz., in that it is present for all beings consequent on its having no desires for itself.  One needs much meditation and consideration on these sentiments to tease out the possible meaning of that line. However, we are in the realm of mysticism where paradox and enigma abound.  Much of that area of study is ineffable and can only be expressed in a poetry that stretches language almost to breaking point.

Again the second stanza of the above poem is replete with paradoxes expressed by way of the "unity of opposites," e.g., "Behind" and "Ahead" and "At One" and "Detached"  at one and the same time.

Invitation to Meditate

Once again as what we are engaged with here is more a spiritual practice than an intellectual exercise it would be profitable to read the above poem again and to let a line or a word therefrom jump from the page as it were into your mind.  Then, with eyes closed, you could do worse than meditating for five or so minutes using that word or phrase as a mantra.

Namaste, friends.