#daodejing

When the great course is abandoned,

humankindness and duty arise.

When wisdom and acuity emerge,

vast swindles begin.

When the six relations are at odds,

filial piety and parental love are born.

When the nation is disordered,

loyal ministers appear.

Laozi. Daodejing, chapter 18. Translated by Brook Ziporyn, Liveright Publishing Corporation, 2023.

Noble has humble as its root, High has low as its foundation. Rulers and lords call themselves Poor lonely orphans. Isn't this using humility as a root?

They use many carriages But have no carriage; The do not desire to glisten like jade But drop, drop like a stone.

-- Laozi, Daodejing Chapter 39

The sage wears rough clothing And carries jade inside.

-- Laozi, Daodejing Chapter 70

Humans are born soft and weak. They die stiff and strong. The ten thousand plants and trees Are born soft and tender And die withered and sere.

The stiff and strong Are Death's companions The soft and weak Are Life's companions.

Therefore, The strongest armies do not conquer, The greatest trees are cut down.

The strong and great sink down. The soft and weak rise up.

-- Laozi, Daodejing Chapter 76

Winter break is coming to an end but it was really, really nice. Lots of time resting and doing personal reading... which I've re-realized is completely different than school reading!

I've really reconnected with the parts of life I've been missing and I hope to retain that once the semester begins.

As I’m doing research for a work of my own, I’ve finally received my copy of Lao Tzu’s Daodejing today—I skim through every other page just to sample what comes of it: chapter 13 spoke to me, much like a chapter in the 50s—all in all, the entirety of the Daodejing is giving me much more than I expected; I went into this with an idea as to what I’d like to cherry-pick, and, in the end, which is only the beginning, I am given more than expected; this is extremely concise, thickly plastered with meaning—I’m ashamed of my intentions not being in the right place when I first conceived of the idea to do this; beautiful.

Especially the Big Words, like Dào, seem impossible, at least if you're setting the goal to only use one word to translate it every time. You'd probably have to translate it as Nasin sometimes and Tawa sometimes.

I know it's ironic to worry too much about words when the very beginning of that book warns against prioritizing signs over signifiers, but even if I don't worry about the specific words, I want to use the words in the same clever ways that Laozi does, which requires finding a word with quite a lot of grammatical versatility. Anyway, here's a couple of the most important words in the Dàodéjīng and how I would translate them into English and Toki Pona:

道 (dào): way, path, sequence, going: Nasin? Tawa?

德 (dé): character, power, greatness, virtue, characteristic: Wawa? Pona? Suli?

玄 (xuán): dark, black, mystery, obscure: Pimeja? Len?

常 (cháng): always, ever, eternal, often: Tenpo Ali (glad I'm sure about at least one of them lol)

無為 (wú wéi): Pali pi Pali Ala? Pali pi Alasa Ala?

天地 (tiān dì): Heaven and Earth: Sewi en Ma

萬物 (wàn wù): (The) Ten Thousand Things, everything: Ijo Mute Ali

芻狗 (chú gǒu): straw dogs, disposable: Soweli Kasi? Mani Ala?

(不)仁 ((bù) rén): humane/inhuman, dispassionate, cold, indifferent: Pona Ala? Pilin Ala?

聖人 (shèng rén): wise/holy person, sage, saint: Jan Sona? Jan Pilin? Jan Sewi?

(無)知 (wú zhī) (un)aware, (un)grasping ignorant, to know: Sona? Pilin?

善 (shàn): virtue, benevolence, excellence: Pona

不爭 (bù zhēng): unstriving, uncompetitive, incontestible: Alasa Ala? Utala Ala?