Daodejing Chapter 70: Put the Dao into Practice
The Daodejing appears to wander aimlessly, even drunkenly, around its subject. A chapter may speculate on the mysteriousness of existence, while another points out the necessity of opposites. Then there is time for a quick indictment of performative ritual and its champions. Now the proper mindset to take into battle, and how to behave and be seen after. All to come around and point again from an adjacent angle. Is it random, this shuffled string of characters like so many bamboo strips tied loosely together? Something this old, we will never know; nobody can ever know.
But I think there is order in what looks like scatter. There is purpose behind the random walk. Intention is moving, from abstraction to specificity, or more crucially, from uncertainty to confidence. In Chapter 20, the frustration of being unheeded spilled off the page, so much so, that I imagined Laozi losing his certainty a little. His confidence, surrounded by so many bright and enlightened others, was shaken. And now, surrounded by lords rushing into wars and soldiers fighting angry, again Laozi pauses the narrative.
My words are quite easy to understand, and quite easy to put into practice. But no one seems to understand them, or put them into practice. My words have their origin, just as things have rules to follow. People don’t understand that, so they don’t understand me. Few understand me, and rarely do they practice what I say. Therefore the sage wears coarse cloth, holding the jade in his bosom.
The last time we were here, I could just imagine Laozi berating the kings making spectacles of themselves, the mourners wailing and beating their chests for onlookers, the poisoners who thought that scripted demonstrations of love would somehow make their children love them more. Hard lessons to swallow, and just for a second, we are allowed to see a shadow of a doubt, because we would doubt, wouldn’t we? So many voices, armed with logic, with results, against our quiet nature, just going about its business.
And here we are again, looking on states rashly taking up arms against neighbours, inviting destruction into their lands. Throwing away the treasures in hand for jealousy and simple greed. Forgetting that what goes around, comes around. But this time we are free from doubt. No doubt about who we are and what we believe. The words have their origin, the rules work for a reason, and it is not the fault of the words or their speaker that people fail to understand.
I have come to recognize that being understood is not always possible, and more, not desirable. There are things about ourselves we can explain, and others that we cannot. Of the things we can explain, some of those we best not. Not everything needs an answer, not every opinion an airing. I am not responsible for the avatar with my name walking around in the minds of others.
That the Daodejing has remained inspiration for so long to so many is a tribute to it's ability to - well, speak to so many, with so many differing interpretations. Partly that is due to the language it was written in, archaic Chinese. We don't really know about the 'order' in which it was written though, now we have bamboo texts discovered from archeological digs where the text is ordered differently from the received version. So, we have speculation upon speculation. Sometimes it's best to just sit with the words. As you did.
“ Not everything needs an answer, not every opinion an airing. I am not responsible for the avatar with my name walking around in the minds of others.” - a lesson i need to remember