Taoism 34 — Literal Translation Version

The speaker begins with a few glossary notes. He explains that the word *ni* here does not mean “mud” in the ordinary sense, but “blocked,” “stuck,” or “unable to pass through.” He cites Zhu Xi and dictionary-style explanations to show that the image is of stagnant water trapped in a muddy hole: when water cannot flow, it turns foul. In the same way, reasoning can become obstructed and fail to reach through.

He then explains *bu wei* here in the sense of “not learning” or “not following.” His point is that the great Way of the sage is vast, far-reaching, and remains open across time; it does not become obstructed. Small ways are not wholly without reason, but in the end they do not remain passable. The great Way often does not please ordinary people, while lesser ways are easy for common people to like and follow.

To illustrate this, he starts telling examples from popular religion. On a trip to the mainland, he was taken to a temple where people lined up to rub a certain stone. Because thousands of hands had touched it, the stone had become shiny. A donation box stood beside it, and people were told that if they touched the stone and gave money, they would become rich and recover from illness.

The stone-cult example becomes a critique of superstition. People even fought to cut into the line, desperate to touch the stone. The speaker says the whole scene was both infuriating and absurd: thousands of people rubbing the same object in hopes of wealth and healing, without considering hygiene, reason, or truth.

The OCR is very noisy in the next stretch, but the drift is clear. He tells several folk stories about local “stone gods” or “fish gods” that supposedly became famous because of rumor, coincidence, and people’s willingness to project power onto ordinary objects. A warm stone after a rain, an animal carcass, or a roadside object could easily become the center of a shrine once stories began to circulate. Once people believed, donations, incense, and miracle tales followed.

His warning is direct: one must not speak wildly about spiritual matters without real grounding. Worship in itself is not the problem; blind worship is. Lesser cults may look impressive and attract crowds, but in the end they do not lead through to the real Way.

He closes the point by returning to cultivation: a true practitioner who seeks liberation from birth and death does not chase miracle stories, even if they appear effective. At that point the lecture turns back to the main verse, now focusing on the line about the Dao giving life to the ten thousand things without ruling them as master.

The speaker cites Lü Chunyang’s explanation: all beings dwell where they dwell and each follows its own course; the Dao does not act as their personal ruler. He also quotes the *Qingjing Jing*: “The Great Dao, nameless, ever nourishes the ten thousand things.” Since it has no fixed name, how could it claim the title of “master”? That is why it nourishes without possessing and supports without ruling.

He then pauses over the phrase “embracing the myriad forms.” To “embrace the myriad forms” means to include everything without exception. The Dao contains all things, transforms all things, and leaves nothing outside itself. Because of that all-inclusiveness, it is called great.

Lü Chunyang, he says, compares the Dao to empty space. It has no visible name or form, yet all things exist within it. Plants, animals, and beings all live within the Dao, but each carries on its own function. The Dao does not micromanage them. To illustrate this, he begins telling an example from a monkey mountain he once visited.

The monkey story is used as an analogy. The speaker says that on this mountain the monkeys appeared and withdrew in orderly groups at fixed times, and that each troop had a leader. When leadership changed, the whole troop responded. The point is not zoological precision but observable order: within the world, beings organize themselves and follow their own heads and structures.

From there he generalizes: lions have lion kings, tigers have tiger leaders, nations have rulers, and communities have their own governing heads. This is what he takes “each governing itself” to mean. But the Dao itself is not one more worldly ruler issuing commands from above. It is the ground within which all things live and move.

So even though all things depend on and return to the Dao, the Dao does not seize lordship over them. It is boundless, all-embracing, and beyond fixed naming. That is what it means to say: all things return to it, yet it does not act as their master.

The speaker now applies the same principle to the sage. The sage models himself on the Dao, so his intention accords with it. His mind is like empty space: not “empty” in the nihilistic sense, but capacious enough to receive and contain all things.

He explains emptiness by analogy: because a cup is hollow, it can hold tea or juice; because space is open, it can receive everything. In the same way, the sage’s heart can accommodate praise and blame, good and bad, without resentment. The lecturer candidly admits that he himself is not yet like that; if someone spat on him, he says, he would still react. A sage, however, holds even insult without losing balance.

He then cites Confucius as an example of someone who accepted criticism as something useful rather than taking offense. The truly great person has great virtue and great action, yet does not claim greatness for himself. Precisely by not self-asserting, his greatness is fulfilled.

This leads into the next verse: “If one grasps the great image, all under heaven will come.” The speaker next turns to explanations from Heshang Gong.

Heshang Gong’s basic point, as presented by the lecturer, is that if a ruler or cultivator truly upholds the Great Dao, people naturally gather without being harmed. At the level of self-cultivation, “spirit” means one’s inner vitality and awareness. If one does not injure that inner spirit, body and mind remain settled. At the social level, if people are governed in accord with the Dao, peace prevails rather than conflict.

The lecturer then turns to Lü Chunyang’s explanation of “the great image.” The “great image” is the image of the imageless: it points to the pattern or presence of the Dao itself. Outwardly, this means that when one walks in the Great Dao, all under heaven return toward it. Inwardly, the “world” also refers to the inner realm of one’s own life and mind; when the mind holds to the Dao, one’s thoughts are gradually set right.

Thus “all under heaven come to it” can be read both outwardly and inwardly. “No harm” means not injuring life. If life is not injured, body and mind become peaceful, level, and at ease.

The supporting notes unpack several words: the heart-mind is the ruler of the senses and body; “harm” means injury; “peace” and “equilibrium” mean stillness and security; and *tai* evokes the hexagram of harmonious intercourse between Heaven and Earth, where things can flow freely.

Lü Chunyang’s interpretation is then restated in practical terms. Ordinary acquired consciousness clings to visible forms, but the primordial Dao has no such fixed shape. The “great image” is therefore the imageless pattern of the Dao.

The lecturer also internalizes the verse: your body is an “inner world,” and your mind is its ruler. If the mind upholds the Dao and takes the common good rather than selfish desire as its orientation, then the many thoughts within begin to return to correctness. When one truly returns to the Dao, one no longer harms living beings. Then the body becomes calm, the mind becomes settled, and things become unobstructed. That is “going to it without harm, and dwelling in peace, balance, and ease.”

The lecture now moves to the line: “Music and bait cause passing travelers to stop.” Lü Chunyang explains that “music” refers to pleasing sound and “bait” to food. Human life in this world is only a moment, so we are like travelers passing by. Pleasant sounds delight the ear and good food gratifies the mouth; both can entice a passerby to pause.

The lecturer elaborates on how brief life is. A year passes in a blink: New Year comes, then the Dragon Boat Festival, then Mid-Autumn, then winter, and soon another year is gone. One life is the same. Whether you have ten years left or eight, no one knows.

So music and food symbolize worldly attractions: things that are sweet, pleasing, and immediately gratifying. They can stop the traveler for a time, but only temporarily.

The speaker’s point is that although pleasures may delight the senses, a human lifetime is too short to let such enjoyments amount to much. Childhood passes in ignorance; adulthood is tied up with family burdens and work; old age comes quickly. How many years of real enjoyment does one actually get?

By contrast, if one keeps to the Great Dao, one reaches the “far shore of the Dao” and is no longer merely a passing traveler. In his religious language, this means transcending repeated birth and death rather than just lingering briefly in worldly pleasures.

The OCR grows especially noisy here, and the lecturer wanders through personal reflections on aging, illness, death, and the weariness of remaining in the human world. But the message is consistent: worldly pleasure is fleeting, life is short, and learning the Dao is better than any sensory enjoyment.

He then cites the *Laozi yishu*: music and bait belong to the realm of visible and tangible things, but the Dao does not. It has no sound, no smell, and no sensuous attraction. It cannot be seen or heard like ordinary objects. Yet when one actually applies it, it reaches everywhere and is never exhausted.

At this point the speaker says the previous chapter is finished and the lecture turns to the next one. The verse under discussion is now the continuation: “The Dao, when spoken, is bland and without flavor; look at it, it is not enough to be seen; listen to it, it is not enough to be heard; use it, and it cannot be exhausted.”

Lü Chunyang’s explanation is that the true knower of the Dao values plainness. The mouth enjoys sharp, sour, salty, bitter, and sweet flavors, but the Dao as it comes forth has no such exciting taste. It is without thought, without attachment, without craving, and therefore appears bland.

Likewise, it has no visible shape or form. It is not like the five colors—blue/green, yellow, red, white, and black—nor like the five tones that can attract and enchant people. Sensory beauty and sound can draw people into fascination, but the Dao has no visible appearance and no audible voice.

The lecturer pauses to note that “blandness” here means stillness and purity, not deficiency.

The final block reinforces the contrast between the Dao and sensory attraction. The speaker cites dictionary notes and a line from the *Book of Odes*—“without sound, without scent”—to show that the highest workings of Heaven are not grasped through ordinary sensory signs.

He then returns to the five flavors, five colors, and five tones. Spicy, sour, salty, bitter, and sweet flavors please the mouth; beautiful appearances and refined sounds delight the eyes and ears. These things can attract and intoxicate people.

But when the Dao is spoken of, it is without fixed form, without image, without craving, and without sensuous flavor. It cannot be seen as color or heard as tone. That is why the text says it is “not enough to be seen” and “not enough to be heard.”

And yet this very Dao, though imperceptible to the senses, is inexhaustible in use. One may apply it endlessly, and it does not run dry. With that explanation, the lecturer brings the chapter to a close.

This literal version consolidates the lecture’s English material into continuous notes, keeping close to the spoken sequence while preserving explanatory detail.