MEDITATIONS: TAO TE CHING CHAPTER FIFTY
when the energy of heaven
meets the energy of earth
birth and death appear
between birth and death
life appears
my bodymind opens to life
nine ways
my bodymind moves through life
with four limbs
these thirteen parts together
can move to create life or
can move to create death
those who create death
try to harden their life
against it
by forcing their life
into still suits of armor
those who create life
are impervious
to claws and teeth
to horns and blades
to dangers above and below
the ancient child asks
how can they do this
because they know how to
step deliberately and move
towards the creation of life
—Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching; An authentic Taoist translation. translated by John Bright-Fey
Rather than try to dissect this chapter stanza by stanza (which would inevitably end in failure, as it would require more knowledge than I possess at the time of writing), I will do my best to discuss in brief what I think it means as a whole.
The first half of this chapter establishes humankind as dualistic beings. Our lives can be characterized as between birth and death, and the course of our lives shares in those tendencies—either toward the affirmation of life or its denial. It is a decision predicated on the assumption of a fundamentally pessimistic world—the assumption that, behind the veil of our finite experience, is a meaningless chaos, an unsympathetic and random nothingness from which all true and illusory order emerges and into which all order shall eventually submerge. This is the context, the grounds for two fundamental attitudes: life, with all its suffering, arbitrariness, unfairness, and turmoil is worth living and perpetuating; or life, because of its suffering, arbitrariness, unfairness, and turmoil, is something that ought to be brought to an end.
Notice that I said “attitude” and not “decision.” These are rarely conscious choices made by individuals (save for the occasional school shooter). Instead, it is a disposition adopted by the very kind of person who cannot bring himself to tolerate the truth about the conditions of his existence. This kind of person rejects that he is limited in ways he wishes he wasn’t. He rejects his moral failings (or rejects morality entirely if he is clever). He fears the unconscious and the unknown because they constantly remind him of his mortality, his ignorance, and his lack of power. Thus begins the stultification through self-deception, arrogance, resentment, then revenge. Like a suit of armor, rigid and hollow, he lacks the necessary animating spirit. He has no creativity, no inspiration. He cannot learn because he cannot accept himself in error. Afraid to let go, all he knows to do is squeeze harder, to apply more and more tyrannical force until finally life is crushed between his fingers.
Meanwhile, there are those who adopt the opposite attitude. They are those who love life despite its absurdity. Perhaps they are those who love it because it is absurd. Regardless, they are those who move through life with deliberation, with purpose, voluntarily facing pain and cruelty. They are not immune to suffering. I do not think that is what this chapter means to suggest. I believe what is being described is the life-affirming ability to transmute suffering into meaning through conscious direction of the will. For those who choose to engage with life each day knowing full well that misery may strike (that misery may be striking presently) are alchemists in a sense. Is it not a proper analogy to say that this attitude is akin to turning lead into gold? Poison into precious moments? Is it not true that momentary pleasure become willing sacrifices to the man who has tasted the fruits of an earned reward?
Lao-tzu. “Chapter Fifty”. Tao Te Ching; An Authentic Taoist Translation, translated by John Bright-Fey, Sweetwater Press, 2014. p.99
