The Mountain Tree

Virtue, or intrinsic virtuosity, can come in rather counterintuitive forms. Why is this so? Because, the Taoists suggest, virtues are what powers and properties we each uniquely possess which enable each of us to fit into our unique places in the world—to move in accord and harmony with the Great Course—and that is something about which we can and are often mistaken. After all, there are an infinite number of ways we can be wrong in our conception of ourselves and the universe, but there is only a single, subtle Path which follows the bends and curves of ever-changing Nature.

We are often wrong about our desires, even about our desire for those desires, and especially about the outcomes if said desires are obtained. Thus, what we believe to be virtues are often actually vices; and things that are virtues at one time become vices without our notice. Likewise, things which seem to be vices can turn out to be virtues in the right time, place, and body. This lesson is put into parable early on in the Zhuangzi’s first chapter, “Flying Far and Unfettered” when Zhao himself writes about how the gnarled tree, unfit for carpentry, is left uncut, able to live out its fullest life.

In “The Mountain Tree,” we see this parable told a second time, only with an added layer of complexity which confronts follow-up conundrums:

Zhuangzi was traveling in the mountains when he came upon a huge tree, luxuriantly overgrown with branches and leaves. A woodcutter stopped beside it, but in the end chose not to fell it. Asked the reason, he said, “There is nothing it can be used for.” . . .

When Zhuangzi left the mountains, he lodged for a night at the home of an old friend. His friend was delighted, and ordered a servant to kill a goose for dinner. The servant said, “there is one that can honk and one that cannot. Which should I kill?” The host said, “Kill the one that cannot honk.”

The next day, Zhuangzi’s disciple said to him, “The tree we saw yesterday could live out its natural lifespan because of its worthlessness, while our host’s goose was killed for its worthlessness. What position would you take, Master?”

Zhuangzi said, “I would probably take a position somewhere inbetween worthiness and unworthiness. But though that might look right, it turns out not to be—it still leads to entanglements. It would be another thing entirely to float and drift along, mounted on only the intrinsic powers of the Course—untouched by both praise and blame, now a dragon, now a snake, changing with the times, unwilling to keep any exclusive course of action. Now above, now below, with momentary harmony as your only measure.” (Zhuangzi 157)

Here we see illustrated the idea that there is no thing outside its context—that is to say what constitutes virtue is neither a hard-and-fast rule nor a matter of whim. It, in fact, doesn’t even fall on this spectrum: as is often the case that a more accurate answer requires looking in three and not merely two dimensions.

In the context of surviving a woodcutter, the overgrown, useless, unworthy tree has its virtue in said unworthiness to the woodcutter. In the context of Zhuangzi’s dinner host, it was the worthiness of the honking goose which spared its life.

It was not a matter of a two-dimensional balancing of worthiness or unworthiness, as Zhuang Zhao himself warns against (which I’ve dubbed the fallacy of the middle ground). It was a matter determined by the circumstances of the objective, transcendent universe—a reality to which virtue is to adapt in accordance with—a reality which requires us to constantly revise our maps and models, to continually reconstitute our notions of virtue, of right and wrong. I believe this is what Nietzsche meant when he implored us to go Beyond Good and Evil. And here we return to that deeper dialectic, the conflict between life-affirmation and life-denial.

Now, at this juncture, if we ourselves were disciples of Zhuang Zhao, we might be tempted to ask, “But how do we know when to be life the tree and when not to be like the goose? Or even when to be like neither of these examples?” In a sense, that is the question at the bottom of all ethics, all morality, all thought of “what ought?”

So far, I have but this to offer: remember that from the equalizing standpoint of the transcendent universe that all is one, collapsing everything into nothing. This is the Equalizing Assessment of All Things, and it is the means by which to dissolve all preconceptions. It is likewise a way to open the mind and soul. Thus open, move forward with faith in the Way—by faith, I mean to choose an attitude to love what you encounter, to decide that you will name what comes as good. And what will come will be a product of the objective universe. It will be the Great Course reshaping your now malleable conscious preconceptions.

It is a matter of breaking yourself down so that you can better fit your potential place in being itself. This is atonement. At-one-ment: to be at one.

Zhuangzi. Zhuangzi; The Complete Writings, translated by Brook Ziporyn, Hackett Publishing Company Inc., 2020