The Last to Comment Wins

[Tempokai]

/ᐠ｡ꞈ｡ᐟ\

Huizi said to Zhuangzi, “The King of Wei gave me a seed from a huge gourd. I plant it and the fruit ripened into gourds that weighed half a ton. I used one for a sauce jug and it was too heavy to lift; I split another into a ladle and there was no room in the house to set it down. It isn’t that their size wasn’t wonderful, but I saw they were useless so I smashed them to pieces.” Zhuangzi said, “You are certainly clumsy when it comes to making use of what is big! There was once a man from Song who was skilled at making ointment for chapped hands. For generations, his family had made their living by washing raw silk. A traveler happened to hear of it and offered to purchase the formula for a hundred catties of gold. The man called his family into conference and said, ‘For generations we’ve made our living washing silk and never earned more than a few pieces gold. Now we can sell our formula and earn a hundred catties of gold in an instant. Let’s give it to him!’ Once the traveler had the formula, he went to the court of Wu to persuade the king to use it in dealing with his troublesome neighbor state of Yue. The king put him in command of his forces to engage Yue’s navy in a midwinter river battle and the forces of Yue were routed. The King of Wu carved a slice from his newly gained territory and rewarded the traveler with a fief. The traveler and the silk washer were alike in possessing the formula of preventing chapped hands; one used it to gain a fief, the other to wash silk – it was in the use of the thing that they differed. “Now you have a half-ton gourd: why didn’t you think of making it into a big boat and sailing the rivers and lakes, instead of worrying about having room in the house to set it down? Really – your mind is no better than a tumbleweed!”

 

[Shiriru_B]

/ᐠ｡ꞈ｡ᐟ\

 

[Tempokai]

/ᐠ｡ꞈ｡ᐟ\

1.6 Huizi’s ailanthus tree

Huizi said to Zhuangzi, “I have a huge tree of the type people call an ailanthus. The main trunk is gnarled and knotted from the root up, you can’t align it with a plumb line, and the branches are all so twisted and bent that no compass or square can mark them. Even if it were growing by the roadside no passing carpenter would think of using it. Now, your words are just as big and useless, so everyone spurns them too!” Zhuangzi said, “Have you ever observed the wildcat? It crouches concealed and waits for its prey to wander in range – then it springs left or right, heedless of heights and chasms. And yet wildcats spring our traps and die in our nets. Or take the yak, big as a cloud hung from the sky – it’s skilled at being huge, but it can’t even catch a rat. Now you have this big tree but its uselessness is a trouble to you. Why don’t you plant it in the village of Nothing-at-All or the plain of BroadVoid and amble beside it doing nothing at all, or wander free and easy lying asleep beneath it? No ax will ever cut short its life, nothing will ever harm it. If there’s no use for it, what hardship could ever befall it?”

 

[Shiriru_B]

/ᐠ｡ꞈ｡ᐟ\

 

[BearlyAlive]

.wins comment to last The

 

[Tempokai]

.wins comment to last The

2.6: On the relativity of assertion and denial
There is nothing that is not a “that”; there is nothing that is not a “this.” One cannot see oneself as a “that,” but if one knows oneself, one knows what it is to be an other. That is why it is said, “That arises from this, and this also relies on a that.” This is the explanation of how this and that are born in the same instant. However, “The instant one is born one is dying” – and the instant one dies one is being born; the instant we allow we prohibit; the instant we prohibit we allow; to rely on what we assert is to rely on what we deny; to rely on what we deny is to rely on what we assert. So the Sage does not proceed by this path. He lays all open to the light of heaven – and yet saying this is also to assert a “this is so.”

 

[Shiriru_B]

/ᐠ｡ꞈ｡ᐟ\

 

[Tempokai]

/ᐠ｡ꞈ｡ᐟ\

2.8: Dividing through assertion; uniting through practice

“Allowable” lies in allowing; “unallowable” lies in not allowing. A dao is created as we walk it; things become so as they are referred to. Wherein are they so? In being affirmed as so. Wherein are they not so? In being denied as so. Things inherently are in some way so, things inherently are in some way allowable. There is no thing that is not so, no thing that is not allowable. We contrive an asserted “this is so” and distinguish a stalk from a pillar, a leper from the beauty Xi Shi. But with the grandness of the bizarre, the Dao comprehends them together as one. When the one is divided, things are brought to completion, and in being brought to completion, the one is destroyed. When things are not subject to completion or destruction, they are once again comprehended as one. Only the man of attainment knows how to comprehend them as one. He asserts no “this is so.” His assertion is lodged in ordinary practice. Ordinary practice means use; use is comprehension; to comprehend is to grasp – once you grasp it, you’re nearly there! Reliance on assertion ends, and when it ends and you do not even know it is so – that is called dao.

 

[Shiriru_B]

2.8: Dividing through assertion; uniting through practice

“Allowable” lies in allowing; “unallowable” lies in not allowing. A dao is created as we walk it; things become so as they are referred to. Wherein are they so? In being affirmed as so. Wherein are they not so? In being denied as so. Things inherently are in some way so, things inherently are in some way allowable. There is no thing that is not so, no thing that is not allowable. We contrive an asserted “this is so” and distinguish a stalk from a pillar, a leper from the beauty Xi Shi. But with the grandness of the bizarre, the Dao comprehends them together as one. When the one is divided, things are brought to completion, and in being brought to completion, the one is destroyed. When things are not subject to completion or destruction, they are once again comprehended as one. Only the man of attainment knows how to comprehend them as one. He asserts no “this is so.” His assertion is lodged in ordinary practice. Ordinary practice means use; use is comprehension; to comprehend is to grasp – once you grasp it, you’re nearly there! Reliance on assertion ends, and when it ends and you do not even know it is so – that is called dao.

/ᐠ｡ꞈ｡ᐟ\... *nods* You could start a cult following with this one.

 

[Tempokai]

/ᐠ｡ꞈ｡ᐟ\... *nods* You could start a cult following with this one.

(it already is, and it's called Daoism lmao. I'm just reading Zhuangzi and copy and pasting whatever I'm reading and analyzing right now.)

2.10: Transcending perfection and imperfection

The knowledge of the ancients reached the limit. What was the limit? There were those who believed that no thing had yet begun to be. The limit! Exhausted! Nothing to add! The next believed there was something, but there had not yet begun to be boundaries. The next believed there were boundaries, but there had not yet begun to be an affirmable “this” or deniable “that.” It is in the patterns of affirmation and denial that a dao becomes imperfect. The source of this imperfection is what brings to perfection attachment. But after all, is there perfection and imperfection or is there not? Let us say that there is perfection and imperfection. This is like the master lute player Zhao Wen playing the lute.

Let us say that there is truly neither perfection nor imperfection. This would be like the master lute player Zhao not playing the lute. Zhao Wen playing the lute, Music Master Kuang beating the time, Hui Shi leaning on the wutong tree: the knowledge of these three men was close to perfection. It flourished in them, and they bore their knowledge to the end of their days. Only, different from others in their love of their knowledge, from love of their knowledge came a wish to enlighten others. But they enlightened others by means of that which was not the means of enlightenment, and thus Hui Shi ended with the darkness of logical disputations, and in the case of Zhao Wen, in the end his own son was left with merely the strings of the lute. And so, in the end, these masters achieved no perfection after all. If what they achieved was perfection, then even I have perfection. And if such as they cannot be said to have achieved perfection, then neither have I nor has any thing.

Thus the Sage sees by the glimmer of chaos and doubt. He does not affirm of anything: “this is it”; his affirmation is lodged in ordinary practice. This is to view things in the light.

 

[DarkCosmos]

??

 

[Tempokai]

??

2.11: An experiment in different levels of language

Now I am about to make a statement. I don’t know whether it is in the same category as assertions that are so or not in the same category as assertions that are so. “Being in the same category” and “not being in the same category” both belong to a single category type, hence the statement is actually no different from its contrary. Nevertheless, let me state it. There is that which has begun; there is that which has not yet begun to begin; there is that which has not yet begun to begin to begin. There is that which is; there is that which is not; there that which has not yet begun to be that which is not; there is that which has not yet begun to begin to be that which is not. Suddenly, there is that which is not, but I don’t yet know whether being that which is not is being or not being. Now I have said something, but I don’t yet know whether what I have said has actually said anything or whether it has actually not said anything.

 

[Shiriru_B]

(it already is, and it's called Daoism lmao. I'm just reading Zhuangzi and copy and pasting whatever I'm reading and analyzing right now.)

2.10: Transcending perfection and imperfection

The knowledge of the ancients reached the limit. What was the limit? There were those who believed that no thing had yet begun to be. The limit! Exhausted! Nothing to add! The next believed there was something, but there had not yet begun to be boundaries. The next believed there were boundaries, but there had not yet begun to be an affirmable “this” or deniable “that.” It is in the patterns of affirmation and denial that a dao becomes imperfect. The source of this imperfection is what brings to perfection attachment. But after all, is there perfection and imperfection or is there not? Let us say that there is perfection and imperfection. This is like the master lute player Zhao Wen playing the lute.

Let us say that there is truly neither perfection nor imperfection. This would be like the master lute player Zhao not playing the lute. Zhao Wen playing the lute, Music Master Kuang beating the time, Hui Shi leaning on the wutong tree: the knowledge of these three men was close to perfection. It flourished in them, and they bore their knowledge to the end of their days. Only, different from others in their love of their knowledge, from love of their knowledge came a wish to enlighten others. But they enlightened others by means of that which was not the means of enlightenment, and thus Hui Shi ended with the darkness of logical disputations, and in the case of Zhao Wen, in the end his own son was left with merely the strings of the lute. And so, in the end, these masters achieved no perfection after all. If what they achieved was perfection, then even I have perfection. And if such as they cannot be said to have achieved perfection, then neither have I nor has any thing.

Thus the Sage sees by the glimmer of chaos and doubt. He does not affirm of anything: “this is it”; his affirmation is lodged in ordinary practice. This is to view things in the light.

I just checked and I just found out Daoism is the same as Taoism, can't believe I didn't get the connection since I thought Daoism is more of a fictional concept.

 

[Navillus]

1346 nya-nya~

 

[Tempokai]

2.14: Escaping the infinite regress of adjudication

Now let’s say that you and I debate. If you prevail over me and I do not prevail over you, does that mean that what you say is so and what I say is not? If I prevail over you and you do not prevail over me, does that mean that what I say is so and what you say is not? Or is it that one of us is right and one of us wrong? Or are both of us right or both of us wrong? If you and I are both unable to know, then others will become muddled as we are.

Whom shall we call upon to put it right? Shall we call upon one who agrees with you? But if he agrees with you, how can he put it right? Shall we call upon one who agrees with me? But if he agrees with me, how can he put it right? Shall we call upon one who differs with both you and me? But if he differs with both you and me, how can he put it right? Shall we call upon one who agrees with both you and me? But if he agrees with both you and me, how can he put it right?

Thus you and I and these others all cannot know – shall we await yet another? Harmonize all of these by the horizon of heaven. Relying on it to stretch forward is the way to live out your full lifespan; forgetting the years, forgetting all judgments, stirring within the boundless.

What do I mean by the horizon of heaven? It is to say, assert what is not true; affirm what is not so. Were what is true so different from what is false, there would be no arguments; were what is so that different from what is not, there would be no arguments. The mutual dependence of shifting voices is the same as if they were not mutually dependent.

Therefore lodge all this in the boundless.

 

[Shiriru_B]

/ᐠ｡ꞈ｡ᐟ\

 

[JayMark]

I can't read.

 

[Tempokai]

I can't read.

3.2 The tale of Cook Ding
Cook Ding was carving an ox carcass for Lord Wenhui. With each touch of his hand, heave of his shoulder, step of his feet, thrust of his knee – whop! whish! – he wielded his knife with a whoosh, and every move was in rhythm. It was as though he were performing the Dance of the Mulberry Grove or keeping to the beat of the Constant Source music.

“Ah, marvelous!” said Lord Wenhui. “Surely this is the acme of skill!”

Cook Ding laid down his knife and replied, “What your servant loves, my lord, is the Dao, and that is a step beyond skill.

“At the beginning, when I first began carving up oxen, all I could see was the whole carcass. After three years I could no longer see the carcass whole, and now I meet it with my spirit and don’t look with my eyes. Perception and understanding cease and spirit moves as it will. I follow the natural form: slicing the major joints I guide the knife through the big hollows, and by conforming to the inherent contours, no vessels or tendons or tangles of sinews – much less the big bones – block my blade in the least.

“A good cook changes his knife once a year, but this is mere slicing. An ordinary cook changes his knife once a month, because he hacks. I’ve been using this knife now for nineteen years; it has carved thousands of oxen, yet the blade is as sharp as one fresh off the grindstone.
You see, there are gaps between these joints, but the blade edge has no thickness. If a knife with no thickness moves into a gap, then it’s wide as need be and the blade wanders freely with plenty of leeway. That’s why after nineteen years the blade of my knife is as sharp as one fresh off the
grindstone.

“But nevertheless, whenever a tangled knot lies ahead, I spot the challenge and on the alert I focus my sight and slow down my hand – then I flick the blade with the slightest of moves, and before you know it the carcass has fallen apart like earth crumbling to the ground. I stand with
knife raised and face all four directions in turn, prancing in place with complete satisfaction. Then I wipe off the knife and put it away.”

“How fine!” said Lord Wenhui. “Listening to the words of Cook Ding, I have learned how to nurture life!”

 

[JayMark]

Good thing I can't read or I'd be really angry right now.

 

[Hoshino]

372,930 years of time loop.