A few little things and something about Tao-Te Ching.
So school is keeping me busy. I have a ton of things to blog about, but I think they are going to have to wait until after this Friday, when my SIP is due. Currently I only have... 26 of 50 pages written? No fear, my non-existent ones, I have great typing capabilities, and all my research is done, so all I am doing is dragging the stupid information out of my head and plopping it down on paper. I got a good chunk written in the library earlier today, and figure if I head there again tomorrow I could probably do a bunch more, but I need to get a bunch done tonight, too. My goal is to have at least another ten pages done by the end of tonight, and I am willing to do about anything to reach that. Currently, my plan is to write out the stuff I don't need my research in front of me for, so that when I get to the library it turns into mostly just filling in the gaps. I also need to update my Works Cited, scan the artwork, scan the original books as necessary, write up my observation notes from the last two conventions, and write my appendix with the terminology and background information... but one step at a time.
This past week I got a lot of reading and watching done. I look forward to being done with my SIP so I can write a little bit about my impressions of various things that I have been watching, as well as reading. I also need to get my tablet fixed so I can access my study information for Japanese. All of this in due time. I also look forward to going "hunting" again so I can try and find some more of the Arashi videos without joining aibakaland, simply because I don't really know how much I want to be surrounded by people obsessed with any one thing again. It can do bad things to my mind and it reinforces obsession in my mind in ways that are definitely not healthy. I intend to better moderate my obsessiveness than I did when I was in middle school now, so... yea. LJ communities if I can. They seem a little less scary.
Anyway, Te-Tao Ching, as promised. I intended to take the time to write up a separate entry on Chinese literature, but I thought that because of my recent time constraints I may not get back to it until most of it has already slipped my mind. In response to this fear, I have decided to simply share with you the journal entry I handed in to my professor on the subject.
So here we go. I entitled this journal "Old Thoughts"
Te-Tao Ching is a confusing first read, though I admit that I think I may have been blessed by a specific edge in having read a similar text before (which I will discuss in a moment). While it is certainly not Gospel truth, I find that it has very interesting patterns in it, a lot of which can be applied by a Christian thinker. One of my favorite quotes might just be “If you’re brave in being daring, you’ll be killed; if you’re brave in not being daring, you’ll live” (Te, Chapter 73). This quote indicates two contradictory ways of being-one in which you are brave through taking action and the other through submission or wading through action. This implies that there is, of course, a time to do both, and that confusing the two can be rather disastrous.
I have dog-eared multiple passages in this book for some form of rethinking later, which I hope to use to develop some semi-concrete impression of the book. Most of them were quote which I found interesting, such as “The Sage accumulates nothing. Having used what he had for others, he has even more. Having given what he had to others, what he has is greater.” (Te, Chapter 81) This reminds me of the teachings of Christ which maintain not to store for ourselves treasures on earth, and the regulations given to the Church for caring for the widows, orphans, poor, and members of their community-which were what James deemed to be “true religion.” The use of one’s resources denotes one’s true heart-the love one has for money should not overrule the love that one has for others or for God.
Besides the things which I just found interesting or enlightening or wise, I also found myself tracing similarities between Te-Tao Ching and another old book of Asian philosophy I have read, The Book of the Five Rings, which is a Japanese text written by a martial arts instructor for his students that has been since applied to business and personal relations because of its roots. It is very likely that the author of that text (Miyamoto Musashi) was familiar with this text and Confucius’ Analectics. I wanted to draw attention to two particular texts-one from each source-which caused me to connect the two:
“The Way is empty; yet when you use it, you never need fill it again. Like an abyss! It seems to be the ancestor of the ten thousand things.” (Tao, Chapter 4).
See also the whole of Tao, Chapter 34 (which is also explicated in the introduction to my copy of the book) for a further understanding of “The Way.”
Now for contrast, there is the final book in the Miyamoto text which is on “The Void.” The Book of the Five Rings is split into five separate books, each indicating a specific school of thought in strategy-earth, water, fire, wind (tradition), and void. The Way of the Void (“way” incidentally is actually the Japanese word 道 or “michi” which means path in a figurative sense, indicating a continuous journey, as opposed to “machi” which indicates a road or street as in a literal sense-michi is a way of life) is described as:
“where there is nothing or any form. Man cannot have knowledge of this because it is nothing. Since we have knowledge of what is, we therefore know what is not. That is the void. People sometimes think that which they do not understand is the void. This is not true. This is confusion. … When your mind is clear, and there are no clouds of confusion, this is the true void. Before you understand the True Void, you may think you have gained understanding either through Buddhism or through everyday thought. When you realize the true Way, you will understand each of us sees the various ways through different eyes. Seeing these other ways is to reject the true way. Make sure you base your practice on a wide foundation…this way you will understand the Void as the Way, and you will see the Way as the Void. The Void is good, and contains no evil.”
While I have not really expounded on this subject (nor really have the time to do so in a journal) I found that these two descriptions of “The Way” and “The Void” were strikingly similar and yet strikingly different. Part of this I am sure is related to the time period (168 B.C. versus 1643 A.D.) and different cultures, but there is still a similar trend in seeing this somewhat difficult to grasp thing which is true life and true knowledge, this true path, which is beyond comprehension and somewhat infinite. If one is to study and to view the world in multiple angles, they are under the impression that an ultimate Truth would be which is only identifiable as its true, pure self. In a way we consider something similar, only God has given us a specific revelation so that we aren’t stumbling around in the philosophical dark trying to find him. Incidentally, I checked the kanji written in the Chinese text for “The Way” and it is the same character as used by the Japanese for the Miyamoto text. I find this significant. I have an overwhelming desire to spend time unwinding these two texts now. Gaaah! I shouldn’t have started this train of thought. Now I can’t get off it.
Arigatou and off I go to SIP land now.
This past week I got a lot of reading and watching done. I look forward to being done with my SIP so I can write a little bit about my impressions of various things that I have been watching, as well as reading. I also need to get my tablet fixed so I can access my study information for Japanese. All of this in due time. I also look forward to going "hunting" again so I can try and find some more of the Arashi videos without joining aibakaland, simply because I don't really know how much I want to be surrounded by people obsessed with any one thing again. It can do bad things to my mind and it reinforces obsession in my mind in ways that are definitely not healthy. I intend to better moderate my obsessiveness than I did when I was in middle school now, so... yea. LJ communities if I can. They seem a little less scary.
Anyway, Te-Tao Ching, as promised. I intended to take the time to write up a separate entry on Chinese literature, but I thought that because of my recent time constraints I may not get back to it until most of it has already slipped my mind. In response to this fear, I have decided to simply share with you the journal entry I handed in to my professor on the subject.
So here we go. I entitled this journal "Old Thoughts"
Te-Tao Ching is a confusing first read, though I admit that I think I may have been blessed by a specific edge in having read a similar text before (which I will discuss in a moment). While it is certainly not Gospel truth, I find that it has very interesting patterns in it, a lot of which can be applied by a Christian thinker. One of my favorite quotes might just be “If you’re brave in being daring, you’ll be killed; if you’re brave in not being daring, you’ll live” (Te, Chapter 73). This quote indicates two contradictory ways of being-one in which you are brave through taking action and the other through submission or wading through action. This implies that there is, of course, a time to do both, and that confusing the two can be rather disastrous.
I have dog-eared multiple passages in this book for some form of rethinking later, which I hope to use to develop some semi-concrete impression of the book. Most of them were quote which I found interesting, such as “The Sage accumulates nothing. Having used what he had for others, he has even more. Having given what he had to others, what he has is greater.” (Te, Chapter 81) This reminds me of the teachings of Christ which maintain not to store for ourselves treasures on earth, and the regulations given to the Church for caring for the widows, orphans, poor, and members of their community-which were what James deemed to be “true religion.” The use of one’s resources denotes one’s true heart-the love one has for money should not overrule the love that one has for others or for God.
Besides the things which I just found interesting or enlightening or wise, I also found myself tracing similarities between Te-Tao Ching and another old book of Asian philosophy I have read, The Book of the Five Rings, which is a Japanese text written by a martial arts instructor for his students that has been since applied to business and personal relations because of its roots. It is very likely that the author of that text (Miyamoto Musashi) was familiar with this text and Confucius’ Analectics. I wanted to draw attention to two particular texts-one from each source-which caused me to connect the two:
“The Way is empty; yet when you use it, you never need fill it again. Like an abyss! It seems to be the ancestor of the ten thousand things.” (Tao, Chapter 4).
See also the whole of Tao, Chapter 34 (which is also explicated in the introduction to my copy of the book) for a further understanding of “The Way.”
Now for contrast, there is the final book in the Miyamoto text which is on “The Void.” The Book of the Five Rings is split into five separate books, each indicating a specific school of thought in strategy-earth, water, fire, wind (tradition), and void. The Way of the Void (“way” incidentally is actually the Japanese word 道 or “michi” which means path in a figurative sense, indicating a continuous journey, as opposed to “machi” which indicates a road or street as in a literal sense-michi is a way of life) is described as:
“where there is nothing or any form. Man cannot have knowledge of this because it is nothing. Since we have knowledge of what is, we therefore know what is not. That is the void. People sometimes think that which they do not understand is the void. This is not true. This is confusion. … When your mind is clear, and there are no clouds of confusion, this is the true void. Before you understand the True Void, you may think you have gained understanding either through Buddhism or through everyday thought. When you realize the true Way, you will understand each of us sees the various ways through different eyes. Seeing these other ways is to reject the true way. Make sure you base your practice on a wide foundation…this way you will understand the Void as the Way, and you will see the Way as the Void. The Void is good, and contains no evil.”
While I have not really expounded on this subject (nor really have the time to do so in a journal) I found that these two descriptions of “The Way” and “The Void” were strikingly similar and yet strikingly different. Part of this I am sure is related to the time period (168 B.C. versus 1643 A.D.) and different cultures, but there is still a similar trend in seeing this somewhat difficult to grasp thing which is true life and true knowledge, this true path, which is beyond comprehension and somewhat infinite. If one is to study and to view the world in multiple angles, they are under the impression that an ultimate Truth would be which is only identifiable as its true, pure self. In a way we consider something similar, only God has given us a specific revelation so that we aren’t stumbling around in the philosophical dark trying to find him. Incidentally, I checked the kanji written in the Chinese text for “The Way” and it is the same character as used by the Japanese for the Miyamoto text. I find this significant. I have an overwhelming desire to spend time unwinding these two texts now. Gaaah! I shouldn’t have started this train of thought. Now I can’t get off it.
Arigatou and off I go to SIP land now.