Why do you think Taoism hasn't caught on as much in the west?

Thank you Zombiewolf. I am glad someone around here appreciates them. Geeeze!

Just kidding. But seriously I thank you for your appreciation. With your work in Japanese martial arts and your study in Buddhism, have you read my posts on Shinto?

You do bring up a good point though. And this does relate somewhat to what The Earth said. There is a potential for misunderstanding because of the age of the writing. Then too, there is a cultural context that has been lost to time.

I am very fascinated with Chapter 6, in which it refers to the Spirit of the Valley---the Chinese is literally 'Valley God.' There is potentially a spiritual reference here that some or much of the context has been lost to time. Then there is the problem of how we divorce the philosophical Taoism from the institutional Taoism of the masses. This leaves room for a potential misunderstanding of references.

For example, the concept of the sage-----this was more than an ancient wise man or a king-----In some writings I have come accross things that hint more of a shaman-god of the Chinese Golden Age who still influences our life and reality today.

But then these are issues that confront the scholar of every scripture, including the Bible. More significantly is the fact that Chinese is structurally a vague language compared to English. The language leaves out a fair amount of meaning that is contextually understood, where in English we have to state it.

Just above the picture of my signature is the last few lines of one of my favorite Chinese poems, Searching and not finding the Master, by Chia Tao (779-843). It is also the title of an Alan Watts book, and he tells about the poem in one of his first chapters.

My favorite translation of the poem goes something like this,

I asked the boy under the pines,
"The master has gone picking mushrooms"
Up in the mountains
Cloud hidden,
Whereabouts unknown.

The Chinese literally states that he has gone to find 'medicine.' But one of the elixers of the ancients was a purple colored fungus, which was considered to have the same yin as that produced by a female during orgasm, and was therefore said to promote long life. I guess I have also seen medicine, in the poem, translated as herbs this works too.

The original Chinese uses the Chinese characters, cloud and deep for cloud hidden. Literally it would be, Clouds deep, unknown whereabouts.

Here is another translation of the same poem:

Beneath the pines, I asked the boy,
"The master has gone in search of simples"
He's on the mountain over there:
Clouds so thick, I can't tell where.

The meaning is essentially the same----but you can see how the nuance, and even certain meanings can change. So I definitely agree with Zombiewolf---look at different translations. I have several myself. And if you are real serious----learn some Chinese for even more insight. Even if you can't read it like a Chinese scholar whose mother tongue is Chinese (like those that Zombiewolf wrote of) it still provides some insight as this poem should show. I can get a little bit of new insight by reading the Tao Te Ching (as best I can) in Chinese, and I am not very fluent in Chinese----in fact, I learned the Chinese characters through Japanese, and some of the characters have a slightly different meaning in Japanese than Chinese.

I grew up in Arvada and Westminster, I spent most of the 80's and over half of the 90's overseas. But I'll send your profile a message on that...

 

PS: If anyone wants to try reading the Tao Te Ching in Chinese (or if you want to wade through it with a Chinese character dictionary) here is one of my favorites:

Lao Tzu: "My words are very easy to understand." Lectures on the Tao Te Ching by Man-jan Cheng, It is published by North Atlantic Books, Richmond, California (because when you think of California---you think of the North Atlantic).

This book has the Chinese on the left page, and English on the right page. The characters are printed and therefore easy to read (Unlike the fancy versions of the Tao Te Ching where you have the characters written in calligraphy over a photo of a nature scene). It uses the older non-simplified characters which are easier for me to read, but if you are using a dictionary, you will want to make sure it is not a dictionary of the simplified characters.

Then of course each chapter has a short lecture in both Chinese and English. The Tao Te Ching is written in large bold type in Chinese, and the lecture in smaller type, so it will be easy for you to tell which characters are of the Tao Te Ching.

It might interest people to know that Chinese characters were invented by fortune tellers, as they tried to divine the future by examining the cracks in bone and tortoise shell. They drew pictures on these shells and bones which represented a mystical spiritual (ie archetypical) symbol of its meaning. So Chinese writing itself started with a magical power (actually most alphabets and writing systems did, but...)

 

Here is something that I got to thinking about---kind of mirroring some of the comments in this thread----As a spiritual tradition to follow---do many of you find it kind of abstract? A philosophy or way of thinking without traditions to cement it into a practice, or viable belief system?

There are traditions of meditation and what not---but that may not be for some of you. If you are simply reading the Tao Te Ching, perhaps that is not enough. Perhaps you need to gain an understanding of the Taoism of the common people as well. This would give the philosophical Taoism more of a cultural context, perhaps more of a sense of its animistic roots. That doesn't mean you have to redecorate your home on the principals of Feng Suei, or set up an alter to the three Gods of luck, Long Life and Prosperity.

But understanding the concepts behind these things, and the I-Ching, Chinese medicine and astrology and so forth, may give one more understanding, giving the philosophy more substance---making it more easy to embrace.

On the other hand---what is wrong with a Taoist altar in your house?----you could insist that any Jehovah Witnesses that come over, bow down before it with you, before you discuss anything with them.

 

Good Idea...

I recommend Chi Kung as a way to explore some Taoist practices in a more physical way.
It is kind of a " Taoist Yoga"

If you dig deep enough, you may discover some esoteric exercises like forcing "Chi' into your nads, or lifting weights with your pecker!

ZW

 

Not sure if this will be agreed but I believe that the main reason philosophical Taoism has not caught on in the west is that westerners typically are out to get all they can out of a religion quick and easy. A prime example of this is christianity. All you have to do is accept Christ and you're gaurunteed heaven, you can study on and on after that but as long as you've accepted him you're in. Many people do not understand that spiritual enlightenment takes time to reach. Its not a fast food joint. As such more spiritual philosophies are often ignored in the West because of this. Perhaps I'm wrong but this theory makes the most sense to me personally.

 

Indy, I was raised southern baptist, and I don't know about you, but I was told that every other belief or religion was "THE DEVIL!!!"
By the time I was 8 yrs old I had already decided that religion, parents and most other authority figures were completely full of shit.
The only thing that kept me from leading a completely dissolute life, was one teacher I had in high school. He was a cultural Anthropology professor.

ZW

 

I was adopted at 5 and force fed Christianity untill I finally decided it was all wrong at the age of 15, since then I have done research of several other religions and my thoughts and ideals have changed countless times untill I finally came across Tao which seems to coincide with my theories of life, and the divine quite well.

 

If anyone is interested in Chi Kung, I highly recommend " Universal healing Tao" series by Mantak Chia.
http://www.universal-tao.com/master_chia.html

 

Great idea Zombiewolf---and I think you can find You Tube videos of Taoist monks pulling incredible weight with their peckers too. All kinds of things. It is amazing what can go on in China with this esoteric stuff. I have witnessed some of it first hand, and can tell you that the stuff I saw was no trick. People generating electricity from their own bodies---there was no way to fake that I could see. Or starting fires from the heat gererated by their bodies, and other crazy things.

Indyhippy----I think you hit one of the problems on the head. I like to think that the hippies I grew up with were more serious in their search and appreciated taoism in this way----others were lazy and it was easy to say, "Yeah man, I'm Taoist." when what they were really saying was, "I don't know anything about it, but, no rules? Far out! count me in----now give me another toke."

But that is the issue with organized religion. We let the priests and everyone else be our go-between with the spiritual, so that we can spend all week driving our big cars, screwing our neighbors wives, and cheating to get ahead in life, so that Sunday morning we can go to church, be all good, and make sure that our go-betweens are keeping that part of our life all holy for us.

I'm generallizing of course, not everyone screws their neighbor's wife, I don't. ...oh, wait... ...well---I was younger and more immature then----I was just a kid.
...I mean, I've grown a lot in the past week... (just kidding)

 

Taoism kicks modest ass!

 

for me toaism is a reminder, i study and start to get it, then realize that i should forget it, then i get back into lives dramas and then come back around....kinda like the 'i heart huckabee' dilemma with the ball hitting the face thing, its very true...

I mean i could live completely in the toa, but i get caught up in the human drama, money, family, food, social expectations, clothes, laws, haha.. all of it... then i come back around and find sublimity in a sunset, a flower, a bird or a tree

 

the tao doesn't very well lend itself to what much of the west demands and expects, mistakenly, of belief. its pretty much that simple. this was almost certainly pretty much the case in lao tsu's own place and time as well.

it is the jewel for those who treasure it.
for everyone else, they are welcome to or not as they see fit.

truth doesn't have to catch on. it just is.

complaining seams to be such a major pastime in western thought
that not creating conditions for them to complain about
is somehow unthinkable

i am too easily distracted myself, by annoyance at so many people seem to be this way.

i'm not so sure it is all that uniquely 'western'. but then all i know of anything non-'western' is what i read about it.

capitolism almost precludes 'getting it', but maoism, i think, did also.

i doubt the very much of china understands the tao. maybe a few places in nepal, maybe a few in india, maybe a few in japan, maybe none anywhere, just a few isolated individuals in all places, recognize that nothing that exists needs for us to impose names on it for itself, only for our own convenience and often self deception.