Bestowing favor and disgrace seems to startle;
Treasure and trouble seem like the body.
Why say bestowing favor and disgrace seems to startle?
Bestowing favor supports the low.
Gain seems to startle; Loss seems to startle.
This says bestowing favor and disgrace seems to startle.Why say treasure and trouble seem like a body?
I, as a result, have great suffering; this means I have a body,
Come the time I have no body, I have what trouble?
Hence, regarding the body as precious supports all under heaven,
Seems worthy of trust for all under heaven.
Taking care in use of the body supports all under heaven
Seems worthy of holding in the palm of the hand, all under heaven.~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Word for Word
Limits: Translations, even the nearly literal one above, lose some of the original meaning due to the cultural context of contemporary words. Studying the numerous synonym-like meanings of the Chinese characters in the Word-for-Word translation mitigates this. (Click graphic at right for on-line Word-for-Word.)
Third Pass: Chapter of the Month
Archive: Characters and past commentary
Corrections?
None this time
Reflections:
Bestowing favor and disgrace seems to startle…
Gain seems to startle; Loss seems to startle.
Favor, disgrace, gain and loss all ‘stress’ the nervous system, or as this chapter has it, startle. Of course, we seek the more pleasant stress that favor and gain invoke, and seek to avoid the painful stress that disgrace and loss invoke. The reality is, these two poles are linked. In giving myself to one side, I inherit the other side. Yet, I hold on to the illusion that I can win the one and somehow avoid the other. This seems all quite natural. Such a bias toward favor and gain help ensure an animal does all it can to survive in the wild. The only hitch here is that I’m not living in the wild!
The biological realities of life make circumstance of gain and loss inevitable. More importantly, instinct drives us toward gains we feel favorable and drives us to avoid losses we feel detrimental. The more deeply I face the inevitability of this survival push pull, the easier it is to take it in stride.
Civilization’s core objective has always been to make life more comfortable and secure. This means maximizing gain and favor (a.k.a., favorable circumstances), and minimizing loss and disgrace (a.k.a, adverse circumstances). That is why we traded our ancestral hunting and gathering ways for the food security of agriculture and animal husbandry once we figured out how to do them (see The Tradeoff). Favor and gain underpin our quest for comfort and security. Given this backdrop, I imagine that disgrace and loss are even more stressful than they would be in ancestral times. Indeed, some have come to expect favor and gain as a ‘God given right’, so to speak. Such expectations only serve to augment the stress that gain and loss evoke. (See Science Proves Buddha Right! and Is Gen Y Unhappy?)
Perhaps this feels somewhat ironic or paradoxical, especially if you believe in ‘progress’ — maximizing comfort and security. As chapter 78 says, Straight and honest words seem inside out, or as D.C. Lau translates this, Straightforward words, Seem paradoxical.
Why say treasure and trouble seem like a body?
I, as a result, have great suffering; this means I have a body,
Come the time I have no body, I have what trouble?
This reminds me of Buddha’s First Noble Truth:
I don’t know whether Buddha was referring to all living creatures when he observed this. At any rate, I see this and his other truths as pertaining to all life. (See Buddha’s Truths Pertain To All Life).
It can be hard to perceive this because we tune into other people’s reality, or rather the outward appearance (the fantasy) that they and we aspire to. It is an illusion. The sorrow is universal, which is the last ‘story’ we wish to hear. We love any story that promises a way to avoid the painful losses in life (i.e., loss ≈ death), and maximize our chances for gain and favor (i.e., gain ≈ survival). Ironically, that further exasperates the suffering stresses than gain, loss, favor and disgrace impart.
Thanks so much for the words. It is funny how seeing the word “Sorrow” evokes a different feeling than the word I am used to, “Suffering”. As I am older, sorrow seems to fit better, but when I look at younger people suffering seems to be more appropriate. Nevertheless, thank you for sharing.