Chapter 29

Commentary::

This chapter inspires many of the Xiang Er precepts and particularly Xiang Er Mandate 8 on restraint and Mandate 9 on non-aggression. Heshang Gong calls this chapter, “How to Do Nothing.”

When we hold the false view that we are a separate self, apart from the world, a compulsion to “fix” arises. Ironically, it is this aggressive struggle that creates our sense of separation. Therefore, Laozi says that struggling to reshape the world inevitably fails. Let’s face it, nothing we have ever accomplished can really be called our own accomplishment. When we hold false views, all endeavors fail and failure brings conflicting emotions. The compulsive struggle to control is the basis of all our difficulties and all of our pain. When we participate in the real (cultivate Da), control is not an issue. Why is this? For the world is a sacred ritual vessel that cannot be manipulated. The world, as a thing, is a vessel for ritual’-a processional ritual of the ancestors whose scale and continuity is beyond comprehension. For this reason, it cannot be manip-ulated. Fate is a flow of qi that tangles and disentangles according to its own naturalness. It is our relative condition.

The Xiang Er commentary on this chapter says two things in reference to “control.” First, it says that fate gives dominion to kings, but this does not mean that they have control. In order to express their fate, those in power, like those without, must cultivate Dao. Second, it refers to the “processional” or astrological flow of events that mysteriously express a cosmic level of “con-trol.” The implication here for the orthodox Daoist tradition is that calculation and subordination in relationship to the Great Procession? may be called truly cultivating Dao. But this suggestion also warns that any effort to manipulate the Great Procession through forced interpretation? (fortune telling) will bring on disaster. The Daoist practice of astrology is thus seen as a synchronization of practice (resolving fate), not for the forced acquisition of advantage (creat ing fate/action).

Tamper with it and you invite ruin. If control is not possible, what is th result of our effort to control? All effort is bollix. All of our striving and strug gling simply produces more striving and struggling. All of our digging on! ruins the natural garden.

Well, if we cannot lead it, can we hang on to its tail? Grasp for it and it slip away. Controlling and clinging are both impossible. Meddling and resistin change generate discomfort and nothing else.

What inspires this meddling and clinging? If we do not remain with our natural state, we easily imagine our relative condition: a self and world all tangled up and in need of fixing. The fact is, beings and the world naturally advance and then fall behind; naturally blow hot, and then cold; are naturally strong and weak; fresh and then decayed. The ups and downs or “story” we observe as a self in the world is, in fact, the relative condition. This relative condition is none other than the expression of the natural condition. Being flustered or delighted and then meddling or clinging is just part of the relative condition-an uncomfortable part.

Laozi’s tells us, therefore, that Adepts have no compulsive need to do and improve. If we clearly see our relative condition, we can be responsive without being compulsive. We are not driven by the overly focused need to improve (desire). Once this misunderstanding is settled, our gi is returned to us, not ransomed to aggression. For, indeed, any false vision of self-and-world demands such aggression. Therefore, they (Adepts) do not cultivate power or search for an absolute. Here, “searching for the absolute” means shifting one’s desire/compulsion from ordinary life to the spiritual path. Most religious/spir-itual traditions recommended some sort of “moral improvement,” a change in behavior that adjusts the relative condition.4 Implied in Laozi is the fact that the relative condition is just as natural as the natural condition. The need to internally or spiritually “improve” is not called for. Preferences are neither rejected nor aspired to. Adepts experience their lives as both relative and natural conditions. These two are not “two.” They are inseparable.

Footnotes::

1. ding
2. the 28 constellations/almanac astrology
3. Here divination has nothing to do with a Divine.
4. See Section 3, Xiang Er Mandates + Precepts on page 217.