Language linking the world and Ideas creating a new world
An article written by way of introducing Professor Pan Shiqiang’s new translation of Laozi’s Scripture On Way and Virtue
Lin Yongqing
Founder of chinavalue.net
Visiting Professor of Beijing Normal University
November 2011
Laozi’s Scripture on Way and Virtue (abbreviated as the Scripture) was the first mammoth philosophical work in Chinese history in the real sense of the term. It took Professor Pan Shiqiang of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences only five days to render it into English, which was first published in Chinavalue.net. This was amazing to me indeed. And the amazement was followed by sincere admiration and respect. As far as I know, it took even modern linguist Lin Yutang who was well-versed in Chinese and Western cultures nearly three years to accomplish translating the work into English.
Professor Pan belongs to the generation of my father. His new version of the classic is but the beginning of our two generations’ gigantic program to introduce Chinese culture into the world and innovate it globally ….
It is a hard job to write this article, not only because of Mr. Pan’s well- done version, but also because of the high accomplishments achieved in the original work. In spite of the difficulties involved, I made up my mind to write it as Professor Pan asked me to --- out of my love for Chinese culture, and above all, out of my sense of mission in innovating it. As culture is the thinking of a nation, its heritage is very important, so is its innovation. On top of these, the 21st century spells the advent of a great axis era, an era of mixing all nations and civilizations together.
Chinese culture, which had once led the world for several millennia, however, began to decline some five hundred years ago, as in the years of remote and immediate modernity. The 21st century bears witness to a raging process of globalization, which coincides with China’s economic-take-off in the past decades, thus offering her another good opportunity to join the innovation of man’s cultures.
At this critical juncture this generation of ours should jump at the opportunity with such courage and sense of mission as “who else but us face the heavy mission?”
What is Laozi’s Scripture on Way and Virtue?
Beginning with the striking sentence, “The Way, if expressed in words, is not the true or eternal Way,” the Scripture was a great masterpiece impacting China and the rest of the world for 2500 years. But what was it after all? Here I would like to offer my personal views on the topic.
To my mind, it was first of all a work on methodology. As early as in the infancy of human cultures it gave a set of great dialectical and paradoxical thinking. To a large extent, ideas are determined by the way of thinking. For example, the oriental way of thinking dominated by holism and intuitional understanding gave birth to oriental cultures, while the Western way of thinking based on restorative and rational theories engendered Western cultures. Compared with Confucianism as represented by Analects, the Scripture had a deeper and stronger appeal of philosophical dialectics. The way of thinking in the Scripture, if further developed in the posterity, would give Chinese genes better access the rational spirit of pursuing after knowledge and truth.
When asked what was the best quality of the Jews, Albert Einstein, who was a Jew himself, replied, “Knowledge for the sake of knowledge!” This was also his main excuse for his rejection of the first presidency of Israel following the restoration of Zionism. Contrarily, the case in ancient China was one of monistic autocracy, which began in the early Han dynasty 220 BC when the empire paid supreme tribute to Confucianism while banning all other schools of thought. Such an approach triggered the premature extermination of almost all schools of thought except Confucianism.
In terms of points of view, I am not against Confucianism. But I am strongly against the autocracy imposed by the posterity on it. More tragically, while the early Han dynasty banned all schools of thought except Confucianism more than 2000 years ago, Confucians of the Song dynasty over 1000 years ago intensified the doctrine to the extreme. The rigid ritual dogmas on monarch and subjects, father and son and on preserving Heavenly principles while killing all human desires and lust raged unchecked. They went so far as to emerge as Confucian orthodoxy and legally instituted authority to serve as state ideology. The Song Confucians even specified the Five Books and Five Classics based exclusively on Confucianism as the only dogma to be followed, making them the only authorized ideas and words in the imperial civil examination system prevailing at the time. “Studying in order to become officials” was said to be the only correct approach for all learners in search of a better life!
The Scripture was also a work on world outlook. In the vocabulary of modern social sciences, it involved all the aspects of world outlook, such as social, political, cultural and economic values, etc., with such ideological depths and widths as if flooding in an ocean or sea of ideologies. From the angle of political sociology it contained the ideas of freedom, equality and general love in infantile Chinese-culture. For example, “engendering all things without owning them, taking action without claiming credits, breeding them without overriding them.” For another example, “The sage is always good at rescuing, and thus never abandons others. He is always good at saving, and thus never wastes anything.” For still another example, “The sage is always selfless, placing the interest of the common people above anything else. I am kind to the kind and the unkind as well: the virtue of kindness. I trust those who are trustworthy as well as the untrustworthy: the virtue of trust.” ….
The Scripture stressed the application of long-term values (the Way). Confucius himself also said, “Metaphysically , my teachings are a doctrine, but physically, they are for application.” But the ultra-pragmatic approach adopted by the posterities regarded Confucianism as an instrument or tool, and no longer as a doctrine, misleading them into caring only for immediate gains without caring for long-term social welfare anymore. Thumbing all over Twenty-Four Histories, few indeed were those who dedicated themselves to the public interest. “Hearing of the Way, those on the upper ladder readily applied it, those on the middle half- believed it, and those on the lower laughed at it. The Way is worthless unless laughed at.” This was a passage from the Scripture describing the various approaches on the Way, all stressing on its application. As a matter of fact, Confucius cherished stronger desire for application of his doctrine. Analects said, “The scholar must show his tenacity without fail, and he has a long way to go.” It even said, “He could die at dusk without regret if he had heard of my doctrine in the morning.” But history teemed with accidentals. The Confucian ruse of imperial domination presented by Dong Zhongshu and his ilk to the throne for the sake of their private interests, coincided with those of the imperial autocratic appeals there and then, fettering the Chinese ideologies for nearly two thousand years!.
What else was the Scripture? Of late, Professor Weng Junyi of Xiamen University department of social sciences offered a new point of view. From the angle of management, “Many scholars regard the classic as a philosophical work, but I think it is a book on strategy, “ he said, In my communication with him, I took notes of his new points of view in his studies on the classic as follows:
1. It involves marginal thinking (rational thinking);
2. Chinese culture stresses on change and Western culture on no change; Orientals stress on holism and Westerners on rehabilitation.
3. We both identify the present era as one of Oriental thinking mixing with Western one. (Actually human culture is inseparable.)
4. Way is laws governing things and virtue, capacity (Weng); Way is the goal, and virtue, value (Lin). There are plenty of studies on the Scripture, including many by famous historians. The article as above presents only some of my personal casual views. They are of course not inclusive of all angles of studies. But my concept is: All dogs, big or small, are entitled to bark.” People of all eras are liable to contribute their innovative views on the basis of the views voiced previously. “Man is as weak as a reed, but weak as he is, he is a thinking reed.” If the contemporaries can only repeat the Confucian ideology as it was without raising their innovative ideas of independent thinking, isn’t it that they have done injustice to the past two millennia?
Culture beginning from language and language blended in culture
In the 25 centuries since pre-Qin dynasty, Chinese culture has seldom made any innovations except in the Tang dynasty when Buddhism from India was innovated into Chan sect of Buddhism in China, and in the Ming dynasty, when Wang Mingyang created theories on knowledge coming from the study of the physical world, starting from psychology.
This had much to do with our cult in authorities. All important works were esteemed as classics, only to be made notes about, not to be surpassed, not to speak of any innovation. Even the notes were monopolized by a handful of officially appointed authorities, for instance Kong Qiu and Zhu Xi, supernaturally worshipped as Confucius and Master Zhu respectively. The notes were called “biographies,” only to be expounded. There were no “deviating” discussions, nor could there anything of the sort, not to speak of any innovation or critical remarks or polemics.
However, in the recent 150 years, especially in such great historic events as the Reform of 1898，the Revolution of 1911，the New Cultural Movement and the May 4 Movement of 1919, there emerged a large number of great men who made tremendous contributions to the innovation and modernization of Chinese culture, such as Lin Zexu, Yan Fu, Kang Youwei, Liang Qichao, Dr. Sun Yat-sen, Chen Duxiu, Li Dazhao, Mao Zedong, Hu Shi, and Lu Xun …. They were as brilliant as the morning stars, championing a great ideological emancipation movement of the largest scale since the contention of all thoughts of school in pre-Qin dynasties 2500 years ago. Evaluating these great men, contemporary famous researcher of the history of Chinese thought Mr. Li Zehou said, Lu Xun was the first Chinese thinker in modern Chinese history. He made the judgment from the depth of personal thought. But I think it was Hu Shi who made the greatest contribution to the innovation of Chinese culture in the Chinese history of remote and immediate modernity, for he initiated and successfully completed the baihuawen (vernacular) movement. He earned the credit on the following two accounts: 1. Many scholars considered the popularization of writings in vernacular Chinese made it possible for the whole population to receive education. The popularization of education was fine. 2. Most scholars did not realize that vernacular Chinese writings injected the spirit of science into Chinese culture. Compared with classical Chinese, vernacular Chinese is more accurate, more concrete, and easier to spread. It is vernacular Chinese that made it possible to render Chinese culture more scientific. Thus the coding, storage and spread of information and knowledge as required by the theories on information and knowledge became possible through the introduction of vernacular Chinese. Only by then could we possibly create and apply natural and social sciences in China…. If Lu Xun is said to have enlightened and deepened the thought of some of the Chinese in the history of remote and immediate modernity, then it was Hu Shi who in the 20th century introduced a revolutionary cultural and ideological tool to the Chinese culture.
This is the tremendous force and value of language. ：“道常无名，朴。虽小，天下莫能臣。” （《道德经32章》: The Way is always nameless and of simple quality. Though small and invisible, nothing under heaven can make it subservient.）This is an excellent and profound English version offered by Mr. Pan. It is “faithful, expressive and tasty,” as quoted from Lin Shu. The version has accurately articulated the profundity, simplicity and wisdom of Chinese cultural spirit.
With regard to language I would insist that it is not only a window on the whole world, but is a world in itself. Man’s studies on artificial intellectual machines in the 21st century show that philosophically, a computer requires the functions of intellectual memory, linkage and computation to create intellectual power. As far as the creation of thought is concerned, language plays exactly the role of these three functions. Language in itself is a self-organized and self-sufficient ideological world. A case in point here today is Nigropanti, a figure of Internet enlightenment and director of MIT media laboratory, who said that the content is something evolved by the receptor from the model…., then come model making, delivery, details to be filled up by the receptor. Another case is Nobel prize winner physiologist G.M. Elderman, who also said that ideas come from substantive things via some structure or conductor mechanism. So I insist that language is the model of ideas and that it is also substantive…..
More evidences. K. Marx, political economist of the 19th century, said that economic foundation decides the superstructure. Drouk (XX) said that there are no underdeveloped societies, there are only mismanaged societies. Hence, whatever it is, politics, economics or management, the eventual foundation is culture. And the vehicle of culture is language. And culture cannot exist without language, just as fish does not feel the existence of water until it is ashore. We can even consider language itself is culture, hence the ample reason for Chinese culture not to distinguish literature, history and philosophy. For example, the Scripture said, 反者，道之运动 （Cyclic and repetitive is the movement of the Way.）The Chinese character 反 carries several connotations, cyclic, repetitive and opposite, and relative, thus involving many difficulties and interesting tastes when translating the character. From the angle of interpretation, the understanding of culture is highly dependent on the context, which is particularly important when it comes to the translation of scriptures, biographies and the inter-translation of various discussions and criticisms.
Concluding remarks: The curtain is just drawn open
In the 6th century BC, the Buddha said what is idea today will become a world tomorrow. But before the creation of ideas, we have to be dependent on language. US structural philosophers in the 20th century insisted that the world is structured instead of being discovered. But how? Also through the instrumentality of ideas and languages.
The translation of the Scripture and other classics, the contemporary comments on them is of far-reaching significance to China and the rest of the world --- from cultural communication, cultural exchange, and furthermore cultural mixture and cultural innovation. On the other hand, he who goes after integrity does not go after fame and reputation and he who goes after fame and reputation does not go after profit and emoluments. This brings us home to Mr. Pan’s special contributions and deep feelings as he is a man of over seventy. He is committed together with us younger men and women to translating or presiding over the translation of more modern comments on classics. All histories are contemporary histories, and all cultures are contemporary cultures. We are ready to communicate to the world the profound thoughts, controversies and even criticisms of Chinese culture and philosophy by Chinese scholars. We identify the approach of the new champion of Confucianism Mr. Feng Youlan that we should go on discussing Chinese culture instead of repeating it.