Research on the Tao Te Ching and Taoism by Michael P. Garofalo

 

 

Tao Te Ching  Chapter Number Index Standard Traditional Chapter Arrangement of the Daodejing Chapter Order in Wang Bi's Daodejing Commentary in 246 CE Chart by Mike Garofalo Subject Index
1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20
21	22	23	24	25	26	27	28	29	30
31	32	33	34	35	36	37	38	39	40
41	42	43	44	45	46	47	48	49	50
51	52	53	54	55	56	57	58	59	60
61	62	63	64	65	66	67	68	69	70
71	72	73	74	75	76	77	78	79	80
81

 

 

 

 

"No translation of the Tao Te Ching is sufficient to understand the text, as the Chinese is subtle and frequently brilliant, carrying a different range of connotations than English, and the Tao Te Ching plays repeatedly on the double and extended meanings of words, which can only be appreciated in the Chinese, unless you have read a wide array of English translations (and perhaps a commentary or two), which will start to convey to you the range of each word's meaning in its given context. Then you can build on what you understand on your own."

-  Richard Carter

 

"The first assignment for Daisetz "Great Simplicity" T. Suzuki in 1898 was to help Paul Carus with the Tao Te Ching.  Dr. Carus knew no Chinese, but he wanted this translation to a scholarly one and he had Suzuki supply a character by character gloss, as best he could, but Suzuki found himself unable to check Carus's use of Teutonic abstractions.  "The Chinese are masters in reproducing the most subtle changes in their innermost feelings," Suzuki wrote of his first collaboration with Carus, "thus, in order to translate passages from Lao Tzu, I had to explain to Dr. Carus the feeling behind each Chinese term.  But being himself a German writing in English, he translated these Chinese ideas into abstract conceptual terms.  If only I had been more intellectually equipped then," he thought later, "I might have been better able to help him understand the original meaning."
In order to supply a corresponding Chinese text, Suzuki cut out the Chinese characters from Chinese and Japanese books, and pasted them in the proper places on the manuscript pages, which where then reproduced photographically [and then printed in 1913]."
-  "How the Swans Came to the Lake," by Rick Fields, 1981, p. 139

 

"Translation," as T. S. Eliot wrote of the Fennollosa-Pound version of Noh plays, "is valuable by a double power of fertilizing a literature: by importing new elements which may be assimilated, and by restoring the essentials which have been forgotten in traditional literary method.  There occurs, in the process, a happy fusion between the spirit of the original and the mind of the translator: the result is not exoticism by rejuvenation."
-  "How the Swans Came to the Lake," by Rick Fields, 1981, p. 165

 

Is That a Fish in Your Ear?: Translation and the Meaning of Everything  By David Bellos.  New York, Faber and Faber, 2011.  Index, notes, 393 pages.  ISBN: 9780865478763. VSCL. 

 

 

"The Dragons of Eden: Speculations on the Evolution of Human Intelligence by Carl Sagan (1977), recounts a story, probably fictional, about the lack of accuracy in text translation programs.  A deputation that included an American Senator was proudly led to a demonstration of a translation program. The Senator suggested a phrase to be translated, "Out of sight, out of mind". The machine printed Chinese characters and these were then entered into the machine to be translated back to English. The visitors were all astonished when the machine printed the phrase "invisible idiot" on the paper. The computer had literally translated the separate expressions "out of sight" and "out of mind". The anecdote and the phrase "invisible idiot" have entered popular culture."  -  Wikipedia, Dragons of Eden

 

 

"World literature students need to keep in mind that different translations, particularly of the classical texts, can impact interpretation. In general, there seem to be four major concerns for translation. 

1. Accuracy (Whether the translation accurately portray the original meaning of the text)
2. Coherence (Whether the translation as a piece itself is able to get its point across)
3. Style (Whether the translation captures the style, e.g. meter and rhyme, of the original piece)
4. Contextualization (Whether the translator makes the context of the text clear)

By definition, academically rigorous translations focus on characteristics one and two, to the extent that it sometimes diminishes the quality of the second two. Non-academic translations usually focus on the second two traits. While this is not intrinsically a bad thing, it is essential to remember that some amateur "translators" may not know Classical Chinese and may not be maintaining fidelity to the original text.

With this in mind, I usually select academic translations, ones that favor interpreting the Daodejing as a political text first and foremost. Historians who intend to invoke the classical text should really take this context into mind before citing passages. Translations focusing on Daoist cosmology and alchemical theory tend to overanalyze in way that can be detrimental for classical historians, even if it is incredibly useful for understanding Daoism as understood during the Han Dynasty (e.g. for understanding the work of Ge Hong)."
-  Jonathan Reiter
 

 

Translating Phrases Used in Taijiquan

What Does "Xu Ling Ding Jin" Mean?

"One of the most vexing phrases in this body of texts appears in Wang Zongyue's "The Taijiquan Treatise."  This is the phrase that I've translated "An intangible and lively energy lifts the crown of the head."  The actual phrase in Chinese is xu ling ding jing.  Xu means "empty," "void," "abstract," "shapeless," or "insubstantial."  Ling can mean "neck," "collar," "to lead," "to guide," or "to receive."  Ding here means "the crown of the head."  Jin is a word that should be familiar to most Taijiquan practitioners, meaning "energy" or "strength."  To translate this phrase literally in a way that makes sense is seemingly impossible. ...  To demonstrate the difficulties presented in translating the phrase, I've assembled for comparison a number of different renderings:

Yang Jwing-Ming translates xu ling ding jin as:
"An insubstantial energy leads the head upward."

T.T. Liang renders it:
"A light and nimble energy should be preserved on the top of the head."

Benjamin Pang Jeng Lo translates the phrase:
"Effortlessly the jin reaches the headtop."

Douglas Wile translates the phrase variously:
"The energy at the top of the head should be light and sensitive."
and
"Open the energy at the crown of the head."

Guttmann gives one rendering as,
"... the head is upheld with the intangible spirit."
Elsewhere, he gives it a fairly plausible if incomprehensible literal rendering as a noun phrase:
"Empty dexterity's top energy."

Huang Wen-Shan translates it as:
"The head-top should be emptied, alert, and straight."

Robert Smith's version has it:
"The spirit of vitality reaches to the top of the head."

Jou Tsung Hwa's rendering is similiar:
"The spirit, or shen, reaches the top of the head."

Finally, in one of the freer renderings I've seen, T. Y. Pang renders the phrase:
"The spine and the head are held straight by strength, which is guided by the mind."

As the reader can see, the range of nuance in these diverse translations of this one phrase is considerable.  Virtually all of the readings are interpretive; that is, the four-character phrase as it has been handed down will not yield a dependable reading based on the characters alone.  One can only conclude that this phrase is a remnant of an oral formula whose original structure eludes our knowledge.  Our understanding of it inevitably depends upon the context─ the following phrase about sinking the qi to the dantian─ and upon commentaries of former masters, including Yang Chengfu's elaboration in the first of his "Ten Essentials."  The concept is also linked to differently worded but related phrases appearing in other classics, for example, "the spirit (shen) threads to the crown of the head" (shen guan ding) in the "Song of the Thirteen Postures," and the phrase about "suspending the crown of the head" (ding tou xuan) appearing in both "The Mental Elucidation of the Thirteen Postures" and the "Song of the Thirteen Postures." "

-  By Taijiquan Master Fu Zhongwen.  Mastering Yang Style Taijiquan.  Translated by Louis Swaim.  Blue Snake Books, 2006, p. 182-183

 

 

"Yes, there is a difference – occasionally profound – depending on the translator. Ninety percent of the time, authoritative translations (like those recommended here) convey the spirit, if not the letter of the literal original Chinese. Why? Understandably, translators need to use some beautiful and persuasive words to make their translations readable. Also, the brightest translators in academia have centered their life’s work around words. This may impede their ability to plumb the depths of the Taoist point of view (e.g., words and speech). Nevertheless, no problem; if we get that 90%, the rest comes to us naturally.

Translators will also tend to bend the Taoist view to match the Western humanist paradigm into which they are conditioned. No problem either! If a reader is likewise steeped in the humanist paradigm, nothing else would be palatable anyway. Understandably, the translation that feels best to us is the one that matches our own personal world view."
-  Center Tao, Translations

 

 

Gushen Grove Notebooks for the Tao Te Ching 

Introduction

Bibliography  

Index to English Language Translators of the Tao Te Ching

Thematic Index 1-81  

Chapter Index 1-81    

Concordance to the Daodejing

Translating, Interpretating, Interpolating, Commenting

Spanish Language Translations of the Tao Te Ching

Resources

The Tao Te Ching (Dao De Jing) by Lao Tzu (Laozi) circa 500-100 BCE