Birth to death. Three out of ten people are alive, three out of ten people are dead, and three out of ten people are born and alive. Why is the husband also?With its life also.
Analysis:The first twelve chapters are a whole, from the definition of morality to the cultivation of saints, and this chapter Lao Tzu continues to talk about morality from the perspective of life and death. It's easy to be bored by always talking about logic and macroscopic, and Lao Tzu uses the topic of life and death that everyone cares about to attract people. The relationship between life and death is something that everyone has to go through, and everyone wants to live a long life, so how can they live a long life?Let's see what Lao Tzu has to say. This chapter can also be read in conjunction with Chapter 22, "The Way of Eternal Vision" and Chapter 51, "Forever and Earth".
Life and death are a pair of dialectical concepts, opposites coexist, Lao Tzu actually argues the relationship between existence and non-existence through the relationship between life and death, compares life to existence, compares death to nothing, and argues which one is worth pursuing through the nature of human beings who like to live and hate death. Understanding this, this whole chapter is read and understood.
The beginning of this chapter is the embodiment of Lao Tzu's philosophical literacy, since we want to discuss life and death, we must first define life and death, how does Lao Tzu define it?Let's explain this paragraph.
Interpretation:In the secular view, birth is life, and earth is death. According to this concept, after birth, people are born with a long life of three tenths, and of those born with a short lifespan of three tenths, these are the laws of nature. There are also some people who have a long life span and are not short, but they have been pursuing longevity, but they are losing their lives everywhere, and there are also three out of ten such people. Why do you lose your life?Precisely because of the pursuit of longevity. The pursuit of longevity is the pursuit of "being", and the pursuit of "being" will "love a lot, and hide a lot will die".
Summary:This passage is relatively easy to understand, and I will summarize three points for you.
First, at the beginning of this chapter, Lao Tzu first defined life and death, that is, he specially explained that his view of life and death is different from the secular concept, in his concept, life and death are not static, which is reflected in Chapter 77 "Those who die and do not forget will live also", indicating that Lao Tzu's definition of longevity is not divided according to the material existence of life, so it will be discussed later.
Second, if we regard life as static, then life itself is "being", and excessive pursuit of "being" will go against the Tao, and we will go from having the Tao to no Tao, and the Tao will of course lose our life. There is a saying: The first half of your life is exchanged for money, and the second half of your life is exchanged for money. Nowadays, many diseases are not genetic, but acquired, so if you don't die, you won't die.
Third, in this chapter, Lao Tzu also expresses the connotation of relativity, the world is relative, and relativity determines that all things have limits, that is, the objective law that the cycle repeats itself and the extremes of things must be reversed. Once the limit is broken, it will change from strong to weak, from more to less, from some to nothing. Therefore, the pursuit of "have" is to challenge the limit, there will always be a day to break through the upper limit, if you can't keep the Tao and cultivate virtue, then the upper limit will not only not be raised, but will be lower and lower.
That's all for today, and we'll continue to learn Xi Tao Te Ching next issue, goodbye.