A Note

regarding the characters

used for this translation.

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​Lesson 3

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How the sage

Leads

 

 

 

   使shǐ 

(人 person + 吏 magistrate.)

to cause, enable

 

Interlinear

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​Line 1

By not extolling the "worthy,"

the people will not

contend with each other.

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不bù 上shàng  賢xián

not  above/rise up  worth

   

使shǐ 民mín 不bù 爭zhēng

cause   the people    not    contend

Not rising up the worthy

causes the people to not contend

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     The character 賢xián, “worth,” “value,” and as an adjective, “worthy,” refers to  an individual’s personal character. In the Han and Pre-Han era (pre-220 AD), the character of the “worthy” person was deemed second only to the character of the sage.  As Yang Xiong (53 BC–18 AD), a poet of the era said about the worthy:

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​The worthy are different from

the common person, and the

sage is different from the worthy.​

賢xián人rén 則zé 異yì 眾zhòng人rén矣yǐ，

聖shèng人rén 則zé 異yì 賢xián人rén

    

     By "not extolling the 'worthy'," the sage declines to compare higher and lower, better and worse. (See the previous lesson.) Instead, the sage meets each person as they are, and by example encourages them to discover their own way and to follow it, while also respecting the ways of all others.

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     Here we see a key difference between Lao Tzu and Confucius. Confucius acknowledges a gradation of worth and humaneness of a person based on their level of self-cultivation and their service to family, friends, and ruler. Confucius prescribes these right relationships to his students, and encourages the cultivation of them.

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     While Confucius certainly offers a healthy corrective for an ailing society, for Lao Tzu, such self-cultivation, along with the hierarchy of  higher and lower worth, is socially induced and therefore artificial.

 

     Rather than cultivating right behaviors, which Lao Tzu would call a kind of "doing," Lao Tzu councils the "not doing" of any action which does not follow the Way, so that the society may return of its own accord to its natural order. No personal "doings" or hierarchies of worth here.

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​    As we see in this line, "not doing" includes “not extolling the ‘worthy.’” An artificial hierarchy of worth may breed rivalry and contention; and the sage, for one, is no one’s rival. He or she contends with no one.* This is the true and natural fabric of a society. 

 

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*Less 66 for example: “The sage does not contend, and therefore no one contends with him or her.” See also Chapters 8, 22, 68, and 81 on 不bù 爭zhēng-noncontention.

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Gram note: This is a typical sentence structure in ancient Chinese—subject-verb-object. Notice too how a character such as 上shàng, "above," typically a preposition or adjective in English, can easily become a different part of speech  such as a verb—"to elevate” or “to raise up,” and even “to advance.”  This flexibility may seem odd, but the same is true in English. Just consider the multiple use of the word “key,” for example, as a noun, verb, or adjective.

 

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