Yesterday I spoke at a local church. They have a special service on the day nearest the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize, and they asked me to come and speak about Liu Xiaobo. I summarized his life's work, mentioning Charter 08 and reading some of the words from his "I have no enemies" statement, especially these:
For hatred is corrosive of a person’s wisdom and conscience; the mentality of enmity can poison a nation's spirit, instigate brutal life and death struggles, destroy a society’s tolerance and humanity, and block a nation’s progress to freedom and democracy. I hope therefore to be able to transcend my personal vicissitudes in understanding the development of the state and changes in society, to counter the hostility of the regime with the best of intentions, and defuse hate with love.
Good to keep in mind...
After the service, the music director approached me and pointed out one of the hymns she had chosen for the service: "These three are the treasures." Turns out it is also called "Song of Lau Tsu," and its lyrics are adapted, by Anglican priest Colin Hodgetts, from passage 67 of the Daodejing. Here are his lyrics:
These three are the treasures to strive for and prize:
be gentle, live simply, and have the humility
to shy from the struggle to put one's self first,
these are the pearls.
If mercy's abandoned by those who'd be brave,
economy squandered by those who'd be generous,
humility slighted by those who would lead,
this is sure death.
Be gentle and you can afford to be bold,
be frugal and so have enough to be liberal,
be humble and thus be a leader of all,
this is the way.
Through gentleness those who attack win the fight,
and those who defend have their safety in gentleness;
this gentleness rests in the children of God,
this is their sign.
Beside the ultimate invocation of "children of God," which strikes me as rather un-Daoist (at least in the philosophical sense), it's a fair rendering. I'm not sure what translation he's working from. It doesn't seem to be Legge or Whaley. Here's Lau for purposes of comparison:
The whole world says that my way is vast and resembles nothing.
It is because it is vast that it resembles nothing.
If it resembled anything, it would, long before now, have become small.
I have three treasures
Which I hold and cherish.
The first is known as compassion,
The second is known as frugality,
The third is known as not daring to take the lead in the empire;
Being compassionate one could afford to be courageous,
Being frugal one could afford to extend one's territory,
Not daring to take the lead in the empire one could afford to be lord over the vessels.
Now, to forsake compassion for courage, to forsake frugality for expansion,to forsake the rear for the lead, is sure to end in death.
Through compassion, one will triumph in attack and be impregnable indefence.
What heaven succours it protects with the gift of compassion.
Hodgetts, the hymn-writer, drops the opening stanza, and gets right to the three treasures, and he takes a bit of license with "pearls." But, obviously, he is finding Christian inspiration in a non-Christian book. And the parallel Daoist and Christian messages of simplicity and humility are certainly there to be found. I had just never seen or heard this hymn before.
And, thanks to the wonders of the intertubes, here is a recording of Episcopal-Daoist synthesis (click through on the Google attachment to listen...)
From the perspective of historical development, modern Western colonization of the backward nation is a progressive, colonization in the world to promote the modernization process. Colonization opened one by one closed region, to develop a culture of a commodity market and the market, so that the whole world, especially East and West are no longer isolated from each other, but are open. More importantly, the colonization of the West belongs to the original human rights, equality, freedom, democracy, competition brings the world to form an international competition. No world without colonization, international. "
- Liu Xiaobo, "tragedy of enlightenment -" May Fourth "movement critical", "Chinese World" in 1989, 3)
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Sam: Liu just said what you wanted to say but feel ashamed to speak out openly. NO wonder Liu is your favorite adopted pet.
Posted by: isha | December 14, 2010 at 03:08 AM
Editor's Note:
I just took down six long comments by Isha... all of which say the same thing as the one I have left. He is obviously working over time for the fifty cents party - maybe he earned as much as a dollar! In any event, repetition does not make weak arguments stronger...
Posted by: Sam | December 14, 2010 at 08:06 AM