Tao Te Ching » (Vintage Books ed)

ABOUT THE TRANSLATORS

Gia-fu Feng was born in Shanghai in 1919, was educated in China, and came to the United States in 1947 to study comparative religion.  He held a BA from Peking University and an MA from the University of Pennsylvania.  He taught at Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California, and directed Stillpoint Foundation, a Taoist community in Colorado.  Gia-fu Feng died in 1985.

Jane English, whose photographs from the integral part of the book, holds a BA from Mount Holyoke College and received her doctorate from the University of Wisconsin in experimental high energy particle physics.  In 1985 she found her own publishing business, Earth Heart.  Her books and calendars include Different Doorway: Adventures of Caesarean Born, Mount Shasta: Where Heaven and Earth Meet (with Jenny Cole) and the yearly Tao Te Ching Calendar.  She was born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1942.

Chuang Tsu/ Inner Chapter (1974), a companion volume to Lao Tsu/ Tao Te Ching, is a direct outcome of the successful collaboration between Gia-fu Feng and Jane English on the Tao Te Ching.

The Tao Te Ching, a 6th-century Chinese masterpiece, is one of the worlds most revered sources of spiritual wisdom. This authoritative translation captures the essence of Lao Tsus language, bringing the Tao Te Chings powerful message to a whole new generation. Unabridged. 2 CDs.

Publishers Weekly

Dale, a teacher of alternative medicine and author of Acupuncture with Your Fingers, offers a new translation of the ancient Chinese text credited by legend to the sixth-century sage Lao Tzu. Relying on several earlier translations from Chinese, Dale lovingly renders the 81 sections into verse rather than prose. Accompanied by Cleare's evocative black-and-white nature photographs, each poem is titled and stands alone. Included are Dale's informed commentaries for each verse that present the meaning of Lao Tzu's words for life today. For example Verse 30, "Defense and Aggression," is interpreted as permitting defense against violence, but never taking revenge or attempting to conquer others through the use of nuclear, chemical or biological weapons. One meaning of Verse 49, "Wisdom," is that each human, no matter how compromised and corrupted, has an innate humanity in his or her core. Dale uses the last verse, "The Paradoxes of Life," to summarize the meanings in the first 80. He contends that despite the evil uses that technology has been put to, such as the development of weapons of mass destruction, it is possible to transform this technological knowledge into a mutually dependent system of economy and communications that may be used to meet the needs of people worldwide. This transformation is a way for the modern world to live within Lao Tzu's Great Integrity, a life of harmony with one another. (Apr.) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.