Tao Te Ching - your preferred translation?

Connor Lidell wrote: I would give my left arm to read the first biblical new testament manuscript in greek. O_O MMMM

I think I read that once... turns out Jesus's abilities might've been a bit exaggerated...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3rLof2cnzg

Stephen Mitchell
a new english version
1988

1

The tao that can be told
is not the eternal Tao.
The name that can be named
is not the eternal Name.

The unnamable is the eternally real.
Naming is the origin
of all particular things.

Free from desire, you realize the mystery.
Caught in desire, you see only the
manifestations.

Yet mystery and manifestations
arise from the same source.
This source is called darkness.

Darkness within darkness.
The gateway to all understanding.

My working version for the past ten years (recommended by a native Mandarin-speaking colleague):

Tao Te Ching, translated by Stephen Addiss & Stanley Lombardo, Hackett Publishing Company, 1993.

"Names can name no lasting name.

Nameless the origin of heaven and earth.
Naming: the mother of ten thousand things.

Empty of desire, perceive mystery.
Filled with desire, perceive manifestations.

These have the same source, but different names.
Call them both deep -
Deep and again deep:

The gateway to all mystery."

Stephen Mitchell is still probably my favorite, but I am loving having all these new versions to read!! :woohoo:

Not all translations are equal, and even though some are better than others, none is definitive.


All is translation.

Alan wrote: My working version for the past ten years (recommended by a native Mandarin-speaking colleague):

Tao Te Ching, translated by Stephen Addiss & Stanley Lombardo, Hackett Publishing Company, 1993.

"Names can name no lasting name.

Nameless the origin of heaven and earth.
Naming: the mother of ten thousand things.

Empty of desire, perceive mystery.
Filled with desire, perceive manifestations.

These have the same source, but different names.
Call them both deep -
Deep and again deep:

The gateway to all mystery."

alan, i like this version! i have never read it before. i will have to check this out somewhere.

tzb wrote: I like a few - of the more "legitimate" translations my favourite is the Addiss and Lombardo version .

My favorite one! Nice pick

tzb

Thank you for the recommendation of the online collection of Terebess Asia Online - Daodejing translations (a site new to me). Last week, we studied Daoism in my world religions class, and even though we have moved on, I will recommend the site to my students. Next semester, I'll work it into the lesson plan.

My pleasure Alan, glad to think it may be of use to others

I have rather painstakingly tried every translation on that site at one point or another, just to see which spoke to me most directly - nice to see several of us have settled on the Addiss and Lombardo text as our benchmark translation!