Secret Tao

322 Pages·2013·7.26 MB·English

THE
Secret Tao

THE
Secret Tao

Uncovering the hidden history AND MEANING OF lao tzu
With an updated translation of the Tao Te Ching
D. W. Kreger

Windham Everitt
Copyright © 2011 by D. W. Kreger, Ph.D.
Original English Translation: Copyright © 1999 by D. W. Kreger, Ph.D.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any
form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or
any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission from the
author, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review or article.
First Edition 2011
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Kreger, D. W.
The secret Tao : uncovering the hidden history and
meaning of Lao Tzu : with an updated translation of the
Tao te ching / D.W. Kreger. -- 1st ed.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
LCCN 2011936898
ISBN-13: 978-0-9833099-0-1
ISBN-10: 0-9833099-0-6
1. Taoism. I. Laozi. Dao de jing. English.
II. Title.
BL1920.K74 2011 299.5’14
QBI11-600164
Windham Everitt Publishing Company
P. O. Box 901330, Palmdale, CA 93590
www.windhameveritt.com
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Illustration & Photography by D. W. Kreger
Printed in the United States of America
For my mother,
Dorothy Christina Knopp Kreger
1922-1975
And special thanks to my patron and friend, Rob,
in whose house in Berkeley, amid piles of old nautical equipment, antiques and
books, I found the peace and tranquility needed to complete the first draft of this
translation.

Contents
Preface ix
Part I: Deconstructing the Tao 1
Chapter 1 The Legend of Lao Tzu 2
Chapter 2 Discovering the ‘Ancients’ 8
Chapter 3 The Yang Shao Culture of Ancient China 18
Chapter 4 The Tao Te Ching as History 25
Chapter 5 The Deconstructed Tao 34
Part II: The Tao of Social Ecology 47
Chapter 6 Love, Ecology, and Not Trying to be the World’s Best 48
Chapter 7 Anarchism: When the Way is Lost, Justice Appears 55
Chapter 8 Pacifism: I Will Not Be The Aggressor 60
Chapter 9 Moral Ecology: When The Way Is Lost, Virtue Appears 65
Part III: The Esoteric Tao 73
Chapter 10 No Transcendence, No Paradox 74
Chapter 11 The Secret Tao: The Hidden Metaphysics of the Ancients 79
Chapter 12 Tao: The Way of Virtue 92
Chapter 13 Te: The Virtue of the Way 102
Chapter 14 Being and Non-Being: Shamanic Existentialism 110
Chapter 15 The Creation of the Universe is Now 118
Part IV: Tao Te Ching, By Lao Tzu
Book I: TAO 125
Book II: TE 201
Appendix: Exploring the New English Translation 291
Notes 297
References and Suggested Reading 306
The Secret Tao
viii
Preface
I
have read Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu for more than meaning of this ancient belief system. I also provide
20 years in many different translations. My spiritual the reader with a completely new type of translation,
interests collided with my scientific curiosity when which hopefully captures more of what I think is the
I noticed significant differences between various very essence of Lao Tzu.
translations of the Tao Te Ching. I began researching
The Interpretation
the original Chinese characters to try to understand
how different translations could vary so much. My
Translating Lao Tzu for me meant taking a stand on
quest for the true meaning of Lao Tzu led me to re-
issues such as who was Lao Tzu. Did he really write the
examine the nature and meaning of Taoism itself. In
Tao Te Ching? And, who were the ancients of whom
the course of working on this translation, I began to
he spoke?
see things that I had never seen before, wonderful,
The inspiration for my interpretation of
obscure, small things.
the Tao Te Ching came to me while studying the
This book is meant to be neither a scholarly
anthropology of the late Neolithic and early Bronze
thesis on Taoism nor the definitive translation of the
Age. I was especially intrigued by the work of Dr.
Tao Te Ching. Rather, it is my intention to provide the
Marija Gimbutas on the cultures of that period. She
reader with some new perspectives on the history and
suggested that the older, Neolithic cultures were
ix
The Secret Tao
not patriarchal, but were predominantly goddess mothers than for their fathers.” This too now made
worshipping matriarchies, led by women and with more sense.
more of a female focused society. It was only later Suppose the ancient ones were the pre-
that many cultures become more male-dominated as civilization peoples of late Neolithic China, and they
civilization developed. practiced a form of pagan goddess worship. And,
One day, while sitting next to a creek in the we know that this was eventually over-turned by
woods, it occurred to me that perhaps the cultural the feudal war lords at the beginning of the Shang
changes of the late Neolithic and early Bronze age, that Dynasty. When you reconcile this cultural perspective
Dr. Gimbutas noted in Anatolia and all across Europe, with the text of the Tao Te Ching, the corresponding
might mirror changes that took place in China prior fit of the two is uncanny! This perspective opened up
to the Shang Civilization. Subsequent research on a whole new interpretation of the Tao, and clearly
the topic confirmed my suspicions. A similar kind illuminated aspects of the Tao Te Ching which had
of transition had in fact taken place at the end of the previously puzzled scholars for ages. The themes of the
Neolithic and the beginning of the Bronze Age in Asia. Tao are different from what we know of the Chinese
Suddenly, I saw a whole new interpretation culture, because the Tao is not from the Chinese
of the Tao present itself. The philosophy of Lao Tzu civilization as we know it, it is a rebellion against it.
is ardently anti-civilization, and curiously pro-female.
This had always been puzzling to me. Now, it all The Translation
started to make sense.
This book contains an experiment in the art of
Perhaps the most intriguing mystery for me
translation. I have tried to do something with my
had been the issue of the “ancient ones”. Whoever
translation that no one has done before. I actually
they were, they supposedly existed before the first
created two translations, a literal translation and a
Dynasty, which would mean the Late Neolithic or
figurative translation, and I present them side by side
early Bronze Age period. We have little else to go
with each other. This solution came to me after years
on, except that they lived as one with Nature and,
of struggling with the challenges of translating ancient
according to Chuang Tzu, “they cared more for their
Chinese into modern English. My goal was to show
x