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Chapter 2

For everything under this heaven, the beautiful conceived
The ugly is born (as correlative)
The good established
The not-good takes form.
Likewise: being and non-being mutually condition each other
The possible and the impossible are complementary differentiations
Large and small characterize each other
The high flips over to the low
Clear sounds and noise complement each other
Before and after [or: ahead and behind] follow each other in a circle
The True Man is like that
He endures in non-acting
He teaches without speaking
He directs without touching [without commanding]
He forms [he makes happen, he leads to development] without taking control
He accomplishes without doing [without calling attention to the one who acts]
Essentially: not residing [in the domain of the correlative where the game of opposites unfolds]
He always participates [in the original force]

Commentary

In the first lines, referring on one hand to the law of correlation of all human notions; then, on the other hand, to its ontological counterpart, to that which can be called the “dialectic of the real”. Taoistically: the solidarity and action alternating as opposites, Yin and Yang, gives rise to modifications of the phenomenal world that now complete each other, then pass one into the other.

This dynamism, previously in the I Ching given by the circle of the “Figures of Heaven”, that is, the trigrams and hexagrams, does not touch the calm and undifferentiated essence of the Principle. Chuang tze: “The immobile center of a circle on the circumference of which crowns all contingencies, distinctions and individuals”. From this, it describes the non-acting behavior of the True Man, of the sheng jen, insofar he reflects in himself the Principle in its aspect without name.

On the gnosiological plane, the relativity and the irrelevance of human distinctions is deduced from the principle of correlation of opposites; therefore, of all the current values which correspond to nothing in reality: “only great spirits are capable of understanding.” (Chuang Tze)

Chinese text and literal translation

Chapter 2 (第二章)