Indian stream·Tao Te Ching·Chapter 51 — Mysterious Virtue
Tao gives life; Te nourishes; circumstance shapes; environment completes
Tao gives birth, Te (virtue) nourishes, circumstance shapes, environment completes. The ten thousand things honor the Tao and value Te — not by command, but always so of itself. To give birth without possessing, to act without expecting reward, to lead without dominating — this is mysterious virtue (xuán dé).
Source context
- Theme
- nourishment and completion of beings through Tao's generative power without possession or domination
- Soul-faculty
- Consciousness Soul
Steiner
not engaged in the GA corpus
Cross-tradition
- Vedanta — Īśvara and niṣkāma karmaThe Bhagavad Gītā's injunction to act without attachment to fruits (niṣkāma karma, BG 3.19) parallels Chapter 51's insistence that Tao brings forth and nurtures without claiming ownership or authority over what it produces.
- Kabbalah — tzimtzum and divine withdrawalLurianic Kabbalah's concept of tzimtzum — the contraction of Ein Sof to create space for creation — presents a cross-tradition congruence with Chapter 51's image of the Tao that gives life and virtue yet does not lord over beings.
- Stoic philosophy — logos spermatikosThe Stoic logos spermatikos, the generative rational principle immanent in all things yet not coercive of them, exhibits cross-tradition congruence with Chapter 51's portrayal of Tao as the silent sustaining ground that fosters without controlling.
Chapter 51
All things are produced by the Tao, and nourished by its outflowing operation. They receive their forms according to the nature of each, and are completed according to the circumstances of their condition. Therefore all things without exception honour the Tao, and exalt its outflowing operation.
This honouring of the Tao and exalting of its operation is not the result of any ordination, but always a spontaneous tribute.
Thus it is that the Tao produces (all things), nourishes them, brings them to their full growth, nurses them, completes them, matures them, maintains them, and overspreads them.
It produces them and makes no claim to the possession of them; it carries them through their processes and does not vaunt its ability in doing so; it brings them to maturity and exercises no control over them;--this is called its mysterious operation.