The Tao Te Ching For Astrologers: Verse 5 & 6

Transcript:

Hi, everyone, this is Acyuta-bhava from Nightlight Astrology. And today we are going to take a look at the fifth and six verses of the Tao Te Ching, continuing our series on the Tao Te Ching for astrologers. So, I've been really enjoying this series trying to do an installation once a week as we work our way through two verses at a time. So on that note, I'm going to put the put the verses for the day up on the screen. And the way that this works is, we start by taking a look at the verses, read through them, and then I offer some commentary on them as reflections after we go and make some connections to astrology and sometimes the philosophy that ancient astrologers had in mind. So let's go ahead and put this up on the screen so that you can see it. This is just for people who are maybe you know, at home following along and want the benefit of seeing the actual words on the screen. Don't forget the edition that we are using is the Tao Te Ching Tarcher Cornerstone edition, translated by Jonathan Star, it's a very nice beginner's addition. If you haven't caught the first parts of the series, I recommend going back and listening to them because you'll get a lot out of hearing the series in order but it's you also can watch it out of order. Every set of verses is really you know, sort of timeless wisdom.

Today we're taking a look at verses five and six. Here's verse five. Heaven and Earth have no preference. A man may choose one over another, but to heaven and earth all are the same. The high, the low, the Great, the small, all are given light, all get a place to rest. The sage is like heaven and earth. To the sage none are especially dear nor is there anyone they disfavour. The sage gives and gives without condition, offering their treasure to everyone. The universe is like a bellows. It stays empty yet is never exhausted. It gives out yet always brings forth more. Man is not like this. When he blows out air like a bellows he becomes exhausted. Man was not made to blow out air. He was made to sit quietly and find the truth within.

Here's verse six. Endlessly creating endlessly pulsating, the spirit of the valley never dies. She is called the hidden creator. Although she becomes the whole universe, her Immaculate purity is never lost. Although she assumes countless forms, her true identity remains intact. Whatever we see or don't see, whatever exists or doesn't exist, is nothing but the creation of this supreme power. Tao is limitless, unborn eternal. It can only be reached through the hidden creator. She is the very face of the Absolute. The gate to the source of all things eternal. Listen to her voice hear it echo through creation. Without fail, she reveals her presence. Without fail. She brings us to our own perfection. Beautiful verses. We're gonna run back through them and I apologise sometimes I forget to change the slide while I'm reading. So I think I messed that up a little bit on verse five. But we'll read through it verse five again and then offer some reflections. And then move on to verse six and do the same. So here's verse five. Again, Heaven and Earth have no preference. A man may choose one over another but to heaven and earth all are the same. The high, the low, the Great, the small, all are given light, all get a place to rest. The sage is like heaven and earth to him. None are especially dear. Nor is there anyone he disfavors He gives and gives without condition, offering his treasure to everyone. The universe is like a bellows stays empty yet is never exhausted. It gives out yet always brings forth more. Man is not like this when he blows out air like a bellows he becomes exhausted and was not made to blow out air. He was made to sit quietly and find the truth within.

So a few things. One is that we're getting advice throughout the Dao De Jing about what a sage is like. Now, it's fair to say the Dow is sages may have lived in the mountains apart from society, there's a great documentary called among white among, amongst among white clouds. And it's a beautiful documentary about Taoist hermits living in the mountains. So there's that. But I think this is still applicable for us. No matter where we live, or what kind of lifestyle we lead. This is timeless wisdom that's telling us how to be how to be in touch with the Tao and how to be a sage. The first thing that this verse tells us is that people like to choose one thing over another. And we have a matrix of preferences, desires, and aversions, and so forth. But to heaven and earth, sort of the yin and the yang, it's all the same, the high, the low, the Great, the small, everything has a place, everything is part of the whole. All is given light under one creation, you might say. So the sage is like this. To the sage, no one is especially dear, nor is there anyone that sage really dislikes. Now that may sound to us. almost inhuman. It's like I have dear friends that mean a lot more to me than Joe Schmo at the coffee shop, or target or something, you know, my wife is certainly more dear to me than most people in the world. You know, like maybe my parents along with my kids and my spiritual teachers, and my best friend all different but same level of specialness, and no one else really compares. So what are they saying here that we shouldn't have fondness in our hearts more for one person than another seems inhuman.

I don't read this to be saying that you have to be seeing everyone as entirely equal, and have no camaraderie or friendship and sit in a cave and think of everything completely equally in some kind of detached neutral state. It says none are especially dear. And what I take that to mean, at least in the case of our everyday modern life, is that we become careful about getting deeply attached and putting people on pedestals or thinking of people with a particularly intense level of dislike, that there's a sense in which we have to see the Bhagavad Gita tells us this too, that we have to learn how to see things with equal vision. We're all spirit souls, I may be travelling rather closely with certain companions. But I understand that there's something that we all share in common. That should help me to see people in situations with this kind of equal vision. And that's more about appreciation in my experience than it is about neutrality. It's about appreciating that everything and everyone has a place. There are some that will be drawn to me more personally and others less so. But that doesn't mean that I should discredit other people, or I should be and I should be careful getting so attached to people that I lose that equal vision.

I think that we're completely capable of doing that while also having intimacy in our lives, mentors, teachers, friends, parents, children. Especially those of course that we share this these spiritual truths in common with it's especially easy to do with other people who say, you're special to me, but I get it. We're all spirit souls or there's something about there's a place for everyone and everything. I think a lot about that light of acceptance that everything has a place that everything is a part of divinity I think about that a lot every day that I practice astrology because astrology teaches me that whether it's a time of peace or war, whether it's a time of a lot or a little you know whether it's a time of great health and happiness or frustrating disease and chronic health problems and hardship. I see it in other people's life in my own, that there is a place for it. There's a season for it. I think there was a band I think that the band was called the birds and they had that song, to everything turn, turn. And yeah, I think it's song is rooted in the Bible, I believe, maybe the Psalms or proverbs or something like that. There's a season for everything. And astrology helps me to see that astrologers knew this. The Taoist knew this, so many traditions have taught us this. And so it's important that when we look to astrology, that we're not looking to it to enhance the tendency that we have to get really attached to things or to be really averse to things desire and aversion. The sage is like heaven and earth. And by doing this by cultivating this kind of mentality, we become like the same, the same light that is shining equally on and giving space for everything. I love this part of the verse universe is like a bellows and stays empty and is never exhausted, it gives out yet always brings forth more pinata bellows is it's sort of it's like one of those things that you pump in the air comes out of it to maybe fan the fire.

But we are not like this. If we were working so hard that we're exasperated, we become exhausted. And this is this teaching that essentially is telling us to be careful of that passionate work. Where we're exhausting ourselves. We're not meant to work like this. It's not that there's no work and creation and that that exercise or that, you know the movement of the breath and song and dance and isn't a part of it. It's not saying like, Oh, look, if you get worked up. That's bad. It's telling us that we're not unlimited in our power. We're not we receive breath in and out. We're not the source of it. No, we're not like a bellows that stays empty and is never exhausted gives out we can get exhausted. And this is humbling. It's a it's a message really of humility. And it says okay, well, because I can get, I can get exhausted, I'm not unlimited in my power. I'm not the source of power behind all things.

But I can sit in quietly contemplate and reflect upon this great presence, and find the truth in it. And that that's the purpose. That's the gift of our position, we may not be this, the power source of creation, but it moves through us and we can feel it and relate to it. And this truth is deeply satisfying if we learn to develop a relationship with it. Astrology also helps us with this because every day, we study the planets. And we realise Oh, I'm not in control. These gods these archetypal fields are moving. Now I might be participating. It's not that I don't have some freewill that I'm not the power source. And because I'm not, I can also I can, I can observe the movement of these energies and powers, I can have a relationship with them. And this is what life is for. It's actually ecstatic and blissful, to come into contact with these divine energies, to feel ourselves and our being as a part of them. It's like in Star Wars, a lot of Star Wars is rooted in eastern philosophy, Taoist philosophy, could feel the force flowing through us binding all things together. It's that kind of thing. And the planets helped me do that every day by showing me these forces that are moving through everything through me, defining who I am guiding me, while I often pretend that I'm in control. So we're have to sit quietly to remember these things. The planets help us see them in the moving spaces of our lives. But the moving spaces of our lives are places that we are also metaphorically learning to sit quietly and find the truth within. That's what astrology is here to help us with.

Let's go on to verse six. Endlessly creating endlessly pulsating, the spirit of the valley never dies. She is called the hidden creator. Although she becomes the whole universe, her Immaculate purity is never lost. Although she assumes countless forms her true identity remains intact. Whatever we see or don't see whatever exists or doesn't exist, is nothing but the creation of the supreme power. Thou is limitless, unborn eternal, it can only be reached through the hidden creator. She is the very face of the Absolute, the gate to the source of all things eternal. Listen to her voice, hear it echo through creation. Without fail, she reveals her presence. Without fail, she brings us to our own perfection. Talking about this verse a little bit, I love this one as well. We have in the dow a statement here that although the Yin, the hidden creator, the feminine here being referred to as the spirit of the valley, the valley is life below, down off the mountain down in the valley. So the Yin is endlessly moving and creating, distributing, pulsating, never dies, always moving. And although she becomes the whole universe and all the diverse forms that she assumes, there's something essential that's never lost. Although she moves through so many things that we might call evil, dark, impure, bad, challenging, ugly, there's something true and pure, that's always still there. Whatever we see or do not see whatever is moving and flowing around us and through us, is nothing but the expression of this supreme power.

I love this, because, to me, this is very much like the planets, the planets as a whole, governed matters in the sublunary sphere, and the moon was the planet most closely associated with the waxing and waning of fortune in the material world. So as fortune waxes and wanes in our everyday lives, and as we go through the ups and downs, the moon rises and falls in her latitude sloughs off for light and picks it back up is a reflective light. This always remains the same, the Moon is always the same, even though she reflects the constant movement and variation.

So sameness and otherness coming to be in passing away, and that which is changeless, they're always co present. The sun, that changeless face of the eternal light is reflected in the light of the moon who's always changing. So she reflects change, although she is constant. So the sun and the moon are so closely related to the philosophy of Taoism. And they're at the core of why we practice astrology every day, We're learning to see the one in the many of our experience

I love the next part of the verse in particular, that we can't reach this divine Tao until we have gone through the valley of life. In other words, that our experiences here and the variation that we see here is all reflective of the eternal and divine. It's only by a reflection upon the things in this world, the changes in this world that we see the changeless that we see, the eternal what looks like time bound, constant fluctuations and changes, there is something of enduring, eternal value that we see when we reflect upon it. Listen to her voice, hear it echo through creation. Without fail, she reveals presence, without fail, she brings us to our own perfection. The moon was the planet, often associated with devotion, and remembrance. So if we look upon creation and see the variations and fluctuations, as reflections of eternity, then it's in and through these the many forms to the many experiences it's in and through these forms of creation, that we come to see, divinity. And that's what the planets are, and especially the moon, but that's what the planets are as a whole. They reflect the coming to be in passing away in this time bound world. And if we bring some cognizance of their presence and their movements into our everyday lives, we start to see something of eternal value. That's why we do this.

And this series is really dedicated to taking out time. It's important because a lot of the content that I create is about the fluctuations and changes. But we're not looking at those fluctuations and changes to enhance our attachments and aversions. We're doing this because it's our prayer life. And so it's important to take time out to study these beautiful texts, these beautiful sacred teachings that come, whether it's the yoga tradition, or the Taoist tradition, with ancient philosophers that practice astrology had to say, we have to spend time reading what they say, and listening and filling our hearts with the wisdom. So that we know why we're doing this. So we know what direction it's actually taking us in. So I hope you guys have been enjoying this series, I'd love to hear your reflections on any of these verses and what they bring up for you. Please leave your comments in the comment section. And we will be back next week and taking a look at the next two verses. Until then, if you haven't caught up on the series, be sure that you do. You can listen to all the previous parts if you haven't yet. And be sure to get a copy of the Tao Te Ching by Jonathan star translation by Jonathan star. This is the text that we're following along with and see if I can bring it back to my face here. So you get a copy. You can follow along on your own and I promise you having this around and even just reading two verses every morning. It does wonders. It just keeps that compass pointed, pointed in the right direction. So that's what I've got for today. I hope you guys have a great weekend and we will be back at it again on Monday. Take it easy, everyone. Bye