42、Comments on Tao Te Ching and Diamond Sutra

The author of the two books is an incredibly great person. He wrote the two books not for all human beings, but for those with outstanding intelligence and amazing comprehension abilities.

According to the current situation, the two books are probably only for 20% of the entire mankind—the leaders and the powerful ones. People with average intelligence find it impossible to understand the true intention of the author. They only misunderstood what the author said following the literal meanings, or they could not understand it at all. The act of looking the two books as something for fun without any idea of the content is, if not acceptable, at least not disastrous compared to the acts of distorting the original intention of the author and randomly speculating, which may hurt others and themselves as well.

The administrators of a society, ranging from the king of a nation, the leader of a government, president of a country, to the authority of enterprises, often have certain control (more or less) over people’s destinies and living environment. Their decisions determine the fate of the country, and Tao Te Ching is written for them. They are the elites of the society, the administrators, the leaders, and the organisers. What does Tao Te Ching tell us anyway? It is required that the elites of a society, the administrative level, decision-making authorities should be strategic and virtuous. They should govern the country, the local place, as well as the enterprises with strategies and virtues. Here, Tao and Te are not what we mean morality in daily discussion.

The two are totally different concepts. Tao in Tao Te Ching refers to the correct, rational, and perfect ways of handling things. Te refers to the accomplishments and performances established following the Tao—the ways. Tao appearing in what was referred to as an enlightened and great king and an unprincipled dim-witted ruler means exactly the same as ways and strategies. That is to say, this king had the appropriate ways of governing a country or he knew nothing about it at all.

With appropriate ways and strategies, a nation, local places, and enterprises can enjoy a full-scale reconstruction and an everlasting prosperity. They will stand as long as the earth, the moon, and the sun exist.

Without appropriate ways and strategies, a nation will decline and be destructed, plunging people into misery and sufferings and enterprises into bankruptcy with the evil forces in charge.

Governing a country, the same as managing an enterprise, requires ways and strategies. Then where do ways and strategies come from? They are from accurate, objective, and rational methodology. They are derived from the insights into the genuine and objective regularities of the country one governs and the enterprise one manages after scientific, attentive, thorough, and objective research and study based on the prior knowledge and the current situation. They are the accurate conclusions drawn and the best projects put forward.

This requires profound knowledge and extremely amazing organisational and thinking capabilities so as to have incredible courage and incisiveness, to accurately locate his or her own position and direction, to draw conclusions that lead to the most appropriate objectives and methods, and finally, to lead people out of dangers and towards brightness and relief.