Line by Line - Verse 53, Line 9

carry a sharp sword at their girdle,
~ James Legge translation, from The Sacred Books of the East, 1891 ~

Carry sharp swords,
~ Gia-fu Feng and Jane English translation, published by Vintage Books, 1989 ~

Carry sharp swords
~ Derek Lin translation, from Tao Te Ching: Annotated & Explained, published by SkyLight Paths, 2006 ~

carrying flashy weapons
~ Ron Hogan rendition, from Beatrice.com, 2004 ~

In our society, the rich typically don't arm themselves; the police serves that function for them!!

As we've seen in the past weeks re the Occupy movement, the police flash their weapons constantly and engage in aggressive behavior to protect the well-to-do. The protesters themselves may do nothing more than engage in a bit of civil disobedience and the response of the police-state is to smash them with an iron boot!

To view the Index page for this series to see what you may have missed or would like to read again, go here.