This is called marshaling the ranks where there are no ranks;
~ James Legge translation, from The Sacred Books of the East, 1891 ~
This is called marching without appearing to move,
~ Gia-fu Feng and Jane English translation, published by Vintage Books, 1989 ~
This is called marching in formation without formation
~ Derek Lin translation, from Tao Te Ching: Annotated & Explained, published by SkyLight Paths, 2006 ~
That's the secret to moving forward while staying put,
~ Ron Hogan rendition, from Beatrice.com, 2004 ~
From the standpoint of Wang Chen, a 9th century military commander (as quoted by Ralph D. Sawyer in
The Tao of Peace),
...when an enemy draws up, even though the Sage excels in military affairs, he does not deploy. Since he excels in military affairs but does not deploy, he does not mount aggressive attacks. Thus, the Tao Te Ching states the he "deploys without lines."
To view the Index page for this series to see what you may have missed or would like to read again, go here.
So, reflecting on the previous post and considering our global over-indulgence as the enemy, it seems that this entire chapter condemns those who are scrambling to 'attack' global warming and instead recommends a 'wait and see' approach. Of course, in the larger context of the wisdom of the tao we should already be using less, being 'green' without making a big show of it, and treating the earth as our loving parent rather than a resource cache... we should ALREADY be doing that whether climate change is a problem or not. But when it comes to pushing eco-responsibility on people (especially through large organizations and governments)as if it's an emergency and condemning those who don't fall in line... well, that seems like playing the host rather than the guest, and advancing rather than retreating. People love to make war on anything, global warming is just the new profitable enemy. No more thoughts.
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