Digging Your Own Well: Part Twenty Five

The Three Treasures

 

In Chapter 67 of the Dao De Jing we are introduced to the “three treasures”.

2. I have three treasures (pao),

To hold and to keep:

The first is motherly love (tz'u),

The second is frugality (chien),

The third is daring not be at the world's front.

3. With motherly love one can be courageous,

With frugality one can be wide reaching,

Daring not be at the world's front,

One can grow to a full vessel (ch'i).

4. Now to discard motherly love, yet to be courageous,

To discard frugality, yet to be wide reaching, 

To discard staying behind, yet to be at the front,

One dies!

5 One with motherly love is victorious in battle,

Invulnerable in defense.

When Heaven wills to save a people,

It guards them with motherly love.

Ellen Chen, trans.

The three treasures of Daoism are something like the ten commandments and golden rule rolled up into one. But to a modern Western ear they sound bizarre and paradoxical. How can “motherly love” help you win battles? How does frugality help anyone become “wide reaching”? And how does one dare not to be at the “world's front”?

 

Motherly Love

 

 

When we go hiking in the wilderness one thing that everyone knows is that you should try to never get in between a mother and her child. Not only does this apply to ferocious predators like wolves, bears and cougars, but also normally peaceful animals like moose or even deer. This is because mother animals protecting their young have a fearlessness and ferocity that is unmatched. Predators chasing prey are wary of being injured. As are males fighting over potential mates. But mothers don't care about their own safety at all.

 

The other aspect of this to remember is the immunity that mother animals have towards retaliation. If an animal attacks humans as prey or because it is too “familiar” with human beings, game wardens will hunt it down and kill it as a matter of course. But if the attack came from someone getting in between mother and cubs, generally people acknowledge that there was no blame, except perhaps on the part of the human. I have read accounts by people who were lying in hospital beds after savage maulings that show the same sentiment.

 

In the relations between people and nations it is a sad fact of existence that violence is sometimes necessary. But Daoists try to always act with the love of a mother towards her children. That means when it is necessary, they need to fight to both ferociously and fearlessly. But the act of violence needs to be directed towards only one aim: defense. All violence must be proportionate and directed specifically towards whomever or whatever is the threat. And once the threat is passed there is absolutely no room for animosity or grudges.

 

We have recently had many examples of what happens when one doesn't follow this principle. Wars that are not about defense but rather about the “interests” of states have severely damaged those same interests. And wars that were based on “shock and awe” and which accepted far too much “collateral damage” have created violent responses by people enraged by the carnage they have seen inflicted on their communities. As long as a nation restricts its military activity to genuine defence, it has the respect of the world. But once it embarks on needless adventures it becomes a pariah.

 

Exactly the same thing happens in our personal lives. We all have boundaries that we need to defend: personally, in our family, and, in the various communities we inhabit. This means that conflict is pretty much inevitable at least once in a while. But Daoists believe that the best way to manage them is by remembering to keep the ideal of the love between a mother and her child as the guiding principle that informs our actions and responses. Of course, no one can ever live totally according any ideal. But it is what we strive towards.

 

..........

 

Another way of looking at this passage is to consider the quality of the relationships one builds in society and how that affects one's influence within it. Another book strongly influenced by the Daoist viewpoint is Sun Tzu's Art of War. Consider this passage:

A general regards his men as infants who will march with him into the deepest valleys. He treats them as his own beloved sons and they will stand by him unto death. If a general indulges his men but is unable to employ them, if he loves them but cannot enforce his commands, if the men are disorderly and he is unable to control them, they may be compared to spoiled children, and are useless.

(Chapter 10, General Tao Hanzhang version, Yuan Shibing trans.)

This idea of a parent sending her children off to fight a war may grate on some people's ears. But the important issue is how the general feels towards her men. Sun Tzu's general is genuinely concerned about her soldiers. She doesn't see them as a means to an end, or, as pawns to move on a chess board in order to advance her career or to prove some aspect of a pet ideology. They are subjects, not objects.

 

Having said that, it is important to remember that a Daoist is not just any type of mother, she is someone who acts in a certain way. That is to say, she is not sentimental. This means that while she treats her soldiers like her own children, she is the type of mother that is not indulgent. She believes in “tough love”. Being overly indulgent towards your children is another form of objectification. This is because the sentimental mother doesn't see her children as individuals that have their own agendas and need to find their own way in the world, but rather as puppets that act out the emotions that dominate her consciousness. Objectively viewing your children as human beings in their own right instead of extensions of your internal mental state can be a profound act of love towards them.

 

If we treat our children as being autonomous individuals who have rights beyond what we want them to be, then they also have responsibilities too. And we expect those children to live up to those responsibilities. Soldiers do not respect officers who over-indulge them because the smart ones realize that their welfare is bound up with the group. Sailors say a “tight [ie: well-disciplined] ship is a happy ship”. This is because in a slack ship the best men end up doing extra work that the worst ones shirk. And when I read Caesar’s Conquest of Gaul, I remember him quoting wise Centurions who warned their soldiers that “indulgent generals lose battles”. And, there can be no greater calamity for a soldier than losing a battle.

 

This point is reinforced by what immediately precedes the above quote from Sun Tzu:

---the general who in advancing does not seek personal fame, and in retreating is not concerned with disgrace, but whose only purpose is to protect the country and promote the best interests of his sovereign, is the precious jewel of the state.

(Chapter 10, General Tao Hanzhang version, Yuan Shibing trans.)

The General who acts according to Daoist principles is selfless. She doesn't care about her career. She isn't dominated by whatever emotional baggage she might be carrying. She is like the mother cougar or grizzly who defends her cubs without any thought to her self interest. It is the same for the Daoist in society---only the “off-spring” may be many things. It may be the soldiers under her command, it may be the sovereign she serves, or, it may be the greater good of the entire community. Unfortunately, these sorts of leaders are very rare, which is why the competent sovereign needs to treat them like “the precious jewel of the state”.

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Moreover I say unto you, the Climate Emergency must be dealt with!