Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #650951 in Books
• Published on: 1992-08-31
• Original language: Mandarin Chinese
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 320 pages

Customer Reviews

A readable scholarly translation
The Tao Te Ching is available in many translations, from dry, scholarly versions heavy with footnotes to very loose translations by poets and new age mystics. This is a scholarly translation, but one that is far from dry and its author has an appealing modesty.

The Ma-wang-tui texts are among the earliest known copies of the Tao Te Ching, being discovered in a tomb securely dated to 4 April 168 BC. Two versions of the Tao Te Ching were found in it, written on silk. One copy, Text A, seems to have been written sometime before the reign of Liu Pang (206-194 BC) and the other, text B, during it. The text often quoted as `the' Tao Te Ching is Wang Pi's dated to 226-249 AD, so these predate it by several centuries and differ from the later versions. Intriguingly both Ma-wang-tui texts have the Te (`virtue') section first and then the Tao (`way') section, reversing the order normally found. This is why Henricks' translation is a Te Tao Ching rather than a Tao Te Ching.

The book is presented in three main parts. A brief introduction discusses the Ma-wang-tui texts, and the philosophy behind them. This is followed by a plain, unadorned translation of the 81 chapters themselves. To give a flavour of Henricks' translation, chapter 1 reads:


As for the Way, the Way that can be spoken of is not the constant Way;
As for names, the name that can be named is not the constant name.
The nameless is the beginning of the ten thousand things;
The named is the mother of the ten thousand things.

Therefore, those constantly without desires, by this means will perceive its subtlety.
Those constantly with desires, by this means will see only that which they yearn for and seek.

These two together emerge;
They have different names yet they're called the same;
That which is even more profound than the profound -
The gateway of all subtleties.


The third and largest section of the book is an annotated translation. This gives the text chapter by chapter, with the Chinese characters from both text A and text B. Usually using the better preserved text B, Henricks only uses text A for lines or chapters where the first is damaged. In some rare instances both texts are damaged at the same point and so he has filled the gaps with the equivalent text from later editions. All this is clearly marked so that the reader can understand the source of each translation.

Henricks has provided generous footnotes for each chapter explaining why he has arrived at the translation he has, and what options he considered in doing so. Engagingly, he also discusses the interpretations other scholars have made of difficult or ambiguous passages and says if he finds their arguments convincing or not, rather than simply presenting his own translation. The notes occasionally cover the meaning of a chapter but are more often related to how the Ma-wang-tui texts differ from each other and, more interestingly, later editions of the Tao Te Ching. The changes are often quite minor - the order of lines may be different, some words differ, and the Ma-wang-tui texts contain more grammatical particles than later editions so is somewhat less ambiguous. The book is rounded off by a section of more detailed notes and a bibliography.

The Ma-wang-tui texts shed light on the early history of the Tao Te Ching and Henricks' book is a well written guide to these intriguing versions and their idiosyncrasies. His translation is readable and his discussion of how and why he has arrived at it informative.

Since this book was published, an even earlier, though more fragmentary, version of the Tao Te Ching has been discovered at Guodian in east-central China. Henricks has also translated that version and it is available from Columbia University Press.