Alo and De Flower #88
(PD) Alo and De Lake on Land.
Copyright ©2018 December 13, 2018
De: Jun... Alo's paper, in hand... try to keep a straight face...
Jun: Uh oh... another one?
De: Yes... more, words... more, silly...
Jun: My giggle... I will try...
Yan: Jun, what are you two whispering about?
Jun: Nothing dear...
Yan: Ha! 'Nothing dear' means 'something'!
Jun: I will explain, later...
Yan: Ha! I have a feeling that I will discover the 'something' soon enough!
Alo: My paper... translation... just first two paragraphs... 'When the highest most supreme holy men taught the ways of heaven and earth, the holy scriptures ruled that the power of virtue is identically the same as the frequencies of rebellions and sizes of the defending armies... the highest most supreme holy men taught from the scriptures that if a man learned knowledge of rebellions and armies, then the man would also know and become virtuous. The great sage of heaven, the one and only heaven child, he stepped into the holy men's chambers, and spoke loudly with his arms raised, holding high a wooden six cubit staff in his left hand: "If you believe in the power of divine spirits of virtue, then also believe me, follow me, venerate me, bow to me, and learn heaven's words, that the great wisdom of heavens has bestowed upon me the knowledge that sizes of armies are only knowable by first knowing how many and what kind of virtues are possessed and expressed within rebellions! Know exact virtues! Know exact armies! Know exact rebellions!" When the holy men asked how such a superior wisdom could be known, the heaven child screamed loudly and long with an eastern nation accent: "One virtue! Ten rebellions! One army enter ten kingdoms! One virtue! Ten armies! Only one rebellion in ten kingdoms!" And thus became the dao that all men today follow and worship as the one true truth.'
Yan: Wow... okay... ha! What was that?
Alo: A scholarly translation of ohm's law... much too easy to simply say 'E' equals 'I' times 'R'... too easy to simply write E=IxR... too easy, to say, 'E' over 'I' times 'R'... too easy, to even say 'voltage equals amperage times resistance'... like the scholarly translations of ancient texts, scholarly translations must flower the existing words into becoming fairy tales of magic... not, simply, speak the words of synonyms...
Yan: Aha, yes, now I understand... parody... poking fun at the outsiders' translations...
Alo: Ancient man, write ten words... modern scholar, write twenty wrong words, and then claim his words are correct translation...
Yan: It is the way of modern man... he is taught, to copy another man's words, rearrange the original words, add more words, and then claim that his invented words are exact truth... fully dishonest, but, that is the scholarly way...
Alo: Today, 'voltage' can mean 'virtue', as, in, 'by virtue of pressure'... 'resistance' is, like, restriction... like, rebellion... 'amperage', is like, number of men in army... no need to use close synonym for a scholarly translation... just make stuff up...
Yan: If not understand the topic, then cannot choose close synonym...
Alo: Precisely... and, apparently, outsider scholars do not understand most of the ancient topics... ancients spoke of simple things, but scholars claim peculiar things that do not relate to what is real...
Yan: I had recently seen another example... 'Junzi have three respect... respect heaven fate, respect great person, respect sage person him talk. Tiny person not know heaven fate and not respect also, intimate-with great person, abase sage person him talk'.
Alo: The 'respect' word, could also be 'fear', but, it would be, rather, absurd to say 'fear'...
Yan: Agreed... but the east scholar, he wrote... 'There are three things of which the superior man stands in awe. He stands in awe of the ordinances of Heaven. He stands in awe of great men. He stands in awe of the words of sages. The mean man does not know the ordinances of Heaven, and consequently does not stand in awe of them. He is disrespectful to great men. He makes sport of the words of sages'... the east scholar chose 'awe', which is similarly absurd as 'fear'...
Alo: Ancient man wrote thirty-six words... scholar wrote seventy-two flowered words, and still could not make sense...
Yan: Yes... the idea of 'awe', is... simply, unacceptable... 'awe' would imply a mind that understood little or nothing of the topic, but a junzi is not of an inferior mind... no awe would occur...
Alo: Agreed... a so-called 'superior man' in awe of inferior things? Makes no sense... contradicts the whole of the author's other writings... also, the emotion... I have no concept of what that kind of awe might imply...
Yan: A related example... 'Born while aware, him person topmost. Learning while aware, him person secondary. Difficult while learning, him again it secondary. Difficult while not learning people present, serve-as under'... the east man wrote... 'Those who are born with the possession of knowledge are the highest class of men. Those who learn, and so, readily, get possession of knowledge, are the next. Those who are dull and stupid, and yet compass the learning, are another class next to these. As to those who are dull and stupid and yet do not learn - they are the lowest of the people'... I am tempted to judge which of the four classes the east man belonged...
Alo: Yes, poor fellow believed in knowledge... believed that knowledge was a mark of superiority... unfortunately, his knowledge, and flowery imaginations, were false...
Yan: Twenty-seven ancient words... sixty-six scholar words... a little under two and a half times more words... and still missed the mark...
Alo: Six dictionaries... many times still do not have useful synonyms... frustrating... the dictionary words, are often as meaningless, and flowered, and wrong, as the east man's translations... so much knowledge available, but, of so little value...
Yan: Very much agreed... one second of understanding, exceeds all knowledge... one second of awareness, exceeds all...