Tao Te Ching - your preferred translation?

There's a vast multitude of takes on Lao Tzu's timeless work out there and no real consensus on which is best, as so much of it comes down to personal preference. Which is your favourite translation?

I like a few - of the more "legitimate" translations my favourite is the Addiss and Lombardo version .

But probably my favourite of all is Ron Hogan's version , which takes a variety of translations and synthesises them into a modern-language snappy dialogue remaster. There's something beautiful about seeing the great leveller Lao Tzu's words presented with such little ceremony, in totally modern language - and, for the most part, the original meaning (or a version of it, which is all that's available in translation anyway) remains pretty much unobstructed:

1

If you can talk about it,
it ain't Tao.
If it has a name,
it's just another thing.

Tao doesn't have a name.
Names are for ordinary things.

Stop wanting stuff. It keeps you from seeing what's real.
When you want stuff, all you see are things.

These two statements have the same meaning.
Figure them out, and you've got it made.

There's room for mysticism and that classic crystalline terseness, but for me there's also room for a little affectionate irreverence.

Additional love for the Derek Lin and Ursula Le Guin translations for their detail and simplicity, respectively.

For reference, this is the best site I've found for links to complete translations .

i was told that like the quran, it is really only useful in the original language. hence why there are so many versions of this thing, with quite a few differences between them.

Well, I'm sure the original is superior in every respect, but not being able to read Classical Chinese I've still learnt a great deal from various translations over the years. The translations have certainly been of practical and spiritual use to me!

Perhaps reading them in this way, being exposed to a variety of different interpretations and then forming our own opinion of what is meant/relevant/valid is more valuable than texts which only maintain a single version?

nah, mostly i was just messing with you, man. i personally dont care which version you use, as it seems to me to be a mental/spiritual rorschach test anyway. you read into it pretty much whatever you want.

I would give my left arm to read the first biblical new testament manuscript in greek. O_O MMMM

Connor

I found this earlier today.

http://www.myriobiblos.gr/bible/default.asp

Connor Lidell wrote: I would give my left arm to read the first biblical new testament manuscript in greek. O_O MMMM

I think I read that once... turns out Jesus's abilities might've been a bit exaggerated...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3rLof2cnzg

Stephen Mitchell
a new english version
1988

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The tao that can be told
is not the eternal Tao.
The name that can be named
is not the eternal Name.

The unnamable is the eternally real.
Naming is the origin
of all particular things.

Free from desire, you realize the mystery.
Caught in desire, you see only the
manifestations.

Yet mystery and manifestations
arise from the same source.
This source is called darkness.

Darkness within darkness.
The gateway to all understanding.

My working version for the past ten years (recommended by a native Mandarin-speaking colleague):

Tao Te Ching, translated by Stephen Addiss & Stanley Lombardo, Hackett Publishing Company, 1993.

"Names can name no lasting name.

Nameless the origin of heaven and earth.
Naming: the mother of ten thousand things.

Empty of desire, perceive mystery.
Filled with desire, perceive manifestations.

These have the same source, but different names.
Call them both deep -
Deep and again deep:

The gateway to all mystery."