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Heaven and Earth Are Inhuman, the Sage Is Inhuman

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Heaven and Earth Are Inhuman, the Sage Is Inhuman HEAVEN AND EARTH ARE INHUMAN, THE SAGE IS INHUMAN Heaven and earth are inhuman and treat the myriad creatures as straw dogs. The sage is also inhuman and treats the people as straw dogs. -Laozi, Chapter 5 The phrase buren /f{= ("inhuman") actually has two different meanings, which should be distinguished.1 The first meaning is as in the Analects statement, "How inhuman Yu is!," or in the Mencius passage, "A ruler who is inhuman does violence to his people."2 It refers to a cold-hearted attitude or vicious action. The second is as in the Yellow Emperor's Medical Classic on the Origins of Disease: "the ill­ ness is neither painfUl nor buren ('unfelt')," and the statement in A Comprehensive Rhyme Dictionary that "to be unaware is to be buren."3 The first meaning describes cruelty, while the second describes insentience. Laozi' s statement that "Heaven and earth are inhuman" utilizes the second meaning. When an empty boat collides with something or a tile falling from a roof hits someone, even if it knocks a person on the head and injures him, the event is ran­ dom and not purposefUl. Du Fu' s "Officer of Xin'an" says, "You may cry until your eyes are worn to the bone I But Heaven and earth will never have pity."4 The poet understood Laozi's meaning and paraphrased it. Similarly, Xunzi says, "The way of Heaven is constant and unvarying. It is not preserved by the sage Yao or extinguished by the tyrant Jie."5 Wang Chong's (27-91) Disquisitions repeatedly observes that Heaven is free of both ')oy and anger" towards man.6 The poem that Han Yu wrote upon the death ofMengJiao's son says, "Heaven answered, 'Heaven, earth, and man I Are fUndamentally independent of each other.' "7 In his letter to Li Qun, Han likewise admits that "I do not understand what is the 270 03' HEAVEN AND EARTH ARE INHUMAN, THE SAGE IS INHUMAN Creator's ultimate purpose is [in allowing good men to live miserable lives or to die early, while unworthy men achieve worldly success or live to old age]. Is it that his values are contrary to human ones? Or is it that he is simply unaware of everything on earth and allows life and death to take their own courset8 These are all restatements ofthe same idea. In treating the myriad creatures like straw dogs, Heaven and earth are free of intent and are "uninvolved" and "unaware." It is not that Heaven and earth cruelly maintain "contrary" aims and are unsympathetic. Wang Bi's commentary on the Laozi passage says, "Heaven and earth entrust everything to what is naturally so. They do nothing and do not make anything, so that the myriad creatures keep each other in order. That is why it is said that Heaven and earth are buren ('inhu­ man')."9 LiuJun's (462-52I) "On Destiny" says, "What gives birth to a myriad of creatures is called theWay. They are born but have no master, this is referred to as 'what is naturally so' ... In giving them life there is no intent that they be brought to fruition or maturity, and in killing them there is no intent that they be cut down."10 The insights expressed here might as well be a subcommentary on Wang Bi' sentry. Western views of Heaven include both senses of buren. Pliny observed that although supreme nature (natura magna) gave birth to the myriad of creatures to benefit man, it also inflicts great suffering upon man, so that it is hard to tell if nature is a loving parent or a wicked step-mother ( ut non sit sa tis aestimare, parens melior hominian tristior noverca fuerit)Y Leopardi said, "As for its procreation and nurturing, nature is man's loving mother. But as for its aims and desires, nature is man's step-mother" (Madre edi parto e di voler matrigna). 12 This is to blame Heaven and earth for being "inhuman" and to accuse them of harboring malicious inten­ tions. Clearly, this accords with the first meaning of buren. On the other hand, the German aesthetician Friedrich Vischer wrote a comical novel in which he sug­ gests that mundane inanimate implements, such as eye-glasses, watches, buttons, pens, constantly play nasty tricks on people (die Tiicke des Objekts). Yet they do not do so deliberately or have their own aims. He claims, instead, that nature (die Natur) is totally innocent in its demonic waywardness (satanisch schuldhaft ganz un­ schuldig).B This too is to blame Heaven for being "inhuman" and yet to absolve it of any calculated wickedness, thus invoking the second meaning of buren. In his "Three Essays on Religion," John Stuart Mill observed that the workings of na­ ture show a "most supercilious disregard both of mercy and of justice."14 This expands upon the second meaning of buren, and is likewise in agreement with the idea in Wang Bi' s commentary.15 We return here to the meaning of Laozi' s second statement, that "the sage is also inhuman." Wang Bi notes, "the sage unites his Power with that of Heaven and earth," meaning that the sage models himself on Heaven and earth. Likewise, .
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