Chapter 4: The Wise and the Scholar
The Tao Te Ching once said: The wise are not wise, and the wise are not wise. Many people think that this is a dialectic, which means that the wise person is not necessarily erudite, and the learned person is not necessarily wise, although this interpretation is also correct, but its original meaning also alludes to the difference between the two kinds of learning. One is a wise man, the other is a scholar!
Generally speaking, we must first be a scholar, continue to learn, and then achieve a transformation from quantity to quality after being erudite and knowledgeable, and then improve the realm, before we can be called wise. But there are also talented people who can understand the deep meaning with a little click, and they are not confined to the rigid knowledge of books, and they are not confined to the limitations of doctrine above academics! This category of people is called the wise.
The wise man understands the unchanging inner with the changing external, and the scholar solves the external change with the changeable external, and the realm is not the same! Responding to the ever-changing evolution with the unchanging root is the way of thinking of the wise!
In today's era, people believe that high learning, high quality, and high culture can only be proved by a high diploma, and only with a high degree can it be recognized! I don't know where real knowledge comes from! This is the realm of metrics!
The wise will understand that knowledge originates from the human mind, is recorded in books, and then summarized in schools. The vast expanse of knowledge is first in the minds of each person, then in the oceans of books, and finally in the academy within the system. That is to say, the deepest knowledge always exists in the depths of the mind, followed by the reserve of erudite knowledge in the tree, and finally in the narrow school.
Throughout the historical process of the land of China, from the pre-Qin teacher system. Bloom out of a hundred schools. The scholarly system that was transformed into later generations opened up a brilliant civilization. In the new century, the school system seems to have been constantly increasing the amount of knowledge reserves, but in fact, it is locking people's thinking step by step. The fixation of thinking has made the barbarians of this age full of devastation. Blindness, arrogance, ignorance, stupidity!
For thousands of years, three of the four saints were recorded in the pre-Qin period, and only one of the later generations was born in the Ming Dynasty. In the new century, it was originally a brilliant and prosperous era where a hundred flowers bloomed and a hundred schools of thought contended, but it was tightly locked by the solidified zombie mentality!
From the great wisdom of the pre-Qin period, the great vertical and horizontal scholars, and the outstanding talents who guided the country, to the think tanks and staff of later generations, and then to the scholars of the new century, their cultural inheritance has gradually narrowed like a funnel invisibly, and this is the greatest tragedy of the latecomers.
The way of the wise man is to obtain knowledge from another soul force, to obtain knowledge from books, to obtain knowledge from the school to guide, to develop the wisdom in the depths of one's own soul, and to constantly innovate in order to reach a higher new realm.
Nowadays, due to the solidification of ideas, one by one, the new inheritors have gradually become numb machines, learning for the sake of learning, learning for the sake of degrees, learning for diplomas, so sacrificing the basics to learn, so pedantic to learn, in the end it can only be a moving mechanical disk! It is only a learned scholar!
What does not change is eternal knowledge, what changes is the form of knowledge that is revealed externally, and people who abandon the origin of knowledge and pursue the external form of knowledge, and can only see the external form of knowledge are the greatest pedantic thinking!
Just like in today's era, we only agree with academic qualifications and degrees, but not with ability, and the mediocrity is very poisonous!
We often hear people around us discussing which good university their children are in, which country they are studying in, and which expensive tutoring classes they are attending, but we rarely hear them discuss what their children have discovered from themselves after learning today. It's a sick decay! Not ashamed, but proud!
Teacher, preaching, teaching, and solving doubts! Spread the way of the ancestors, teach the inheritance of the world, and solve the confusion of the unknown! One of the most important links is to solve doubts! Unraveling the wonders of the whimsical imagination enables us to progress as a whole of humanity, and preaching and teaching are only the foreshadowing of both. If you lose the most important link and go to practice at the end of your life, you will not only harm yourself, but also harm future scholars!
Throughout history, every sage has had his own way of thinking. Those who have left their names in history are those who have the courage to pursue doubts and solve doubts.
Young children are the future of mankind, and the future is the hope of new life, not pedantic stencil printing, rigid records! This also explains the root cause of why the Chinese have lagged behind Westerners in the past hundred years. The society in an era is measured by money and power, and the other is a society led by innovation, and the two cannot understand the root cause, even if they learn more knowledge, they will eventually fall into the inferior realm!
One is the path to the wise, and the other is the path to the scholar. And the control of the mind is the lifeblood of tightly controlling the future!
We do not deny the merits of the school system, but under this premise, we must clearly recognize the core value and the most fundamental meaning of this system, and then know what to do to flexibly change and update, instead of following the framework of the system to learn mechanically and pedanticly!
The wise man learns knowledge from life, books, and schools into his mind, and then independently discerns and thinks about all the roots of it, and solves doubts. Therefore, he has been observing and learning all the time throughout his life, making progress, improving his cognition, and innovating for the future.
And the scholar's knowledge is fixed and accepts the inherent system, to abide by him, blindly pursue the school, the teacher, and when all the learning time is over, he stops learning and thinking, and life can only stop there!
Lu once wrote in the Spring and Autumn Period that those who dare not discuss the law are also the people. Those who abide by the law to the death have divisions. Those who change the law with the times, the Maven also. Although the status of people is different in ancient books, the choice of realm is not determined by people. There are three realms that we can choose from.
I have never believed that there is a distinction between high and low people, and I still believe and agree that everyone can be holy. And the pity is that I have trapped myself in a narrow mind and am unwilling to come out. Zhuangzi said: Summer insects can't talk about ice, they are bound to the time, and well frogs can't talk about the sea, they are bound to their feet! Qu Shi can't speak, it's bound to teaching!
The meaning of this bondage is that you are trapped in a single narrow academic field and are unwilling to extricate yourself, and you are unwilling to come out of the ideological space!