The harmony in Eastern and Western conception:

Taoism and Classical Greek philosophy.

Henrik Klindt-Jensen, University of Aarhus, Denmark

Preliminary remarks

In this paper, I am going to clarify the relation between the concepts of harmony in Eastern thought - particular in the Taoism - and in the western thought, particular in Classical Greek Philosophy.

Chinese versus Greek philosophy in general

In the ancient Greece, the discipline philo-sophia “philosophy” was born as the concern and love for wisdom; Pythagoras seems to be the first user of the word: he would not proclaim himself as being a wise man, a sophos, but through rationality he could reflect wisdom in a way, where it can be of understanding and use for people of less wisdom; he thus conceived himself as a philo-sophos, a “philosopher” in stead of a sophos.

Furthermore, Pythagoras was a mathematician, discovering the law for harmony in the tone pitches with regard to length of the strings. The Greek Philosophy is born as a Philosophy of nature, not necessary denying the existence of the gods, but not relying on these. The giving up of the gods as the explanation for the world does not imply the old Greek belief in harmony. Now it is found in the co-existence of several elements of nature, by Empedocles four in number. Also Chinese Philosophy states a minor number of elements; the balance of these must also be found in man and thus indirectly in society.

We find a common feature in the conception of harmony in the classical Greek Philosophy and Chinese Philosophy: the harmony is prepared in nature, but man must seek to accomplish the harmony within the society and the concrete individual harmony in body and mind. Here we find the crucial concept of self-control in the Greek Philosophy. It is expressed in the old virtue sophrosyne. If we shall have harmony in society, we must have harmony with ourselves - through sophrosyne.

The Chinese Philosophy is a Philosophy of cosmos as well as philosophy of life. Since the Greek Philosophy is rather reflective, it more separates these areas of thoughts. Born as a thinking of nature, the Greek Philosophy only later reflected upon life – beginning with Socrates. Socrates inherited also wisdom, not concerned as Philosophy before him: he followed the inscription over the entrance to the Apollo Temple in Delphi, stating “Know thyself” and “Not too much”. Such wisdom is a part of Chinese philosophy from its very start – since we have given a more broad definition of philosophy in China. But this wisdom becomes part of Greek Philosophy through Socrates. Socrates was provoked by the sophists, stating relativism and lack of obedience to the gods, the denial of the old values, the virtues belonging to the former aristocratic society. The sophists belonged to the new time, not based upon cultivating inherited land with the use of slaves, a land that originally was appropriated by warfare and courage; the sophist represented the new culture that was based upon trade and craft. Socrates wanted to restore the old values, to reformulate them in a way, where they could enter into the new time. Socrates became critical about the new democracy, where the old values, the virtues where lost. The way forth worth would be a kind of general education; he began with the youngsters on the square of Athens. The new time provided a breeding ground for drift towards egoistic power and greediness. This meant the break of the old harmony. The task was to create a new harmony. You would have to begin with your own self-control, your modesty – which was one of the old virtues: sophrosyne. Socrates’ pupil Plato continued this project of education by his school, called the Academy. Here, he draw Socrates more concrete broader education back into the mythical and metaphysical perspectives. Thus we find the myth of the lost Golden Age, where gods and men had been together, found by Hesiodus etc. The development had been decay to Hesiodus’ own Iron Age. The task was thus to get a memory of the old time and to bring it into the new society. Also in Chinese philosophy, we find a conception of the history in terms of decay. Especially in Confucianism, the task for the philosophy is seen as bringing back the golden time of the early Chou Dynasty, or at least features of it. Socrates, Plato and Aristotle understood themselves in an opposition to the actual democratic way of government of the state; they more believed in some kind of Aristocracy, but not in the decadent form of the reactionary rule of the 30 tyrants, which for few years interrupted the democratic development. The Chinese philosophers – at least in principle - were often true to the actual aristocratic empire, but saw that it was in need of improvements. Thus the Chinese and the Greek philosophers can be compared: earlier on things were much better, but now things are going wrong, people are not finding the harmony inside themselves, and thus the harmony of the state cannot be maintained. Also the leader/ the leaders of the state must train in a way, where he or they can lead himself or themselves, and lead the state in the benefit for all. Philosophy is the medicine for a sick society and the ultimate tool for its leader. Especially Socrates then could have been a fine Chinese philosopher. His devotion for his city-state, polis, namely Athens, his abundance of power in his own behaving, his desire for the harmony and modest self-knowledge is quit worthy for the Chinese castle, as well as for the square of Athens. His insistence on fine old values, developed in aristocratically harmony, is rather Chinese. His humor is of Chinese greatness. And his irony would have killed him in China, just as it did in Athens. But the temperament of the Chinese philosophers themselves goes more in the direction of the later Stoic philosophers: Later on, in the Hellenistic philosophy and especially in the Epicureanism, we find the concept of ataraxia, meaning peace in mind; this must be compared with the Taoistic “wu wei”, “do nothing”: the “wu wei” expresses, that you should not hesitate with doing all kind of desperate things, be aware of what is going on and act in calm accordance with this, so that changes happen though you and not from you, according to the Tao: In Tao Te Ching, it is stated: “Let nothing be undone[i]. Ataraxia is the attitude, where you calmly take part in life in awareness of all the fight for power, reputation etc.

Later again, the stoic philosophy gets impact in the Roman Empire through Cicero etc. So in the end, also the classical western philosophy becomes critical sustaining an empire like the Chinese philosophy was from its very beginning. At that time, however, the classical philosophy was not Greek any longer, but Roman. Paradoxically, the way to harmony goes through some kind of war. Both Chinese and Greek philosophy has origins in war cultures. To be a soldier is to be a man of virtue, and the virtue makes society possible. War is the condition but peace is the way forth worth. You must fight with yourself in order to get harmony, balance, but the fight comes from the war. Philosophy is a proceeding of the war turned to a fight for peace and harmony.

Thus the pre-Socratic philosopher Empedocles sees the continuing changes between Philotês/ Philia - Friendship, Love - and the Neikos – Strife - as the cosmic and metaphysical principle[ii]. The changes are expressed by the verb metaballein and the substantive metabolê,[iii] which is also the crucial expression of change in the second part of the Parmenides-dialogue; we shall return to this later. Taoism, as grounded on I Ging, is a Philosophy of changing. Thus harmony is gained through the change of the outer war into and inner fight between opposite feature of our body and mind, and through a strengthening of both in inner balance.

We must also mention Aristotle's concept of the golden mittel way. The classical Greek seek for harmony will also be a seek for avoiding the extremes. We shall further regard four themes in the relation between classical Greek philosophical way of harmonizing, and Taoistical way of harmonizing – the first theme will be the mentioned strengthening:

The theme of strength in Taoism and Greek philosophy

The original meaning of Te is found it the very title Tao Te Ching, is the power[iv]. It is commonly translated virtue, and this meaning cannot be excluded neither: the task is to train the virtue as a spiritual strength. Socrates gives his pupils a mere intellectual training in understanding the old attic virtues as lost values that should be restored. So this point is crucial. The intellectual training is presented in parallel to the physical. The verb is gymnazein to make exercises (without having Clothes on: gymnos means naked). The gymnazein is used metaphorically about the intellectual training. There is, however, no relation between the bodily and the intellectual training. But in Chinese tradition, quite the opposite was and is the case: here, the spiritual strength is generally combined with the training of the body. This is seen especially in the Chai Ch’i. Neither does Lao Tzu’s former mentioned “wu wei”[v] express weakness, lack of decision, but spiritual strength: in “doing nothing”, you do unite yourself with the Tao, so that you are fulfilled with the Te and “nothing is left undone”. Here we have the crucial difference between Chinese and Greek philosophy: The Chinese Philosophy – and not in the smallest degree the Taoism – combines insight, harmony, equilibrium with personal and perhaps universal strength. The strength has also a spiritual dimension. This is simply not the case in the Greek tradition. Socrates, for instance, indeed had been a soldier, a so called hoplite, and during the rest of his days we find him brave and wise in the same perspective. He had been very strong, had gone barefooted through snow, had left the battle-field as the last one etc. – but this strength is not emphasized in connection with his wisdom.

On the other hand, on cannot come to classical Greek virtues like courage and sophrosyne, in the meaning of modesty and self-control, without having some strength in mind and body. The Greeks indeed accentuated the training of the body. But apparently is spiritual strength itself not emphasized explicatively in the Greek tradition as directly connected to wisdom, insight, having virtues etc. It seems that the Greek Eros in taming often replaces the spiritual ethical strengthening in the Chinese tradition. In the dialogue Phaedrus, the soul is allegorized with a chariot with two horses [vi], apparently representing the Eros with it’s to urges: a white horse, driving up, and a black horse, driving down. The driver – apparently the Nous, the reason – must then harmonize and balance the two opposite forces in a very Chinese way, but it has not the strength in itself.

In some sense, the Eros must be conceived as the strength, pointing at the Te, in another sense it points towards the Tao itself; we shall return to this later.

The spiritual strength is general in Chinese tradition in combination with the training of the body. This is seen especially in the Chai Ch’i. It is the spiritual training itself that is the crucial dividing point. The Eros as such can exceptionally take the place even as the Tao itself: in Plato’s dialogue Symposium, Eros is the seek for ones lost other half-part[vii].¨ The theme of duality: the Chinese conception of Yin and Yang versus Pythagorean teaching. The theme of duality is expressed in the relation between Yin and Yang, where these are balanced in harmony. This is stressed in the Taoism, but it is not invented by this school. It is found all over in the different Chinese schools of philosophy. We also find Yin and Yang in a school of its own, the Yin-Yang Chia, represented by Tsou Yen. The very words seem to appear for the first time in a commentary to The book of Chances, I Ging[viii]. Taoism is, as mentioned, simply grounded on I Ging.

Also in the western philosophy, we find the opposing of contrasts as principles, were the contrasts carry each other, two and two; but in the Chinese conception of Yin and Yang, they also contain a little point of their opposites. This seems to be a more specific Chinese way of thinking.

But especially the Greek Philosophy states the contrasts as the thought that oppositions carry each other is as mentioned also found in the western philosophy; it is already found among the pre-Socratic philosophers, especially Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans. Here we find a table with two pairs of opposite categories, called archai, principles, twines[ix]. According to the view of duality, presupposed in this table, no unifying principle is needed, no unity precedes the duality: the One and the Many are two such opposite categories to be seen at the same level. The duality does not imply that everything is divided into two worlds, such as we find it in radical dualism in some western philosophy. But there is neither a specific unity to sustain a radical monism, although everything is related to everything. The final inspiration for duality in the Chinese conception of Yin and Yang and in the Greek Philosophy is the contrast between night and day, dark and light, winter and summer etc. Thus we find Yin representing the darkness, the night, the winter etc., and yang the light, the day, the summer, the light etc. This is also the case for the Greek duality: the light and the darkness are also found among the archai-pairs in the Pythagorean table. But in the Chinese duality, there is also a theme of gender, Ying representing the female, Yang the male. This is not found in the twine-table of opposite categories by the Pythagoreans. Here, on the other hand, we find the difference between Good and Evil – the light is the good, the darkness is the evil. This point towards stronger dualism and is alien to the Chinese way of thinking. Here the “Good” is the balance between Yin and Yang, the “Evil” is the lack of harmony.

The duality between female and male is found elsewhere in the Greek tradition: in Plato’s Timaeus we find the cosmos as a child of the male paradigm, and the female receiver of his imprinting. So here the duality male-female is inscribed in a triad (not ‘triad’ in the sense, that the duality presupposes a unity). We shall return to this later. But the basic idea is the same in the Chinese and in the Greek tradition: it is possible to think in contrasts in a way, where they so to speak

Only need each other and no other principle to harmonize them. On the other hand, in both traditions, it is also possible to think contrasts as carried by a third thing: in China, we find the Tao, and in Greece we find Logos and ‘Being’ and other concepts.

The theme of the way

The concept of Tao in Taoism and its Greek parallels, especially the Logos of Heracleites. Generally in the Chinese philosophy, the Yin and Yang must be harmonized. Originally, they were constituted in a balance; in the Taoism, the Yin and Yang in balance is coming from the first principle, the Tao; or it can be said, that the Yin and Yang in balance is established by following the Tao as the Way. This balance, however, can be disturbed; but again, the Tao makes it possible to restore this harmony. The concept of Tao of course neither can be translated to Greek nor to English. Since it is not only the central concept of the whole Taoist philosophy, but also is even an older word which gets more specific meaning in the Taoism, it must be taken as an idiomatic Chinese concept.

In comparing Taoism and Greek philosophy, we must – none the less – try to find concepts pointing in the direction of Tao. We can take the former mentioned Empedocles into consideration: In the Strife, we find the battle for power, the Yang; in the Friendship, we find seek for peace, the Yin – and the continuing changes between these express the Tao.

We have mentioned that the Eros is also to be seen as the force of the Greek Philosophy; both Taoism and Greek Philosophy are in need for such a force. In common Greek comprehension, Eros expresses Greed; seek for Power – that is, the Yang. But the Greek Philosophy is not just such a Yang way of thinking. The Eros, as described in Plato’s Symposium, really is the harmonizing principle, were One seeks ones own lost other half-part. Greek philosophy actually seeks harmony through Eros not only as the force that should be tamed by virtues such as sôphrosynê/ modesty,

good and righteousness; Eros can itself be seen as the harmonizing principle, corresponding to the Tao. As mentioned, the word for ‘strength’ in Taoism, Te, also in itself has this meaning of virtue in the sense, that the force is not a blind, untamed force. The Tao thus is the way, were nothing goes purely accidentally, but according to an order, that successively shows itself. In some sense, you must be virtuous in order to follow the way, the Tao – in another sense, the virtue is, that you simply follow this way!