Ever since societies became politically organized and became aware of it, words have been part of the problem (let them tell us that we don't believe a single word when they come from a certain place). Written or spoken, as Plato already showed in his "Phaedo", they had no more value than that of a rhetoric aimed at public persuasion. The question is why he wrote, but he already answered that in his "Letter VII" and as a scholiast also pointed out, the Athenian distinguished very well between what he knew and what he wrote. The words, in their equivalence with knowledge itself, were in turn discussed by the Eastern tradition, which led to a religiosity of renunciation of the world. On this side, the distrust was absolute.
I bring you here -in relation to the book by Freund and his writer in crisis- a story from almost twenty-five centuries ago attributed to Chuang-Tzu (illustration), in the version of the Trappist monk Thomas Merton, a recognized defender of civil rights in America, on the other hand, and notable thinker on spirituality. It is titled "Duke Hwan and the Wheelwright" (Debate):
"The world values books, and thinks that by doing this it is valuing the Tao. But books contain nothing but words. Still, there is something else that gives value to books. Not just the words or the thought contained in the words. but something else contained in the thought, tilting it in a certain direction that words cannot grasp. But it is the words themselves that the world values when it puts them into books: and though the world values them, these words have no meaning. value while that which gives it is not honored.
That which a man apprehends through observation is nothing but the outer form and colour, name and sound, and he believes that this will put him in possession of the Tao. Shape and color, name and sound, fail to reflect reality. For this reason: 'He who knows does not say, he who says does not know'. How then is the world to know the Tao through words?
Duke Hwan of Khi, the first of his dynasty, was sitting under his poop reading philosophy, and Phien the wheelwright was in the courtyard making a wheel. Phien put aside the hammer and chisel, ascended the steps, and said to Duke Hwan: 'May I ask, sir, what is that you are reading?' The Duke said: `To the experts. The authorities. And Phien asked: 'Alive or dead?' 'Dead a long time ago'. 'So,' said the carter, 'you are reading nothing but the rubbish they left behind.' The duke replied: `What do you know of this? You are nothing but a carter. You better give me a good explanation or you'll die. The carter said: `When I make wheels, if I take it easy, they fall apart; if I'm too violent, they don't fit; if I am neither too calm nor too violent, they turn out well. The work turns out as I wish. This cannot be translated into words: you simply have to know how it is. I can't even explain to my son how to do it, and my own son can't learn it from me. So here I am, in my seventies, still making wheels! The men of old took with them to the grave everything they really knew. And so, my lord, what you are reading there is nothing more than the rubbish they left behind.
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