Mining Gnosis Through the Tao Te Ching–verses 1 & 31

Welcome back to Gnostic Insights and to The Gnostic Reformation on Substack. My name is Dr. Cyd Ropp and I’m your host. This episode of Gnostic Insights is going to continue discussing Gnosis and the Tao Te Ching.

In the previous episode of Gnosis and the Tao Te Ching, verse 40, I described how I translate the Tao Te Ching using Jonathan Star’s Tao Te Ching—The Definitive Edition. Today’s episode evolved from two earlier Simple Explanation blogs where I first interpreted the Tao Te Ching using Simple Explanation terms. Years later I added Gnostic terms to the articles and released the episode as a podcast on December 3, 2021.

You needn’t become a Taoist to be a Gnostic. These are just labels. But truth is truth, and there is only one truth.

Many wisdom books over the ages have written about this truth, and our familiar Gnostic scriptures that are contained in the Dead Sea Scrolls or in the Nag Hammadi are merely one set of Gnostic scriptures. But other cultures have had similar revelations worldwide and throughout time, and that’s why I share the Tao Te Ching with you. We will begin with verse 1, and I’m taking this from the Stephen Mitchell translation of the Tao Te Ching, which reads like this:

The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao.

The name that can be named is not the eternal name.

The unnameable 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.

In 2010, I posted an article to my Simple Explanation of Absolutely Everything blog about verse 1 here, and this is what I said about it back then, as I was translating it into Simple Explanation terms, and it goes like this:

The information and principles of organization imagined in ideal form in the metaverse are more perfect and complete than we can ever articulate. Pure conscious awareness without time and space exists outside our universe. Abstract thought on the part of pure consciousness defined creation prior to the Big Bang.

In our universe, we are only able to recognize objects and concepts we have named. When we set down our meme bundles, we are freed from personal preference. In that clear state, we may perceive the workings of the universal model and our role in it.

Remaining attached to our memes obscures the inflowing metaversal patterns and keeps us tethered to our familiar material and relational patterns. Pure undifferentiated consciousness dwells in the unformed darkness of the metaverse. The thought patterns that produce light and matter arise out of the metaverse, but the manifestations of these patterns take place within our universe.

The portal into our universe is the gateway to all understanding.

So that was spoken in terms of my Simple Explanation of Absolutely Everything Theory of Everything Model. But since that time, I have become knowledgeable concerning the Gnostic terminology and concepts.

And so, let me re-translate this into Gnostic terms that you may be more familiar with. To begin with, as explained in the previous episode, the Tao Te Ching speaks of the Tao. This is what we refer to as the Father in Gnostic cosmology.

And the Father that can be spoken about? Well, obviously we cannot capture any description of the Father. The Father is unformed consciousness. It’s pure consciousness without thought.

And for us to attempt to describe that, obviously it’s not possible. But we can say that that’s what it is, even though we can’t quite articulate it, see? The name that can be named is not the eternal name. So when we say, oh, we’re speaking of the Father, we’re just saying the Father that is this category of pure consciousness, our ground state of the universe, the resting matrix of all that is—but it’s not the same as the Father. It’s just that we are conceiving and calling the Father, because the Father is greater than that. The unnameable is the eternally real.

So the Father is eternal. That means there is no time. It’s not that it’s infinite time, it’s that it is eternal. It is outside of time. And the Father is the eternally real substance that predates all of existence. And by the way, that is the nugget of gnosis.

When it is said we’re supposed to gain gnosis, what we are attempting to realize is the gnosis that there is this thing we call the Father, or in Simple Explanation terms, the metaverse. It is outside of everything we know, and it pre-exists everything we know. It is before time and space.

Naming is the origin of all particular things. So one thing about humans in particular, since we are the ones who speak with language, in order to conceive of anything, in order to think about a concept, we have to have words to describe it to ourselves. We talk to ourselves about it. Or to describe it to someone else, like I’m talking to you, we have to put this into the form of words. And words is the same as naming.

In the Old Testament, in Genesis, it said that man gave name to all the animals, right? Or is that a Bob Dylan song? I think that’s how Bob Dylan said it in that song, man gave names to all the animals in the beginning, in the beginning.

So that is how Dylan put it. But in Genesis, it says that it was the job of mankind or humanity to name all of the animals. And we humans didn’t only name all the animals, we named everything. We name concepts. That’s what we do. We are little meme generators.

Do you remember there was a movie, what, about 15 or 20 years ago, called, What the Bleep Do We Know? [released in 2011] Did you see that movie? They claimed in that movie, that when the ships, the sailing ships from the Spanish came and encountered the Native Americans for the first time, I think it was the Americans, that the natives that were standing on shore could literally not see the sailing ships because they had never conceived of a large ship like that with sails. And because they had never named it, they literally could not see it. And they didn’t notice that they were being invaded by the Spaniards until the Spaniards pulled those ships right offshore and began to disembark. And then they could see that they were boats and there were people. That’s what how they put it in that movie.

Anyway, according to verse 1 of the Tao, it says, naming is the origin of all particular things. Because until you name them, it’s just one big observation without any particularity. It’s like if you look at a painting and you look at it as one gigantic gestalt prior to noticing the colors, and then you name the colors, or prior to noticing the shapes or the objects in the painting, and then you recognize those objects by naming them and those shapes by naming them. Before naming things, it is all undifferentiated. So naming is the origin of all particular things.

Then the Tao says, free from desire, you realize the mystery. And I discussed that at length in the previous episode from November 28, 2021. [Perhaps I will rerun that episode next week—back in 2021 I wasn’t posting transcripts, so you Substack readers probably didn’t get the earlier Tao episodes.]

Our memes, and our words, and our orientation of emotions to objects is a pattern. And in order to get beyond those patterns of what is familiar and what we already can know and name, if you’re trying to expand your realization to beyond what you already know, you have to drop what you know, because the memes, the meme bundle that you’re already holding onto, defines what you know. So in order to transcend that, it’s extremely helpful to put away those memes, to drop them, to get rid of them, at least during the process of contemplation. And only then can you realize the mystery, can you see beyond what you know.

The Tao says, caught in desire, you see only the manifestations. And the manifestations is another word for our material universe. We are in a manifested state here in this universe, with time and space and objects, materiality, things we can touch. But prior to this physical state, it was all conceptual, it was all idealized. Yet mystery and manifestations arise from the same source.

So that which we don’t know, and that which we are surrounded by, and which we can touch and taste and see, all arise from the same source. And we call that source the Father. In the Tao, the source is called darkness, darkness within darkness. In other words, the depth of consciousness is so deep that we can’t penetrate it. It’s a darkness within darkness. It’s untouchable. And that is why in my illustrations, I illustrate the Father as the black page underneath the other figures. The blackness is the ground state.

Yet it is the gateway to all understanding. And this is why the Gnostic gospel basically invites us to remember the Gnosis that we had prior to our instantiation. We can remember the Gnosis of the Father, of the Son, and of the Pleroma, because this is where our consciousness derives from. We are being poured into this universe, and we take this physical manifestation form. But the consciousness is one unending flow that comes from the Father. All right, that was verse 1 of the Tao Te Ching.

Now let us go on to verse 31 of the Tao Te Ching, which is from a post on the Simple Explanation of Absolutely Everything blog from May 6th of 2011. Here is verse 31, which I’m going to read to you directly from my own personal translation that I took off of that Jonathan Star Complete Tao book, which I mentioned in the previous 2026 episodes. He’s put all of the pictograms for the verses on one side of a ledger, and then all possible translations for each pictogram on the right side of the ledger. And in this way you can use your own discernment to kind of drift down the right side of the ledger and find the Gnosis that is most meaningful to you. The Gnosis will emerge from the words written on the right side.

And so I was reading the Tao many years ago prior to my familiarity with the Gnostic cosmology, and the words that I use here are from the Simple Explanation cosmology, which is entirely consistent with our Gnostic cosmology, by the way, but it is put in less religious terms, more generalized terms. So here’s how that goes. Verse 31:

Even the finest instruments of war cannot bring good fortune. All units of consciousness seem to detest them. Therefore, one who is aligned with the universal unit of consciousness avoids them.

Consciousness prefers the passive, the weak, the feminine. War gives preference to the active, the strong, the masculine.

Instruments of war are the least fortunate of all tools. In opposition to the instruments preferred by the indwelling Lord, our universal unit of consciousness, they should only be used when unavoidably compelled. Detached restraint is the best policy. Even in victory there should be no boasting, but rather find beauty in the universal unit of consciousness.

Truly, those who find joy in killing others cannot expect to instantiate heaven on earth. Joyful events celebrate the feminine. Sorrow and calamity prefer the masculine.

The second-in-command occupies the masculine position on the left. The commander-in-chief takes the place on the right, or the feminine side. An arrangement on par with a funeral rite.

Accordingly, killing others causes all units of consciousness to weep with sorrow. Victory in battle is, therefore, an opportunity for mourning and should be treated as one.

Now, in our Gnostic cosmology terminology, when I speak of units of consciousness, it’s our Self, our big S Self. Our Self is in contrast to our ego. So, our personality is made up of a couple of parts. The ego is that part of us that interacts with the manifested world around us. Our ego also comes to us from above, but then the memes of our earthly existence stick to our egos like iron filings drawn to a magnet and befuddle us with confusion.

Our Self is a pure reflection of the Pleroma above. We are the fruit of the Pleroma in Gnostic cosmology. We are their children. And our consciousness is the same as their consciousness. Our Self, which is that spiritual part of our Self, is a reflection of the consciousness of the Pleroma coming down from the Son, coming down from the Father. That’s our conduit to upwards. Pure consciousness comes down to us, into our Self.

So, taking another look at verse 31:

Even the finest instruments of war cannot bring good fortune.

All units of consciousness, that is, all of our Self that reflects the Father above, seem to detest the instruments of war. Therefore, a person who is fully aligned with their true Self, and with the Father and the Pleroma and the Son, avoids using these instruments of war. Consciousness—that is the Father—prefers the passive, the weak, the feminine.

And in Taoism, feminine is not a negative term. Passivity is not a negative term. It’s not better to be active than passive. It’s not better to be masculine than feminine, and vice versa. It’s simply that passive means receptive, yin, whereas masculine is active, yang. So, according to the Tao Te Ching, consciousness prefers the passive state in us, whereas war refers to the never-ending battle that we are engaged in down here.

Remember, the Second Order powers, all of us creatures, were sent down here from the Pleroma to engage the deficiency and overcome it. Not to kill it and wipe it out and destroy it from the face of the earth, but to redeem it. But the tragic thing about us Second Order powers is, once we came into this manifested universe, and we begin to engage in this never-ending battle with the Demiurge and the Archons, we tend to forget that our actual mission is love and redemption, and we think we’re just supposed to kill them.

That is an error in Gnostic thought. It’s also an error according to the Tao. It says that instruments of war are the least fortunate of all tools, and they are in opposition to the instruments of the indwelling Lord. And the indwelling Lord, in Gnostic terminology, is the Pleroma, or the Christ. If you are redeemed, you have some sort of heavenly-from-above indwelling Self that is in alignment with and powered by the Pleroma, the Son, the Father, and the Christ. So the instruments preferred by this indwelling of the Pleroma is love.

I’m going to love you to death, and not, I’m going to chop off your head. Detached restraint is the best policy, and that is very difficult to come by. I, myself, am a very passionate person, and it’s very hard for me to approach conflict with detached restraint. And I so admire people who have an approach of detached restraint, because bluster and anger and threats don’t really move the ball forward. It just re-engages us in the war. Detached restraint, it says here in the Tao, is the best policy.

Even in victory, there should be no boasting. But rather, in the victory, you would find the beauty of the Father. It says, truly, those who find joy in killing others cannot expect to instantiate heaven on earth.

So, you know, terrorism is not a good idea, is what it’s saying. Or going ballistic and running over people with your car is not going to bring joy to the Father above. It is a tragedy.

Joyful events celebrate the feminine. That is, passivity is the face of joy. Sorrow and calamity prefer the masculine. These acts of violence are active yang-type events. They are manifested parts of the war. They are not coming from the consciousness of the Father in the Pleroma.

Then this verse 31 talks about some ancient Chinese ritual type of placements, which I think are not that important to our discussion. But that’s what that’s about. The commander-in-chief takes the place on the right, the feminine side. And the second in command is the one that occupies the yang position, the position on the left. So, at least they’re in balance. The commander-in-chief, she, is supposed to be more passive, slower to act, more contemplative. This is the job of the commander-in-chief, to be in touch with the Father’s will. Whereas the second in command is the guy commanding the troops. He’s the one holding the swords that’s ready to rush out in battle at the command of the commander.

Verse 31 notes that the same arrangement is the way they did their funeral rites, with the masculine position on the left and the feminine position on the right being the way that people stand and mourn those who have fallen. Accordingly, it says, killing others causes all units of consciousness to weep with sorrow. Victory in battle is, therefore, an opportunity for mourning and should be treated as one.

So, he’s saying that battle is analogically the same as a funeral. Battle and funerals are the same type of activity, causing all units of consciousness to weep with sorrow, including the units of consciousness of the Aeons above in the Pleroma and the unit of consciousness of the Son. Victory in battle is, therefore, an opportunity for mourning and should be treated as one, not as something to rejoice over.

And that is the wisdom of verse 31. Here’s how I discuss that in terms of the Simple Explanation in the article I wrote back in 2011. It said, this verse is most obviously about how we should react to war and the slaughter of war.

Simply put, killing an enemy is only a last resort when absolutely compelled by circumstances. Even then, victory is never sweet, never an occasion for boasting or celebration. For according to verse 31, good cannot come from it. Heaven on earth will not result from war. It’s axiomatic. Axiomatic means a law of the universe—an axiom is a law.

Secondly, this verse talks a lot about left and right, feminine and masculine. These are references to yin and yang, not women and men, per se. And by the way, I think that in the Gnostic Gospels that I’ve read contained in the Nag Hammadi scriptures, or the book of Thomas, for example, when it talks about the feminine or the weakness of the feminine, this is what it has meant. It’s not saying that women are weak. It’s saying that the passive position is actually the one preferred by the Father, in order to be able to hear the gnosis.

The Tao says, about this yin-yang polarity, that consciousness requires a yin state of mind, whether it be your own personal unit of consciousness, your own Self, or the universal unit of consciousness, that is, the pleroma and the Son of God, with which your personal Self longs to be united. To be or to become conscious, one must cultivate and dwell in the passive feminine yin state, which is to say, the receptive state. War, conflict, and killing are evidence of passionate yang states, the masculine active mode. Verse 31 is advancing the axiom that the mode of being required by war is antithetical to that required by consciousness.

So it’s one or the other. Either you’re in your war-like state, or you are in your Gnostic state. But to be within gnosis and to be wielding the sword at the same time doesn’t work.

Lao Tzu equates beauty and joy with consciousness, or with the Father, and being in alignment with the universal unit of consciousness, which is the Son and the pleroma. This is why he equates killing with sorrow, because to wield the sword, the gun, the explosive vest, or the truck, is never the metaversal plan, is never the will of the Father, and will never bring the desired joyful outcome.

And, by the way, as a quick aside, the war-like God of the Old Testament, the one that was always sending the Hebrews into battle, this is actually the demiurge of this universe. This is the creator of this universe, but it is not the same as the will of the Father above. The demiurge is after the fall. The demiurge has amnesia. The demiurge does not remember the will of the Father, and cannot dip into the well of Gnosis. So, the demiurge is all yang, we could say, whereas the Father is yin. So, when people are being compelled by God to pick up the sword and kill others in the name of God, this is actually in the name of the demiurge.

And, indeed, the demiurge is the God of this manifested universe, Jehovah, Yahweh, but he is not identical, as far as Gnostic thought goes, to the God Above All gods. You see, they’re completely different states of being. One is the active yang state of our manifested universe, and one is the passive yin state of the Father.

And, lastly, here’s how I interpret the part about the second in command occupying the yang position and the commander occupying the yin. When seeking enlightenment or alignment with the Father, the pleroma, God’s will, the God Above All gods—your personal Self needs to hold the commander’s position in your soul. If your Self is in control, rather than your little me mind—your emotional yang passions of your ego—you will be in the passive yin state, and be able to channel the Father and the pleroma. In that yin state, it is just fine for the passions and the mind, the ego, to be second in command. This is how it should be. When those roles are reversed, as they are for most people, whose theater of action is the material world, then their yang state precludes the receptivity required for enlightenment.

In other words, their ego is in control and they are in the Yang state, they are in the active mode, and they are not being receptive to the will of the Father. Therefore, when, with full consciousness of the tragic consequences, the Self must preside over war or battle; this is an occasion for mourning, as if we were presiding over a funeral.

Okay, I’m going to leave you with that today. That’s two more of the Tao Te Ching verses. There are 81 altogether. I probably won’t be sharing all 81 here on Gnostic Insights. Maybe just a couple more next time or, with your encouragement, perhaps I will keep them coming.

Thank you for spending this time with me. Feel free to send me a line using the comments form at the GnosticInsights.com website or Comments under the transcript on Substack. I always respond personally. I like to correspond with my listeners.

So, until next time, God bless, and Onward and Upward!

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