溫故知新 Old wisdom, today’s insight — ONGO
Why Does Hardship Come First Before a Great Calling?
If hardship is the tempering before a great calling — does this difficulty now pressing on me also carry some meaning?
When Heaven is about to lay a great charge upon a person, it first embitters the heart and will, and wearies the sinews and bones.
To the question whether hardship holds meaning, answers long diverged. Mencius saw it as Heaven's discipline; the Stoic Seneca said "misfortune is virtue's opportunity," that God tempers those he loves. Both traditions read suffering as material for growth. But the author of Ecclesiastes gazed at the opposite — the same fate befalls the righteous and the wicked, and the reason cannot be known under the sun. The Book of Job pushed this question to the limit and, in the end, gave no reason at all. Over whether hardship bears meaning or is meaningless, East and West split head-on.
In an age that as easily packages pain into a growth story as abandons it to meaninglessness, the question "does this hardship hold meaning?" still demands an honest gaze.
Mencius read adversity as Heaven's tempering.
📝I, Too, Stand Before It
Mencius read adversity as Heaven's tempering. Upon one it would burden greatly, Heaven first embitters the heart and wearies the body, forging the capacity for what one could not yet do. This is not a glorifying of all suffering — only a long observation that hardship endured enlarges a person. I know this question can be a dangerous comfort. Yet if I can see the present strain as preparation for a calling, the grain of my endurance changes. I stand not fully knowing this difficulty's meaning, before the question.
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