Repay Resentment With Virtue

answered by Laozi, "Dao De Jing", Ch. 63

기원전 6~4세기

🎬 TODAY'S FILM — IT ASKS THIS

Ben-Hur (1959)

dir. William Wyler · USA

Stripped of everything by a friend's betrayal and sent to the galleys, a man regains power and stands before the chance for revenge. He wavers between completing it and being released from its chain.

THE QUESTION THE FILM ASKS

Must I be freed from the thirst for revenge before I can truly be free?

THE CLASSIC'S ANSWER · ORIGINAL

大小多少，報怨以德。

📜 THE CLASSIC'S ANSWER

Whether great or small, many or few — repay resentment with virtue.

💡 TL;DR

Laozi said that before resentment, one should repay not with resentment but with virtue.

📝The Classic Answers

Laozi said that before resentment, one should repay not with resentment but with virtue. Revenge looks like punishing the other, but in truth it re-binds the avenger to the very chain of that resentment. The moment the betrayed answers the betrayer in kind, the two are no longer different people. Whenever I hold onto a grudge as unfinished business, I first ask whether repaying it will set me free, or bind me more tightly still.

— ONGO · Curator

🌱Apply It Today

Recall one grudge weighing on you today, and ask yourself whether settling it would truly make you freer.

📖 Classic Source: Laozi, "Dao De Jing", Ch. 63. Ancient text in the public domain; rendered and interpreted independently by ONGO.
The film is honored as an equal questioner; its plot is rendered only as a universal dilemma. The classic source is an ancient text (Public Domain), and the reflection is 100% original ONGO content.