Do Not Let Artifice Destroy What Heaven Has Given

answered by Zhuangzi, "Autumn Floods"

기원전 4세기경

🎬 TODAY'S FILM — IT ASKS THIS

Our Twisted Hero (1992)

dir. Park Jong-won · South Korea

Before the absolute rule of a class monitor over his classroom, only a newly transferred boy refuses to conform. The rest choose comfort, and his resistance becomes a long, lonely fight.

THE QUESTION THE FILM ASKS

If bowing to power is survival, what, then, is resistance for?

THE CLASSIC'S ANSWER · ORIGINAL

无以人滅天，无以故滅命，无以得殉名。謹守而勿失，是謂反其真。

📜 THE CLASSIC'S ANSWER

Do not let the human destroy the heavenly; do not let contrivance destroy what is fated; do not let the pursuit of gain destroy your good name. Guard this carefully and do not lose it — this is called returning to what is true.

💡 TL;DR

Zhuangzi warned against letting artifice destroy what heaven has given.

📝The Classic Answers

Zhuangzi warned against letting artifice destroy what heaven has given. Bowing to the power of a class monitor who has taken complete control makes the whole classroom comfortable. But that comfort is bought at the price of each person erasing the very judgment heaven gave them. Only a boy newly transferred in refuses to conform, enduring discomfort alone. That very discomfort is the struggle not to lose what is true. Whenever conformity offers me comfort, I trace back what, exactly, I am erasing in exchange for it.

— ONGO · Curator

🌱Apply It Today

If you are erasing your own judgment for comfort today, recall once more what that judgment actually was.

📖 Classic Source: Zhuangzi, "Autumn Floods". 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.