How are we to interpret the following testimony to ancient Chinese wisdom? “Thus, the wise man looks into space and does not regard the small as too little nor the great as too much (…) He has gained clarity regarding the straight and even way, so that he is not happy about his birth nor unhappy about his death. For he knows that neither end nor beginning can be fixed or held.” (Zhuangzi, Das wahre Buch vom südlichen Blütenland, S. 181)
Zhuangzi recommends an attitude of natal-mortal indifference, the ataraxic “middle way” between belief in the advantage of having been born and in the disadvantage of having to die. – It is an attitude which “sits out” one’s own life and permits the begetting of further human beings, since these latter too will be free to cultivate the attitude of natal-mortal indifference.
