The Comparison of the Holy Bible the Dao De Jing

INTRODUCTION

The Bible speaks to the religious antiquities intended to gull Christian believers through their lives, setting up the ethical code to pursue. Many refer Moses as the first human author who wrote the first five books within the Bible- Torah books. The Holy Bible falls into two categories, the old and new testament with a total of 66 books. The Bible is very strict with the standards in it: the Christians must follow them without questioning, doing how God said it.

The Bible’s Old Testament is thought to originate in the ancient Hebrew.  Numerous researchers have held that the Hebrew Bible began in the sixth century B.C. because Hebrew composing was considered to extend back no more.  The Bible has influenced most of many cultures globally through its effect on different languages. More than 22,000 English words take the Hebrew foundation. That is more than the underlying foundations of French, Latin, and Greek (A History of the Holy Bible, 1976). Bible contains the equitable convention and forms a profound quality, ideas of equity, and social gatherings over thousands of years. It is a solid declaration to the historical movement of a State in numerous structures.

On the other hand, The Dao De Jing is a book written by the Chinese philosopher Laozi over 2,500 years ago. Being a critical oriental great work, Dao De Jing profoundly has impacted Chinese spirituality. It is a Chinese accumulation of 81 traditional writings that hold the covered solutions to human reality, the profound significance of life, to what is and what is not, and to creation and God. The Dao De Jing comprises of three words. Dao, which for the most part refers to the way; De, which relates to virtue; and Jing referring to power.

It penetrates each part of Chinese daily life, its way of life, thinking design, perspective, and the oriental rationality. It likewise has a massive impact in the West, particularly in philosophy. Dao De Jing has more than 200 English translations, more than the Confucius books. Eminent as the second-most generally translated book on the planet after the Holy Bible, the Dao De Jing’s effect on Asian idea, writing and artistry have been significant. Notwithstanding its importance as a philosophical content in the established Chinese corpus, the Dao De Jing has likewise been compelling in the improvement of different indigenous Chinese religious customs.

Since the two books share some similar events and characters, the more likenesses we share, the more trust we will have in one another. It depends on the fact that the brains of every person are equivalent; hence a similar judicious cognizance is controlled by all individuals regardless of their race, education, and religion. The similarity of Dao De Jing and the Bible lies in that both harp on metaphysics, cosmology and the Absolute Truth, which rise above all societies. Even though the Bible is the foundation of western civilization, individuals ought not to get overlooked as it originates from Asian culture. In this way, it holds numerous primary grounds with Dao De Jing. Even though the two works of art may have contrastive contrasts in style, phrasing, a method of reasoning and necessary foundation, their otherworldly likeness is obvious both concentrate on the Absolute Truth.

Hypothesis: While the Holy Bible and Daodejing seem to be teaching something different, they are similar in their representations of God & Jesus and Dao & Sage, respectively.

The relationship between the Dao and God

The mention of love

The entire Bible demonstrates God’s love for people. Here are a few citations from it on love: “For God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him will not die but rather have everlasting life.” (John 3:16).

On the other hand, in numerous spots, Dao De Jing likewise discussed the unselfish love of Dao. “Everything is conceived of the Dao. However, he never praises himself. He sustains them with LOVE, but does not claim to be master over them.” (34:4).

The mention of Yehovah

The God of Israel in the Old Testament, had numerous names, for example, Jehovah, Shaddai, and Elohim. These initials uncover distinctive identities of the Almighty. It is an uncommon occurrence that the old Chinese called their Supreme Lord “Shangdi”; its elocution is very like “Shaddai”-  both signifying the Highest.

The name Yehovah is mysteriously clarified in Chapter 14 of Dao De Jing, even though Lao Zi had never contacted the Bible. The Three-in-One was regarded to as “Yi-Xi-Wei.” The Yi represented the eye that stares yet observe it not, the Xi represented the ear which is listening but instead cannot hear it, and Wei represents the hand that feels however it cannot hold.

The Dao De Jing Chapter 14 idea shows that Dao (Yi-Xi-Wei) is invisible, undefined, and infinitive. He is the light source; on the off chance that one can ride in the Dao, everything present and past were clear to them. By correlation, we can perceive that “Dao” from numerous points may mean Yehovah in the Bible,

The idea of God/Dao as our parent

As per the Dao De Jing, “Dao” is mostly referred to as “the Mother of all things.” (1:2). In any case, it is intriguing that the Dao is once in a while called Father.

On the other hand, some people refer Yehovah as Father in the Bible. From an otherworldly perspective, seeing to the Creator father or mother is just a social inclination, in a definitive, it is the equivalent. In religious philosophy, God is Spirit, who possesses no gender orientation. The thing that matters is the way that human dialect is restricted while God is boundless. When we utilize the restricted dialect to depict God, we are limited by its insufficiencies. As known, the Chinese culture has a gentle nature that favours acquiescence and softness, while Western civilization is of fatherly quality, which advocates experience and toughness.

The use of analogies to describe the nature of Dao and God

The Dao resembles water. The water analog holds has a particular critical place in Dao De Jing because it is the “root analogy” through which an entire arrangement of idea plots about Dao are presented. Honestly, water is the mildest thing, in any case, it is additionally ground-breaking. In a storm, nothing can stop its direction. On the off chance that a person strikes still water, it will give way; water is flexible to the point that a person has no real way to attract it. Much the same as water, the Dao is god-like; in any case, its quality showcases through its shortcoming.

The water metaphor additionally assumes a necessary part of the Bible in which God appears as “the spring of living water.” (Jeremiah 2:13). Moreover, light is a crucial image of God in the Bible, since it resembles God from numerous points of view. Lao Zi likewise looks at the Dao as the light.

The comparison between Jesus and Sage

As per the Sage, there is emphasize on being like children: Lao Zi says. So we can state that in the kingdom of Dao, there is no place for “grown-ups,” just kids. All must strive toward becoming children before entering the Dao. On the other hand, the Bible records similar expressions of Jesus. When people guide children to Jesus to have him contact them, he rebuked them. He called the children and stated, “Let the little children come to me, and don’t prevent them, for the kingdom of God belongs to them.” (Luke 18:15-17). The sage was a self-effacing man of fewer words who did not provoke experiences. Jesus appears to have shown a comparable style. The individual encapsulation of the paradoxical inversion is the Sage.

Laozi had no name for the Nameless, so he called it Dao; Jesus was not able to depict the Kingdom of God accurately, so he contrasted it with mustard seed. In the two instances, dialect is created to express more, and paradox is utilized to express prominent solidarity that lies past the logical inconsistency. Along these lines, the mystery turns into the symbol of the bringing together the character of both/and rationale. The confusing inversion is by a wide margin the most common repeating topic in the DDJ. This topic additionally reverberates all through the expressions of Jesus in the New Testament, for instance, “So the last will be first, and the first last” (Mt. 20:8). Laozi also utilizes these inversions to flip around regular profound qualities.

The Bible discusses two occasions Yehovah and Jesus Christ. Yehovah is the predominant figure in the Old Testament, while Jesus is the most dominant in the New Testament. Coincidently, Dao De Jing fundamentally talks about the Dao and the Sage. Be that as it may, the Sage in Dao De Jing is to some degree baffling character to me. Some trust that the Sage was a significant anonymous figure, others think he was just a fanciful model under Lao Zi’s pen. Still, others state that it was inconceivable for such an ideal individual to live in such a world.

Doubtlessly, their puzzlement is reasonable. In Dao De Jing, more than thirty locations referenced the Sage, his comment and activity. At the point when Laozi talks about the “Sage,” he is portraying the characteristics of the great pioneer as opposed to the qualities ordinarily connected with leadership. For Laozi, power is in lowliness, not forceful self-statement. The above leads him to the ambiguous relationship of servanthood &  good leadership. In that similar sense, Jesus stated, “You realize that among the Gentiles those whom they perceive as their ruler’s lord over them, and their incredible ones are tyrants over them. But it isn’t so among you…” (Mk. 10:42-44).

CONCLUSION

From the above relative study, we can see that there do exist numerous likenesses between the Holy Bible and the Dao De Jing, and these similarities can be the basic landscape for exact spiritual correspondence between the West and East. Currently, in the economic globalization, the religious buildings both in the West and East are disintegrating; groups in either side are experiencing the purported “identity crisis” spiritual poverty. Their otherworldly odysseys have advanced various correspondence and general comprehension. The investigation of the shared traits of East-West societies won’t just extend our understanding of the quintessence of multiple cultures and their formative standards yet also their methods of reasoning, along these lines advancing world advancement and harmony. On the off-chance that we contrast the Holy Bible with being an epic, Dao De Jing with just 5,000 words is much the same as its encapsulation, which is dazzling and brief. The examination of the two sacred texts will debase nobody yet make each sparkling all the more splendidly in the other’s organization.

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