Original language:
Chinese Translated from: (Lietuvių) nežinoma
Composers: Macevičius, Juozas
Translated by: Macevičius, Juozas
ISBN: 9955-649-25-9
Published in: Vilnius
Published on: 2005
Publisher: Gamta
“A journey of a thousand li starts beneath one’s feet“. – Chinese proverb
Over the ages an immense literary heritage has been collected in China. This set of aphorisms “A Thousand li: Ancient Chinese wisdom“ conveys sayings and proverbs of Ancient Chinese sages as well as philosophical and literary traditions of three philosophical schools: Confucianism, Taoism and Chan (Zen) Buddhism. There is no hostility between all of these teachings.
The aphorisms in this book present an excellent example of Chinese concreteness of thinking and a different vision of the world, dominates short and specific images of ideas, situations and feelings. This set consists of Ancient Chinese proverbs and sayings of the wise and the Chinese philosopher Confucius quotes taken from the “Analects of Confucius“ in which we find the Master‘s and his students reasonings. “A Thousand li“ book also consists of fragmented Taoist reasonings from the book “Guan Inzi“ (10th century) and selected Chan maxims, which convey the ideas of Chan (Zen) Buddhism as well as Hong Zicheng and his contemporaries aphorisms from the set “Vegetable Roots Discourse“. In Ancient China people understood that various teachings and ideologies are possible. In many cases next to one author‘s ideas exist the same ideas and symbols from other authors. Therefore, the same ideas are conveyed in this book, but “The most expensive between heaven and earth – a man“. Maxims presented in this book are not just exotic thoughts of the past, they are timeless and relevant to every generation. Everyone can gain inspiration from them: state leaders, ordinary employees or students.
Book “A Thousand li“ highlights the uniqueness of the East. The most important difference of the eastern-based society can be formulated as: “People are different and the difference must be clearly demonstrated“. Eastern philosophies focuses on the unity of life and cognition.
The book is just a small reflection of Chinese literature. These aphorisms and thoughts remained relevant to this day, it helps to understand not only the Chinese, but the East Asian laws, ideals and values.