cover image Walking the Way: 81 Zen Encounters with the Tao Te Ching

Walking the Way: 81 Zen Encounters with the Tao Te Ching

Robert Rosenbaum. Wisdom (PGW, dist.), $17.95 trade paper (260p) ISBN 978-1-61429-025-4

Drawing on his experience as a Zen practitioner and qigong teacher, psychologist Rosenbaum reflects on the Tao Te Ching, written in the sixth century B.C.E. This founding text of Taoism, the author writes, “is not a ‘how to’ manual; it is an invitation for us to practice finding our Way.” The “original self” is a key theme as Rosenbaum explores each of the 81 verses, which he compiled from multiple translations; each section is followed by a brief, candid anecdote. Topics include silence, emptiness, effort, and empathy. Rosenbaum’s concept is ambitious; however, acute observations are mixed with rambling, clichéd, or dubious generalizations (“When you have no unfinished business, dying is not so big a deal”). Terms are sometimes used too vaguely, and the author addresses a “we” with pronouncements that not all readers may consider applicable (“We fear if we don’t have enough money, fame, and power, we’ll be vulnerable to the vicissitudes of life”). More “fragments of Zen” amid ruminations than “Zen encounters,” the book makes explicit at its conclusion the author’s attraction to the “effortless effort” of Taoism’s Way to balance the “striving” that can sometimes emerge in the practice of Buddhism. (May)