Comparison Of Taoism In The Ten Ox Herding Songs

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While “The Ten Ox Herding Songs” is a collection of Buddhist poems it can still be analysed from the viewpoint of Taoism. The collection as the name suggests, contains ten different poems, each one continuing an overarching story that spans all ten poems. The titles of each poem addresses its main theme; the titles are: The Search for the Bull, Discovering the Footprints, Perceiving the Bull, Catching the Bull, Taming the Bull, Riding the Bull Home, The Bull Transcended, Both the Bull and Self Transcended, Reaching the Source, and lastly In the World. The first poem is titled The Search for the Bull. This poem includes five major themes; the pasture of the world, the tall grasses, the bull, the nameless rivers, and the interpenetrating paths of distant mountains. The first line of the poem The first line of the poem “The Dawn has come” is highly metaphorical and symbolic. Dawn is also known as a sign of new beginnings and the turning of a new leaf. This could represent the author’s decision in poem five to “turn over a new leaf” and stop fighting against Tao. The second line also deals with the author’s decision to follow Tao and everything it has set out for her. “Within my thatched dwelling I have abandoned the whip and ropes.” While at first this line may seem to just be a literal acceptance of their surroundings and how content they are with the ox’s pacification this can also be taken metaphorically with their willingness to as the first line represents “turn over a new leaf”. The whips and ropes represent the hardship and unhappiness that they went through while fighting against Tao, but now that they no longer wish to feel the bite of the whip and ropes so they have abandoned them in favor of the comfort and happiness that can be found in their thatched

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