Everyone would like more wisdom and could benefit from becoming
wiser, which is supposed to come with age and experience. Yet
we can enhance and awaken our inner spiritual wisdom by studying
and learning from the wisdom of others. In fact the wise are able
to avoid mistakes and find a more direct path to enlightenment
by learning from the experiences of others as well as their own.
Only fools burn their fingers on a hot stove after having been
warned.
Today there seems to be less understanding of wisdom than in the
ancient times and with all our modern complexities an even greater
need for it. T. S. Eliot lamented, "Where is the wisdom we
have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in
information?"
Wisdom transcends the knowledge of science, because it concerns
not only knowledge but also spiritual and human values. Knowledge
and science alone cannot tell us what to do but only how to do
something. All our choices are based on values; our values are
what we love. We may conceptualize these as good and bad, loving
what we consider good and avoiding what we consider bad. Wisdom
helps us to understand what is truly good, giving us the ability
to love well.
Ancient philosophy often placed great importance on knowing what
is good and how we can learn to choose what is good. The ancients
endeavored to discover and realize human virtues in order to avoid
the pain and misery which come from vices. They also sought the
higher spiritual truths found in the enlightenment which comes
from experiencing the divine or the soul or the source of truth
and goodness. In many of these texts realization of eternal spiritual
reality obviates the fear of death.
The Wisdom Bible combines together some of the greatest
wisdom ever put in literary form from the great philosophical
and religious traditions of ancient China, India, Greece, the
Middle East, and Rome. Having examined the recorded history of
human civilization I would say that five great philosophical traditions
stand out for the depth, power, and spirituality of their knowledge:
from the ancient times China, India, Greco-Roman, and the Middle
East, and in recent centuries Europe and America.
This collection brings together under one cover the greatest texts
of spiritual wisdom from the four ancient traditions so that their
lasting value can contribute to our modern world. They are drawn
from the richest period of philosophy and extend from the eighth
century BC to 632 CE. Their influence and ideas have continued
to this day.
These texts are some of the best writings from Daoism (Taoism),
Confucianism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Platonism, Epicureanism, Judaism,
Christianity, Stoicism, and Islam. They contain wisdom from such
great philosophers and spiritual teachers as Lao-zi, Confucius,
Krishna, Buddha, Socrates, Epicurus, Solomon, Jesus, Epictetus,
Boethius, and Muhammad.
In most cases I have included whole texts. I have selected the
brief portion by Confucius from the Da Xue, usually titled
The Great Learning and which I call Higher Education,
and have not included the bulk of the text which is a commentary
on the words of Confucius by Zeng-zi. Included complete are seven
of the shorter principal Upanishads. I did select the first
sermon of the Buddha, because I think it encapsulates his main
teachings. The selections from Epicurus focus on his ethical teachings.
I have taken selections from the Qur'an, because it is
very long and repetitive.
The main exception is what I call The Good Message of Jesus
the Christ. This is a synthesis of the four traditional Gospels
of Mark, Matthew, Luke, and John, with some highlights
from the recently discovered Gnostic Gospel of Thomas.
Of course the four Gospels have been widely available for
a long time in the New Testament. However, this synthesis
combines together the various elements from the four different
versions into one continuous narrative so that readers can get
the whole story as we have it from these sources in a unified
comprehensive account. I hope this will make the life and teachings
of Jesus as presented in the Gospels even more available
to people who seek this wisdom in a single, clear and readable
narrative.
The Wisdm Bible is not an attempt to replace the Holy
Bible of the Judeo-Christian tradition, but I do hope that
it will supplement that collection of ancient texts with a wider
collection of the spiritual wisdom of humanity. The Wisdom
Bible does not duplicate the Bible, because The
Good Message of Jesus the Christ synthesis is a new contribution
beyond the four Gospels, and the one text from the tradition
of Judaism, the Wisdom of Solomon, is taken from the Old
Testament Apocrypha, which is not included in most Bibles.
The Wisdom Bible also supplements the Great Books of the
Western World which were gathered together and published in 1952.
In 1976 I asked Mortimer Adler when they were going to put out
a collection of the Great Books of the Eastern World, but he said
that it was very far off in the future. The Wisdom Bible
gathers a few of the greatest texts from Eastern civilization
along with some of the best spiritual wisdom of Western culture.
The only overlap with the Great Books of the Western World is
in Plato. I have included Defense of Socrates (Apology),
Crito, and Phaedo because of their great importance
and concise wisdom. In addition I have selected the first Alcibiades,
which is not included in the Great Books edition of Plato, because
I believe it offers a marvelous introduction to Socratic method
and wisdom on the important theme of self-knowledge.
As we move into a global age in which we encounter many more peoples
and cultures than ever before, I believe that a good liberal education
will expose individuals to a wide variety of spiritual teachings
such as are contained in this book. As our understanding evolves
and our spiritual wisdom awakens we will begin to see the universal
principles of human life which can be found in various traditions.
I believe the age of parochial religion will be passing away as
we grow and expand our awareness of universal truths and delight
in the diverse cultural history of our world civilization. Instead
of the closed and dogmatic attitude that "my religion"
is the only one that is any good, we can learn from many different
philosophies and wise teachers who have lived and shared their
insights. This does not mean that we must give up our own tradition,
whether it is the religion we were born into and brought up in
by our family or whether it is the set of teachings we have chosen
to follow as our personal path of enlightenment or salvation.
Nevertheless we can gain knowledge and insight into other cultures
and wisdom for our own lives through the study of great teachings.
I believe that in the future more people will be searching for
the truth anywhere they can find it. Tolerance of ideas and beliefs
different from our own is essential to understanding and respecting
the people of other cultures. Without this tolerance misunderstanding
and conflict can cause much human misery that might be avoided.
It seems to me that as we become more aware and enlightened we
become more universal in our interests and knowledge.
Having studied the great world religions and philosophies for
many years, I am offering here what I consider to be the most
helpful of ancient texts in the development of wisdom. It is difficult
for one person to be an expert in everything, yet after many lifetimes
of spiritual endeavor and thirty-five years of spiritual searching,
work, teaching and writing in this life, I believe that I can
bring an intuitive understanding to the concepts expressed in
these various texts. Thus these English versions are in some respects
unified by my consciousness. I have attempted to select the best
modern English words to describe the original spiritual meaning
of the texts so that similar concepts from the different books
can be understood more easily.
Nevertheless I must admit to my limitations. I have translated
the Plato, Epicurus, the Wisdom of Solomon, the Gospels,
and Epictetus from the Greek originals, and I translated Boethius
from the Latin. In the case of the Bhagavad-Gita, the edition
annotated by Winthrop Sargeant is so detailed in giving the grammatical
form and various meanings of every word that by using this I could
almost call my English version a translation. The above translations
make up about 80% of this collection.
In regard to the other texts originally written in ancient Chinese,
Sanskrit and Pali, I compared several English translations and
used my intuition to select what I considered to be the most spiritually
accurate words after having read the various choices of other
translators. Having studied and taught the philosophies of China
and India I know many of the terms and concepts. On the Chinese
texts I have been assisted by the useful advice of Ken Tsang,
who compared my English versions to the original Chinese and made
useful suggestions. With the Upanishads, Patanjali's Yoga
Sutras, the Buddha's first sermon, the Dhammapada,
and the Qur'an I cannot call my work translations but only
English versions.
In all the translations and English versions in this collection
I have attempted to be as accurate to the original as I could
be, trying to find the comparable or nearest English expressions.
I often found that other translations rather freely paraphrased
or summarized what is in the original. I have avoided doing this
even at the risk of making the text seem a little more difficult
or awkward, although I have avoided awkwardness as much as I could.
I want the readers to have the best chance they can to understand
what was originally written even though it might be a slightly
different way of saying something than we would today.
I often found that if I gave myself enough time to understand
the author's use of words that suddenly, as though a light had
come on, the sentence began to make sense as it was written in
a different way than it had been translated by others. I could
only do this, of course, in the translations. Since this is the
first edition of this book, I would be grateful for any corrections
or suggestions individuals might like to offer for improving these
versions and the translations.
I have attempted to avoid sexist language as much as possible
but not so much as to change the original meaning of the texts.
Some translators have used sexist language when it is unnecessary
to do so. In referring to God or Spirit I might use the impersonal
pronoun "it" unless the male pronoun was more clearly
indicated in the original. For example, Jesus often refers to
God as Father and himself as the son; I left these this way. Instead
of putting "kingdom" I have used "sovereignty."
In some cases in referring to the earth or other personifications
the female pronoun was used, and of course I translated them that
way. Often in the Chinese texts there is no indication in the
original of gender, number, or even the tense of verbs. Thus problems
could be avoided by using the plural, for example.
Perhaps another major contribution of this collection of this
Wisdom Bible is the way the words are phrased line by line
like free verse so that they are easier to read and understand.
Ancient texts were often written and copied in this manner, but
the only one I found to be entirely in this form is the Wisdom
of Solomon. In the case of that text almost every line of
my translation matches a line of the original. The other example
of this is with the poetry in Boethius' Consolation of Philosophy.
I do believe that by putting all of these English versions in
"phrase-form," as I call it, the readers will find them
much easier to read and understand. It also makes them easier
to read aloud to a congregation.
Almost every text is broken up into numbered divisions. The only
texts that included titles to these sections within the texts
themselves are the Yoga Sutras, the Dhammapada,
and the Qur'an. I have included those titles in the text
also. However, to help readers find different subjects in the
various texts I have given topical titles to each of the numbered
sections in the Contents of Topics at the beginning of this book.
Other than the very shortest of these texts the only one that
did not have any numbered divisions in the original is Plato's
Alcibiades; I have made numbered divisions for this text
myself. Also I have divided The Good Message of Jesus the Christ
into one hundred chapters.
Each text contains a brief introduction to the historical background
and gives biographical facts for contextual understanding. At
the end of these introductions I have provided a few notes to
clarify some of the references in the text by using the chapter
numbers, but there are no footnotes nor any detailed scholarly
apparatus.
Perhaps the main purpose of this book is to popularize the ancient
wisdom teachings by making them more available to people in a
single, easy-to-read edition. I believe that the universality
of these teachings can be understood by anyone who cares to study
them. I hope that someday the Wisdom Bible might be found
on almost everyone's bedside table if not in every motel room.
I feel that churches and other religious and social groups could
benefit by reading aloud and studying these texts. Of course could
also be used as a sourcebook for high school or college courses
in the humanities or philosophy or world religions.
My greatest hope is that more people will apply these teachings
of wisdom, love, and justice in their actions so that we can all
live more in freedom, harmony and peace with each other on this
planet. I trust that the readers will be able to find their own
personal and spiritual interpretations of the meaning of these
writings for themselves and that they will be inspired by them
to live a better life for the benefit of everyone.