VOLUME III, SEMESTER 4, CHAPTER 41, SECTION 3

VOLUME III, SEMESTER 4, CHAPTER 41, SECTION 3

Position Is Not Identity: The Man Who Changes Position Four Times in a Day

The first two sections set out two people. One a thirty-eight-year-old son, subordinate, manager, debtor to a mortgage. One a boss of twenty-odd people, five ropes on him. The two together point at one and the same thing: the four are all on one person, and change at any time.

But here a person must stop, and say clear the weightiest line, or the two sections before will be read crooked. That line is: position is not identity. This is the first thing the first semester set at its opening, and the thing most easily misread in this whole book. This section speaks of it on its own, and once it is clear, the eleven chapters to come will not go astray.

One, identity is pasted on, position is stood out into

First pull these two words apart. Identity is a label pasted on a person, pasted and it walks with him, off it comes nowhere, still there while he sleeps. Birth, class, standing, trade, rank, all are this kind. Others hear the label and the heart has a judgment first, the man not yet seen and the verdict already written.

Position is not this. Position is where a person stands at this moment, and what relation he is in with another. It does not walk with the person; it walks with that layer of relation. Change the relation, and the position changes. That manager last section, half past eight under the appraisal sheet stood one position, half past ten before three subordinates stood another, only two hours apart, and the man did not change.

So that line of the first semester must be read this way: he who takes the constraint is the slave, he who lays the constraint is the master. This line speaks of the direction of that relation, not the grade of that man. It does not fix a nature on a person; it points a road. Look this end, the constraint is taken. Look that end, the constraint is laid out. Heard as identity, this line sounds like a curse; heard as position, its true meaning is known. When the first semester set this line, it used a master who could not cook and a cook who held his three meals. The master, at the free end, lays the constraint. At the eating end, he takes it. One and the same pair, one and the same day, two directions, two positions.

Two, read position as identity, and two ills come

The first ill is hating men. Since that is identity, that is the grade of the man himself, he stands at that end, so the man himself is bad. So the cursing comes out, a hundred years ago cursing the factory owner, today cursing the platform, the boss, the man up in the tower, and the cursing done, the heart eases a while, and the next day it is back to work as before.

But the cursing done, that position has not budged a whit. The whole second semester was spent guarding against this hand: labeling from far off is the least effort, and the least use. Those five ropes last section stand there, and curse the boss down, put another in his seat, and those five ropes are still the same five, not one fewer. The position does not move, and whoever goes up it is the same.

The second ill is bowing to fate. Since that is identity, it cannot be changed, I was born at this end, my whole life is thus. So he does not look at that position, does not ask where those five ropes come from, nor ask what he himself still holds in his hand.

This ill wounds deeper than the first, for the first wounds another and this wounds himself, and wounds at the weightiest place, at the one thought of whether he still wants to move. The first semester set a line: the free in form is that he has the right to say no, the free in substance is that he has the stake to say no. The man who bows to fate cuts off even the thought of saving up that stake; he takes a position that can be changed for a fate that cannot.

There is one more ill, pasting identity on another and standing wrong oneself. One man remembers all his life he is the one wronged, and at every turn looks first who owes him. Another remembers all his life he is the one with the skill, and at every turn looks first who is less than him. Neither is looking at position; both keep a label. To keep a label and pass the days is the most restful, and the blindest to what is before the eyes.

Three, one and the same person, four changes in a day

Back to that thirty-eight-year-old, mark his day again, this time marking only position. Before light, at his mother’s bed, that is the giving position, asking no return, keeping no account. Half past eight he clocks in, under the appraisal sheet, that is the taking-constraint position, clock and appraisal both over his head. Half past ten he hands out work, before three people, that is the laying-constraint position, the pen in his hand. The tenth of each month that deduction, he is in the debt’s position, pinned from moving. And his little savings flow in the market, standing for him at yet another position.

Four positions, one day, one person. Which is his identity? Not one. Say he is a slave, and how does the half-past-ten stretch reckon. Say he is a master, and how does the half-past-eight stretch reckon. Say he is the giving one, and how does that tenth-of-the-month sum reckon.

So it can only be called position. He stood here in the morning, there in the forenoon, and changed to another place in the afternoon. The man is still the man, the clothes did not change, the temper did not change, the position changed four times. The ancestors saw this thing early. The Book of Changes speaks of the lines. One and the same line, set at a different place, and the good or ill fortune differs. The line itself has no good or bad; only fitting its place or not has the sense of it. A person is the same. A person is himself no slave and no master. Stood at which end of which relation, only then is there slave and master.

Four, position changes, so there is a way out

Position is not identity, and there is a further layer that matters most. Identity cannot be changed; position can. That thirty-eight-year-old, if he saves a sum these years and loosens that mortgage a little, the ground under his words to the manager is other than it was, and that word swallowed three years may come out. If he grinds the trade in his hand to where no one can stand in for him a while, that position under the appraisal sheet loosens too, for then the hand that holds him fears his leaving. The first semester’s line lands here: the free in substance is that he has the stake to say no, and the stake does not fall from the sky; it is saved a day at a time.

But here guard against a deeper pit. The way out is not in climbing higher. Last section saw it plain: walk up one layer and the ropes are one more; that boss has five, more than he. The last line the first semester set is: the higher the position, the more the constraint, the way out is not in rising, it is in the clear eye.

What is the clear eye? It is knowing at any moment which end one stands at, knowing where that constraint comes from, knowing where it pulls, and knowing what one still holds in one's hand. Laozi said, to know others is wisdom, to know oneself is clarity. To see clear where another stands is wisdom. To see clear where oneself stands at this moment is clarity. What this book teaches, start to end, is the latter.

Five, the four are the same, they have no identity

Push this layer one step out and it reaches this semester’s whole picture. A person has no identity, only position, and those four institutions are the same. Slavery is not a bad thing, capital is not a good thing, labor is not the middling one, need is not the highest. They are four positions, each handling one matter, each on one relation. Last chapter set it: the four rules measure four different things, no one can stand in for another, no one is higher than another.

These two lines are in truth one line. Paste an identity on a person and there is high and low, noble and base, and once people are graded high and low, the words cannot reach one place. Paste an identity on an institution and there is advanced and backward, and once institutions are graded before and after, that queue lined wrong is back again. Once pasted on, a person no longer walks up close to look, no longer asks where it stands at this moment, whom it bites, what props it. The second semester took apart that mirror, and it was this layer it took apart: walk up close and look, look down into what is under it, and what is seen is a position, not good or evil.

So this chapter, start to end, did one thing only. It asked the four out of four kinds of people, four eras, four books of doctrine, and asked them back into one living man’s day. They hang on him at once, changing by the hour, not one more, not one fewer.

Here add one word of measure, lest a person walk to the other end. To say position is not identity is not to say what a person does has no good and bad. At one and the same position, one is kind, one is harsh, one uses that constraint with measure, one uses it to the last drop. The good and bad of a person is there; only it does not grow on the position, it grows on the heart, grows on character. This layer dug to the bottom is the soil this volume hands over at the last, and chapter fifty will speak of it face on.

Six, what this section sets

What this section sets is an old line, and the first ground of this whole book: position is not identity. A person is no slave, and no master. A person stands at some end of some relation. Change the relation, and the position changes. Position changes, so there is a way out. And the way out is not in climbing higher; it is in seeing clearer: to know others is wisdom, to know oneself is clarity.

This chapter walks to here and is done. Chapter forty let the four be seen running at once. This chapter let those four be seen hung on oneself. The next chapter changes the scale again. Not a day, a life. From the day a person comes into the world to the day he goes, to see how these four take turns holding him up, to see clear which stretch is which rule taking over.

Credit to the ancestors; the mistakes are mine: Tiger Lyon.

Chapter 42: Four Elements Supporting a Single Lifetime of an Individual