VOLUME VI, CHAPTER 5, SECTION 8
The First Step Is Not to Strike but to Save, and to Save First the People Inside the Legal System
The last section shone a light down that whole chain that harms the people, every stroke driving the people to their deaths, lawful killing, no one named as the killer, and yet life after life. Reading to that step, the fire in your heart has probably burned to its peak. This section, for the first time, answers head-on that question pent up in your heart all along, then what, in the end, is to be done? And the first step it gives is not to strike, but to save. This is the first time in thousands of years that, facing the chain that harms the people lawfully, someone does not go rooting out people, ruling people, striking people, but goes to undo the lock, to save people. Whom to save first? Save first the people inside the legal system.
One. You Have Clenched Your Fist, Waiting to Say Bring Down
Reading to that step of the last section, the fire in your heart has probably burned to its peak. You have clenched your fist, waiting to say those two words, bring down. Take this whole nest of the illiterate-in-the-law, the lawmakers, the judges, the lawyers, the enforcement officials, drag them all out, bring them down, punish them, vent your anger, let them too taste being crushed, being robbed, being hounded, let those living people sent onto a dead road by one thought of theirs have an answer.
I understand this fire of yours. This fire is the fire a person with a conscience must have, after seeing a whole chain of lawful killing. This fire is not wrong. But in this section, the first thing is still to press this fire down. Because the first step to take you on is not to strike, but to save. You are taken aback again. Having seen every stroke driving the people to their deaths, having seen the lawful killing, still save this whole nest of the illiterate-in-the-law? Yes.
It is not to snuff out this fire of yours. This fire is a good thing, it is a warm heart that cannot bear to see the people harmed to death lawfully, cannot bear to see the world unjust, and this heart is more precious than anything. What is to be done here is not to douse it, but to point it a road on which it can truly get something done. A fire aimed at the wrong place burns a whole lifetime and burns out no result. Aimed at the right place, it can truly get the thing done. It is exactly to take this precious fire of yours off that road of striking people, which for thousands of years has never gone through, and lead it onto the road of undoing the lock and saving people, the road that can truly cut the chain. Let me give you two reasons, and hearing them through, that fire will, of itself, turn from striking to saving.
Two. The First Reason, Striking Is No Use
The first reason, the last section already touched on it, striking is no use. For thousands of years, how many people, clutching a fire exactly like yours now, shouted to bring down the corrupt officials, to bring down the unjust courts, to bring down those illiterate-in-the-law who harm people. They dragged them out, brought them down, changed the dynasty, founded new dynasties. And the result? That chain that harms the people lawfully, that nest of the illiterate-in-the-law who cannot read the intent, did not move an inch.
The old court was smashed, and the new court stood up. The old illiterate-in-the-law were brought down, and new illiterate-in-the-law sat into the new positions. New laws were made, new procedures walked, and every stroke still drove the people to their deaths. For thousands of years, people have all along been striking people, and that chain was never once cut. So that chain has all along been harming people, and that nest of the illiterate-in-the-law has all along been doing lawful killing. This fire of yours now, what it means to strike is exactly the thing that, for thousands of years, countless people struck, and never once struck to a stop. You cannot finish striking, because what you strike is people, and the people are replaced batch after batch, but that mechanism of reading the letter and not the intent, of doing it by the letter and harming people lawfully, does not stir. Thousands of years have proven it, resting on striking people, this chain cannot be cut.
Think what a disheartening thing this is. Generation after generation of people, who could not bear to see the illiterate-in-the-law harm the people lawfully, clutched a breast of fire and brought down batch after batch of those unjust judges, those illiterate-in-the-law who harm people, and this thing of the illiterate-in-the-law harming people lawfully, did it stop? It did not. This is not that those before were not brave enough, it is that they struck the wrong place. They spent a lifetime's strength all on striking people, and that chain which truly harms people, they never once touched. So this time, no longer walking that dead road which for thousands of years has never gone through, we walk a new road.
Three. The Second Reason, They Too Are People Rolled Up in the Lock
The second reason, those people you hate, want to bring down, they too are people rolled up in this lock. Look back, this whole nest of the illiterate-in-the-law, how did they come to be? They were not unable to read the intent from their mother's womb. They were not born liking to harm people by the letter. It is that whole set of things that raised them into what they are today.
That legal education which tests only the letter and not the heart, from their first day of law school, what it teaches, tests, has them memorize, is all clauses, procedures, the letter, and the intent, protecting people, the heart, these are not tested, not taught, not scored. That selection and promotion which looks only at fluency in procedure, precision in the letter, cases won, so that the ones who passed the hardest law exams, who memorized the most clauses, who won the most suits, rise, and the ones who want to read the intent, who want to protect people, who want to stop and lift their heads for one look, cannot rise, are left on the cold bench, are laughed at by their peers for being too naive. That professional air in which protecting the people wins no name and doing it by the letter is the safest. That whole culture in which the robe and the gavel became a position and not a calling. This whole set took the good people who entered that line of work and raised them, inch by inch, into today's nest of the illiterate-in-the-law.
Four. In Their Day, They Too Went In with a True Heart
Among them, how many, in their day studying law, went in with a true heart to uphold justice, to protect the common people? How many. It is that they entered that mechanism and were raised, by this whole set, into what they are today. That their eyes hold only the letter and their hearts no longer hold the person, they were not born this way, it is that whole set that raised them this way.
And think one layer deeper, they themselves too are people being destroyed by this lock. You are tormented, crushed, robbed, hounded, rolled over by this chain, and that pain in your heart is one of the deepest pains of this world. But look back at that one illiterate in the law, sitting every day in the court, signing, striking the gavel, is his heart at ease? It is not. Over his heart hangs that calamity of all-is-finished-if-it-comes-out. He knows that every signature he puts down may send a living person onto a dead road. But he dares not stop. Stop, and he cannot rise, he cannot keep his position, he offends his peers. He pretends not to know, pretends that what is done by procedure has nothing to do with him, but in the deep quiet of night, he cannot help thinking, he is not a stone. Rolled along by that lock, doing things that in his heart he does not truly want to do, a whole life, on edge, against his conscience. This state, rolled along by the lock, living a whole life against one's conscience, is another kind of being harmed. He harms you, and he himself is harmed by that lock.
Do not feel this is speaking up for the illiterate-in-the-law, being soft-hearted. Here it is sorted out clear as day, that under their hands that chain harmed the people, this account, not one cent of it will be let slide, and the next section, and the one after, have hard iron waiting. But what you are to see is that to take them for born demons and strike them and be done, you can then never see that lock clearly, and never cut that chain. You have to see first that they too are people rolled in by the lock, their conscience destroyed by the lock, and only then can you understand that the thing that truly ought to be dealt with is that lock which rolled both the people and these illiterate-in-the-law in together, harmed them together. See this, and you can walk that road no one has walked in thousands of years, the road that can truly cut the chain.
Five. To a Locked Person, the Thing to Do Is Undo the Lock and Save Him
The same as that hand of the third chapter, clutching the mountain of gold, locked the tightest. The same as those officials of the fourth chapter, rolled up in the lock of the collusion of officials and business. They are locked people, their conscience being destroyed, people to be saved. Then to a person locked, his conscience being destroyed, to be saved, what is the thing to do? It is to undo that lock binding him, save him out of it, so that he is no longer rolled along by that thought of harming people lawfully, no longer doing things against his conscience, no longer on edge a whole life. So that he goes back to being that clean person who, in his day, entered law school with a true heart, wanting to protect people.
This is the way to save them. This is exactly what this book has done all along the road. Saving the slave was letting the locked out. Saving the laborer was loosening the welded man. Saving the one who lives on capital was settling the frightened man. Saving the people inside the political system was saving out the officials rolled up in the collusion of officials and business. Come to this chapter, saving the people inside the legal system is saving out the illiterate-in-the-law rolled up in that lock of reading the letter and not the intent. One lineage, handed straight down. All along this book's road, it is getting the locked people out of the lock, not half a step off.
Six. Others Hack People, This Book Saves People
This is the first time in thousands of years that, facing the lawful harming of the people, when what everyone else thought of was how to cure it, root it out, punish it, taking that nest of the illiterate-in-the-law for an object to be rooted out, punished, brought down, raising the knife to hack people, this book, for the first time, thinks the other way. That nest of the illiterate-in-the-law are people rolled up in the lock, their conscience being destroyed, lawfully doing harm, people to be saved. That chain that harms the people has to be severed at the source, by saving them. Taking up the pen, undoing the lock, saving people.
Others hack people, this book saves people. Others root out the illiterate-in-the-law, this book saves the illiterate-in-the-law. Others make new laws to manage the illiterate-in-the-law, this book sets up the intent to save the illiterate-in-the-law. This is the very root this book has set up all along the road, use the pen, not the knife. Come to this chapter on law, facing the lawful killing that most cries out to be avenged, it does not depart half a step from this root, do not strike, save.
Seven. Whom to Save First, Save First the People Inside the Legal System
With the fire turned to saving, then this first step of saving, whom does it save first? The ones it saves first are the people inside the legal system. You hear this and are probably taken aback again. The people inside the legal system? Are those not exactly the judges who hound people until their families are broken and their people dead, the lawyers who roll over people lawfully, the lawmakers who make laws that torment the people, the low-level officials who rob money with broken code? How is it that the first ones to be saved are them?
Let me ask you first to see clearly who these words, the people inside the legal system, mean. They are those who make the law, sitting in the legislatures, taking up the pen to make law. They are those who judge by the law, the judges in robes, sitting in the courts, striking the gavel. They are those who speak the law, the lawyers who have read a bellyful of clauses and make their trade speaking the law for others. They are those who enforce the law, the officials with the word law in their very titles, sitting behind the windows, signing and stamping. These four kinds of people, that nest of the illiterate-in-the-law of the last section, are the people inside the legal system.
Eight. Why Save Them First, Because They Are at the Source
Then why are they the first to be saved? Because they are at the very source of that chain that harms the people lawfully. Look back, how does that chain that harms the people turn? It is that thought in the hand of the illiterate-in-the-law, flowing down from the source. The lawmaker makes a law that torments, the judge hands down a ruling that crushes, the lawyer works a loophole that eats homes, the low-level official robs money with broken code. The thought comes out, and flows into tormenting, flows into crushing, flows into robbing, flows into hounding, flows into one life after another.
This chain does not harm people out of thin air, it flows out of their hands. They are the source of this chain, and also the key to whether this chain can be cut. So if you want to cut this chain, you cannot go around this nest of people. Save them, undo them from that lock, and the thought as they set their hand to it changes, and what flows down from the source is no longer lawful harm, and this chain is cut. To save them is the only key to cutting this chain. Not because they most deserve saving, most deserve sympathy, but because they are at the source, are the key node of this chain, and to save them is to save everyone harmed, and everyone who would be harmed. This is the first time in thousands of years that, facing the lawful harming of the people, someone does not go rooting out people, ruling people, striking people, but goes to undo the lock, to save people. But in your heart there is still a last knot pressing down. To save them, then the people they lawfully harmed to death in the past, is that just to be let go? Undone out, is he to go on sitting in that position? This knot, the next section, together with what to save them with, tells through, one by one.
Credit to the ancestors; the mistakes are mine: Tiger Lyon.