Chapter 75: Healing the Injured Hand

People are not afraid of death, so how can they be afraid of death? If the people are constantly afraid of death, and if someone is found strange, I will kill them, who dares? There are always those who are in charge of killing. The husband who kills on behalf of the chief craftsman is said to kill on behalf of the great craftsman. It is rare that the great craftsmen of the husband's generation did not hurt their hands.

Translation: If people are not afraid of death, what is the use of threatening them with death? If the people are really afraid of death, I will arrest and kill those who do evil. Who would dare to do evil? Usually it is the executioner who should kill them, and the killing should be done on the executioner's behalf, just like cutting wood on behalf of a skilled carpenter. There are very few people who cut wood on behalf of a skilled carpenter without hurting their own hands.

The famous commentator He Shang Gong said: The rulers of the country are severely punished and the people have no life, so they are not afraid of death. Those who treat the body are addicted to lust and harm the spirit, and are greedy for money and kill themselves. The people do not know how to fear them. If the ruler does not give lenient punishments and teaches the people to be free from lust, why should they set up criminal laws and fear death? We should eliminate what is left to us and teach the people to get rid of their desires for profit.

Wang Bi: The strange and chaotic crowd is called strange. Those who are disobedient are hated and resented, and those who are unkind are hated by others. Therefore, it is said that there are always officials to kill.

Zhu Yuanzhang: King Chen Gang Ji, everyone has his own department, and he is responsible for it. If the people are guilty, there is an agent to blame, and the officials abide by the law to rule them. However, there are still mistakes, so the ruler is responsible for violating them. Unforgivable.

Classic Interpretation In this chapter, Lao Tzu mainly talks about his political opinions. He believed that the rulers at that time implemented harsh government and torture, suppressed the people, and killed innocent people indiscriminately. One day, the people could not bear it anymore and they would no longer be afraid of death.

As the saying goes, "Those who kill will kill." In Laozi's view, the natural death of human beings is controlled by heaven, but the cruel and unjust rulers push the people to death. This is fundamentally It violates the laws of nature. Therefore, Laozi made serious criticism and protest against the harsh punishments and laws at that time, which forced people to die.

In addition, Lao Tzu also mentioned that if the people are really afraid of death, and those who do evil will be caught and killed, who would dare to do evil? Some people took this out of context and thought: "I often talk about retreating, being submissive, and not daring to be the first for the world. This is his method. He was not polite to the people who rebelled, and he dared to use the knife to kill people. But when he saw it, he used death to kill people. It's useless to scare people, so I told the truth: "The people are not afraid of death, so why should they be afraid of death?" In the past, some people deliberately said that I did not advocate killing in order to cover up my vicious image of being hostile to the people. "

In fact, Lao Tzu pointed out that the people have been oppressed by the brutal rulers and are suffering so much that they are no longer afraid of death, so why use death to threaten them? If severe punishments are not used on the people, and the people have their own place and live and work in peace and contentment, they will be afraid of death. In that case, if the evildoer is caught and killed, who will dare to do bad things again?

Lao Tzu’s idea is to consider both subjective and objective aspects of the situation, and adopt a tolerant policy; if you do not act according to the laws of nature and disregard human life, you will cause endless disasters. Although there are several words "kill" in this chapter, if you carefully understand Lao Tzu's original intention, it should be clear that he is by no means using cruel means to kill people at will.

--------------------------Examples of Wisdom------------- --------------------------

Set up your position and don’t overstep your authority

I said: The husband who kills on behalf of the chief craftsman is called the master craftsman who kills on behalf of the master. It is rare that the great craftsmen of the husband's generation did not hurt their hands. It means: usually the executioner should kill them, killing people on behalf of the executioner, just like cutting wood on behalf of a skilled carpenter. There are very few people who cut wood on behalf of a skilled carpenter without hurting their own hands.

Two idioms can be thought of from this: one is "the more you do, the more you do." "Although the cook does not manage the cook, the corpse will not overtake him and take his place." That is to say, even if the cook does not prepare the food for the sacrifice, the person in charge of the sacrifice cannot overstep his position and cook for him. It is a metaphor for going beyond the scope of one's duties to deal with other people's affairs. The second is "If you are not in your position, you will not seek political power."

This is what Confucius said, which means that a person should do what he should do and not think about what he should not think about. Zengzi also means the same thing when he says, "One cannot think of one's position."

Zhang Ling is a very active girl with many ideas and a strong drive for doing things. When she first arrived at the company, her performance satisfied her leaders. After receiving the affirmation from the leader, Zhang Ling became more confident and felt that the work situation was excellent.

Once, her department had a meeting, but when she arrived at the conference room, she discovered that other departments had not finished their meetings, so everyone was waiting outside the door. Zhang Ling, however, ran in alone and expressed her own opinions on the work of this department, telling everyone what should be done. Little did she know that these gesticulating comments made colleagues in this department very disgusted.

This happens again and again. She would comment on anyone's work, thinking that no one else thought as much or as well as she did. Until one time, she signed a contract that required the signature of the leader on her own initiative. When asked by her boss, Zhang Ling said, "I didn't think there was any problem, so I signed." As you can imagine, she was fired soon after.

Zhang Ling is an active-thinking employee, but it is a pity that she did not position herself correctly. Not only did she go around commenting on other people's work, she even went so far as to make decisions for the leader, which was a taboo in the workplace. In fact, if she can be down-to-earth, use her active thinking in her own work, and make more valuable suggestions, she can definitely become the leader's right-hand assistant.

In the enterprise, some people never take the initiative to do things. They always hope that others will take care of everything and just sit there and get wages and bonuses. On the other extreme, there are some "promising young people" who always like to take over others' duties and have a hand in everything. This kind of work enthusiasm should be encouraged, but if it exceeds the limit, a good thing will turn into a bad thing.

As soon as Huang Wei graduated from university, he joined a high-tech company and earned a pretty good income. Due to his professional counterpart, he was at ease in the company and quickly became a leader among technicians and was highly valued by managers.

The manager is a good person and often seeks advice from his subordinates. He also always values ??young people. Therefore, Huang Wei directly put forward some of his views on the company's management to the manager. At first, the manager was very happy and praised Huang Wei for treating the company's business as his own.

Huang Wei also started to become arrogant. He frequently pointed out management deficiencies to the manager, and even inadvertently revealed his contempt for the manager. As time passed, the manager got fed up, and finally found a random excuse to fire Huang Wei.

At first, my colleagues thought it was strange. The manager is not usually like this! But after they discussed it later, they finally came to a unanimous conclusion: the manager hired Huang Wei because he valued his skills, rather than letting him make irresponsible remarks on corporate management every day. I believe that no matter how generous a leader is, it will be difficult for his subordinates to criticize his management behavior over and over again.

Of course it is good to use your brain more and actively make suggestions. In fact, every enlightened leader will like such subordinates. But what leaders need is to make targeted suggestions after understanding the situation and thinking carefully, rather than making random noises beyond their scope of authority.

Some young employees feel a little "in the air" after receiving recognition, are impatient, forgetful, like to express their opinions on everything, and are keen to give opinions and suggestions to others. However, if you don’t understand the working methods and content of this functional department, what is the value of your opinion, and how can your words convince the public? Pointing fingers will only offend people!