"The greatest Virtue is to follow Tao and Tao alone. The Tao is elusive and intangible. Oh, it is intangible and elusive, and yet within is image. Oh, it is elusive and intangible, and yet within is form".
From my brief journey into absorbing what Tao is, here I feel is a most important statement. Lao Tsu is attempting to show the reader that what he can tell you is not the Tao because in order to understand the Tao, one must experience it and see it through their own eyes and perceive it for themselves. It is elusive because what one can be told of the Tao is not in fact the Tao because it must be understood and absorbed in a way that can not be ultimately taught. To me it seems that the Tao is something that is "unteachable", that one must find their own meanings and take it to heart as they will.
Another translation of this passage reads, " The grandest forms of active force, From Tao come, their only source. Who can of Tao the nature tell? Our sight it flies, our touch as well. Eluding sight, eluding touch".
As a fledgling student in Eastern philosophies, I appreciate this translation even more. To me it implies that everything I will learn about the Tao will ultimately come from me. No matter what I read, or am taught, what I take to heart are the ideas that I have formed and have tailored to suit myself. As a student I relish in the thought that these ideas and readings will only, as I see it, be what might be considered the Tao when I reflect personally upon them and make them my own.
This reflection of mine was from chapter Twenty-One on page 23. I have left many of my other thoughts of this passage out, but mentioned what resonated with me the most.
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