Volume II — Te
Chapter 71 of the Tao Te Ching
知不知，尚矣；不知知，病也。夫唯病病，是以不病。聖人不病，以其病病，是以不病。
This verse addresses the fundamental relationship between knowledge and ignorance, revealing that genuine wisdom requires the recognition of one's own limitations. "To know yet think you do not know—this is the highest"—zhi bu zhi, shang yi (知不知，尚矣). Shang (尚) is highest, supreme, most excellent. The person who knows but maintains awareness of what remains unknown possesses genuine wisdom. This is not false modesty but accurate assessment—all human knowing is partial, and to know this is to know truly.
"To not know yet think you know—this is a disease"—bu zhi zhi, bing ye (不知知，病也). Bing (病) is disease, illness, affliction. The person who is ignorant but believes himself wise suffers from a fundamental delusion—a sickness that prevents all cure because the patient denies being ill.
"Only by recognizing this disease as disease can you be free from disease"—fu wei bing bing, shi yi bu bing (夫唯病病，是以不病). The verse plays on bing (病) repeated: to be sick of the sickness, to recognize the disease as disease, is the cure itself. The moment one genuinely sees one's own pretension to knowledge, that pretension loses its grip.
"The sage is free from disease because he recognizes disease as disease"—sheng ren bu bing, yi qi bing bing, shi yi bu bing (聖人不病，以其病病，是以不病). The sage is not wise because he knows everything but because he accurately perceives the limits of his knowing. This clear-seeing is itself the health that others lack. The sage has no immunity to error except the immunity of recognizing error as error.
The complete translation includes four classical perspectives — Wang Bi, Heshang Gong, Chan Buddhist, and Internal Martial Arts — plus a detailed character-by-character reference guide.
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