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De (Chinese) - Wikipedia

De (/də/; Chinese: 德; pinyin: dé), also written as Te, is a key concept in Chinese philosophy, usually translated "inherent character; inner power; integrity" in Taoism, "moral character; virtue; morality" in Confucianism and other contexts, and "quality; virtue" (guṇa) or "merit; virtuous deeds" (puṇya) in Chinese Buddhism.

The word
Chinese de 德 is an ancient word with complexities across several subfields of linguistics: namely in its semantics, orthography, and etymology.

Meanings
The Hanyu Da Zidian, provides twenty meanings for de 德, translatable as

Rise, go up, climb, ascend. [升; 登.]
Morals, morality, virtue, personal conduct, moral integrity, honor. [道德, 品行, 节操.]
Denoting a wise/enlightened person with moral character. [指有道德的贤明之人.]
Kindness, favor, grace, graciousness. [恩惠, 恩德.]
Grateful, gratefulness, thankful, indebted. [感恩, 感激.]
Benevolent rule, good government, good instruction. [德政, 善教.]
Objective regulations/rules. [客观规律.]
Quality, nature, basic character, characteristics, attribute. [性质; 属性.]
Intention, purpose, heart, mind. For example: "Be of one heart and mind". [心意. 如:一心一德.]
In Five Phases theory, a reference to seasonally productive energy/air. [五行说指四季的旺气.]
First growth, initial stage, beginning of something. [始生; 事物的开始.]
A phoenix-head pattern/decoration. [凤凰头上的花纹.]
Blessings, good fortune, happiness, resulting from benevolent actions. [福, 善庆的事.]
Used for zhí "straight, just". [通 "直(zhí)".]
Used for zhí "to plant, grow, establish". Plant a tree. [通 "植(zhí)". 立木.]
Used for "get, obtain, result in". [通 "得".]
A national name. An abbreviation for the Republic of Germany during World War II. [国名. 第二次世界大战结束前的德意志联邦的简称.]
A star name. [星名.]
A river name. Another name for the Yellow River. [水名. 黄河之别名.]
A surname. [姓.]
This dictionary provides early usage examples, and all of these de meanings occur in Han or pre-Han Chinese classic texts, except for number 17 (de abbreviating Deutschland).

Translating de into English is problematic and controversial. Arthur Waley believed that de was better translated "power" than "virtue", and explained with a "bank of fortune" metaphor.

It is usually translated 'virtue', and this often seems to work quite well; though where the word occurs in early, pre-moralistic texts such a translation is in reality quite false. But if we study the usage of the word carefully we find that de can be bad as well as good. What is a 'bad virtue'? Clearly 'virtue' is not a satisfactory equivalent. Indeed on examining the history of the word we find that it means something much more like the Indian karma, save that the fruits of te are generally manifested here and now; whereas karma is bound up with a theory of transmigration, and its effects are usually not seen in this life, but in a subsequent incarnation. Te is anything that happens to one or that one does of a kind indicating that, as a consequence, one is going to meet with good or bad luck. It means, so to speak, the stock of credit (or the deficit) that at any given moment a man has at the bank of fortune. Such a stock is of course built up partly by the correct carrying out of ritual; but primarily by securing favourable omens; for unless the omens are favourable, no rite can be carried out at all.[1]

Based on the cognate relation between de and zhi "to plant", Waley further noted the early Chinese regarded planting seeds as a de, hence it "means a latent power, a 'virtue' inherent in something."

The linguist Peter A. Boodberg investigated the semantics and etymology of de 德, which he called "perhaps the most significant word, next to tao 道, in ancient Chinese macro- and microcosmology."

The standard translation for it is "virtue," both in the sense of inherent quality and in that of moral excellence, but with the validity of the traditional rendering somewhat shaken by Arthur Waley's insistence on interpreting it as "power." Indeed, it is believed by many scholars that the term originated in the mytho-magical period of Chinese speculation when tê was conceived as a kind of mana-like potency inherent in substances, things, and human beings, a potency which, on the one hand, made them true to their essence, and on the other, made possible their influencing of other entities. It appears often as if it had been imagined as a kind of electric charge permeating the thing in question, waxing or waning in accordance with some mysterious law, and capable of being transmitted, in the case of living beings, from one generation to another. Contrary-minded students of ancient Chinese philosophy dispute this interpretation as rather narrow and possibly anachronistic, and point to the fact that tê had early acquired, at least in Confucian literature, ethical connotations close to our "virtue," that is, as moral, and only rarely amoral or immoral, efficacy. They find, therefore, no quarrel with rendering tê, almost invariably, as "virtue." Philologists are, however, troubled by the absence in the Chinese term of any connotations reminiscent of the Latin etymon vir, such as manliness and virility. They remind us that tê is free from any contamination with sexual associations and differs in that from its great counterpart, tao, the Way, which, in one or two expressions, such as jên tao 人道, "the way of men and women," is suggestive of sexual activity. Other recommended translation, such as "energy" and "essential quality," seem also inadequate from the etymological point of view.[2]

Victor Mair explains that the difficulty of accurately translating de,

...is evident from the astonishing sweep of thoughtful renderings of its meaning: power, action, life, inner potency, indarrectitude (inner uprightness), charisma, mana (impersonal supernatural force inherent in gods and sacred objects), sinderesis (conscience as the directive force of one's actions), and virtue, to name only a few of the brave attempts to convey the meaning of te in English. Of these, the last is by far the most frequently encountered. Unfortunately, it is also probably the least appropriate of all to serve as an accurate translation of te in the Tao Te Ching.[3]

Mair (1990, p. 135) concludes that Daoist de is best translated "integrity", which "means no more than the wholeness or completeness of a given entity," and like de, "it represents the selfhood of every being in the universe."


Chinese Oracle script for de 德 "virtue"

Chinese Bronze script for de 德 "virtue"

Chinese Seal script for de 德 "virtue"

Stroke order of the character 德
Characters
De "power; virtue" is written with the Chinese character 德 in both Traditional Chinese and Simplified Chinese. This character 德 combines the chi 彳 "footstep; go" radical (recurring graphic elements that suggest meaning) with zhi 直 "straight; vertical" and xin 心 "heart; mind". De 德 has rare variant characters of 徳 (without the horizontal 一 line) and 悳 or 惪 (without the 彳 "footstep" radical).

The earliest written forms of de 德 are oracle script from the Shang Dynasty (ca. 1600–1046 BCE) and bronzeware script and seal script from the Zhou Dynasty (1045–256 BCE). Oracle characters wrote de 德 with 彳 "footstep; go" and 直 "straight", later bronze characters added the 心 "heart; mind" element. The oracle script for zhi 直 "straight; vertical" ideographically depicted shu 丨 "vertical line (in a character)" above mu 目 "eye", the bronze script elaborated the line into shi 十 "ten", and the seal script separated the eye and heart with a horizontal line. Poetically this could read as a choice of "from the womb or to the tomb". As the eye is associated with worldly desires and wants as opposed to the heart, being the home of de and needs.[4]

Etymologies
Boodberg undertook a "graphophonetic analysis" of de. Based on the phonetic element zhi 直 "upright; erect" and the radical 行 suggesting movement, he translates de as English arrect "set upright; direct upward" (from Latin ad- "to") or insititious "ingrafted; inserted" potency (from Latin insitio "to implant; to graft"). Interpreting the 心 "heart; mind" to connote "innerness", he takes the prefix from Latin indoles "innate quality; natural disposition" to further neologize indarrect. Boodberg concludes that the noun de is best translated enrective in the passive sense of power, or arrective in the active sense of influencing others. He says the Chinese understood de as potent but not coercive, and as arrective rather than corrective. Since early texts describe de 德 as an acquired quality, he proposes it is a paronym of de 得 "to acquire; to obtain", which is a common definition of de "power; virtue". Lastly, he notes a possible etymology of "see straight; looking straight at things; intuition" because early zhi 直 graphs depicted a straight line over an 目 "eye" (horizontally written 罒 in 德).[5] Victor H. Mair proposes a correlation between Proto-Indo-European dugh and de.

Te was pronounced approximately dugh during the early Chou period (about 1100 to 600 B.C.). The meanings it conveys in texts from that era are "character," "[good or bad] intentions," "quality," "disposition," "personality," "personhood," "personal strength," and "worth." There is a very close correlation between these meanings and words deriving from Proto-Indo-European dugh (to be fit, of use, proper; acceptable; achieve). And there is a whole series of words derived from the related Teutonic verbal root dugan. There are Old High German tugan, Middle High German tugen, and modern German taugen, all of which mean "to be good, fit, of use." There is another cognate group of words relating to modern English "doughty" (meaning worthy, valiant, stouthearted) that also contribute to our understanding of te. They are Middle English douhti, dohti, of dühti ("valiant").[6]

In modern Dutch, the noun de can be translated as deugd; the verb deugen means "to have virtue".

According to Axel Schuessler, de < *tək 德 "moral force, virtue, character; quality, nature" is probably in the same word family as de < *tək 得 "to get" and perhaps zhi < *drək 直 "straight; right".[7] It quotes the proposal of Edwin G. Pulleyblank that de 德 and de 得 are cognate with Tibetan language thub "a mighty one, one having power and authority".
 

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