第四十二章
物损而益
原文
道生一，一生二，二生三，三生万物。万物负阴而抱阳，冲气以为和。人之所恶，唯孤、寡、不谷，而王公以为称。故物或损之而益，或益之而损。人之所教，亦我而教人。强梁者不得其死——吾将以为教父。
英译
Things May Gain When They Seem to Lose
The divine law,
the only origin of the world,
contains both Yin and Yang.
They co-exist to achieve a harmony,
in which all things come into being.
All things turn from Yin to Yang
and gain a new harmonious body by mixing.
What people hate most is "the sole", "the few" and "the barren",
but the rulers use these words to call themselves.
Therefore, for everything,
when it seems to lose, it may increase;
when it seems to increase, it may lose.
Other people teach me like this,
and I teach others in the same way.
There is no burial place for a cruel man,
which I take as a lesson.
说明
1、“道生一，一生二，二生三，三生万物”的英译
从道家的思想上讲，“一”为虚无之气，“二”为阴阳。一、二合而为“三’‘而生出了“万物”。许渊冲直译成“One is the child of the divine law. After one come two, after two come three, after three come all things.”，似乎没有点出老子真正要表达的意思；Arthur Waley译成“Tao gave birth to the One; the One gave birth successively to two things, three things, up to ten thousand.”，倒也中规中矩，但对“二”“三”的理解欠妥，译成了事物的具体数量“two things”、“three things”。辜正坤用了增译法，译成“Tao begets（产生）the One; the One consists of Two in opposition(the Yin and Yang);The Two begets the Three; the Three begets all things of the world”，较好地阐释了老子的“宇宙生成论”。
我们使用了意译法，译成“The divine law, the only origin of the world, contains both Yin and Yang. They co-exist to achieve a harmony, in which all things come into being. ”，用only对应“一”，用Yin、Yang对应“二”，用harmony对应第“三”者，以求读者更准确地理解老子的本意。
2、“强梁者不得其死——吾将以为教父”的英译
“强梁者不得其死”是指“强横逞凶的人不得好死”；“吾将以为教父”的意思是“我把这句话当作施教的宗旨”。很显然，Arthur Waley的译文“Show me a man of violence that came to a good end, and I will take him for my teacher.”与原意有出路，但反过来看似乎也有点道理。辜正坤的译文是“‘The violent will not come to a good end.’ This I will take as the first lesson when I teach.”；许渊冲译成“The brute（残暴的人） will die a brutal（残忍的） death. I will teach this as a lesson.”。两位译者理解准确，用this 代指前面内容。前半部分，我们译成“There is no burial place for a cruel man（残忍的人死无葬身之地）”，后半部分，我们译成了一个非限制性定语从句“which I take as a lesson”，“which”代指主句整句话的内容，这样更便于理解。