Learn the Dao

Overview

Learn the Dao is a place to memorize the Tao Te Ching, the 81 short chapters written about 2,500 years ago. You work in phrases, not pages - roughly the length of a breath. Read one, then recite the next line from memory and compare.

When you recite, the app shows you word by word what you missed. Then it schedules that phrase to come back just before you would forget it. Every chapter shows James Legge's 1891 translation, with Dao De Kooi, an original rendering by David Kooi, beneath it.

It does not do streaks, badges or notifications. You can start as a guest and attach an email later to keep your progress.

Why I built it

I wanted the Tao Te Ching in my head, not on my shelf. The book opens by warning that the Tao you can walk down "is not the enduring and unchanging Tao," so reading about it was never going to be enough. Rereading cover to cover is a poor way to remember anything. Reciting and spacing the returns is the best-studied way I know to make a line stay. Learning the thing that can't be known, one phrase at a time.

How it works

1. Begin without an account - you land on Chapter 1; no sign-up, no password. 2. Read a phrase - one breath-length line at a time, in Legge's 1891 translation. 3. Recite before you look - type the next line from memory and see word by word what you missed. 4. Come back when it's due - each phrase returns just before it would fade, on a schedule set by FSRS, a modern memory algorithm.

Feature highlights

• Word-by-word recall check - recite a line and see exactly which words you dropped or changed.
• Spaced returns (FSRS) - each phrase comes back just before you'd forget it, at longer and longer intervals.
• All 81 chapters, open to read - every chapter page is public, no account needed.
• Two renderings - Legge's public-domain 1891 translation, with Dao De Kooi, an original rendering by David Kooi, beneath it.
• Guest mode - start practicing immediately and attach an email later to keep your progress.
• Ask it from your AI assistant - an open MCP server lets an assistant read, search and cite all 81 chapters with attribution.

Pricing

Free. No account needed to start; sign-in is a passwordless email link when you want to keep your progress.

Notes

• For whom: Anyone who wants the Tao Te Ching to live in memory rather than on a shelf, a few minutes a day.
• Privacy: Your data is not sold. Analytics are limited to page views and a few named actions, with session recording off. Copies or deletion on request by email.