Beautifully, this reads like it came right out of Le Guin's rendition of the Tao Te Ching: Most translators of popular texts look closely at other translations

Beautifully, this reads like it came right out of Le Guin's rendition of the Tao Te Ching: Most translators of popular texts look closely at other translations to "triangulate" on meaning and authorial intent. Older translations may use archaic writing but have historical understanding, well-researched translations may be more precise about tricky words or concepts. More "writerly" translations tend to rebuild the work from the building blocks and produce a more cohesive whole. None of these are wrong approaches.