AUTHOR: LAOZI (ATTRIBUTED TO)
DATE: FIRST MILLENNIUM BC
The Tao Te Ching (which loosely translates as The Way and Its Power) is the chief spiritual guide for followers of the ancient Chinese philosophy of Taoism. Taoists advocate leading a simple, humble and pious life, and in so doing achieving balance with the Tao (which effectively equates to the universe in its material and spiritual manifestations). In simplistic terms, adherents seek a peaceful existence at one with nature, expounding such concepts as virtue (de), naturalness (ziran) and non-action (wuwei).
The book’s purported author, Laozi, is a highly disputed figure, who may have lived around the sixth century BC as a contemporary of Confucius, but who some scholars have suggested was instead alive at a later point sometime in the next two centuries. Many others doubt whether Laozi (often translated as ‘Old Master’) was a real person at all. Instead, there is a large school of thought that thinks the Tao Te Ching is a collection of poetry and sayings originating from a number of different authors.
The volume aims to provide guidance to Taoists as to how they can exist in harmony with the universe. Although Taoism allows for deities, the universal energy at the core of its philosophy is not regarded in terms of a godhead. Rather, this energy connects everything, creating a unified whole, and adherents attempt to live in balance with its oppositional forces – for example, light and dark, fire and water, action and inaction. These dualities are encapsulated in the concept of yin and yang.
The text of the Tao Te Ching is relatively short, comprising just over eighty short sections and only around five thousand Chinese characters. At its heart are the ‘three Jewels’ of compassion, humility and moderation. Its various teachings, often summarized in a few short words, are frequently mystical and hard to pin down. In particular, the concept of wuwei has inspired many interpretations, although most agree that it promotes the avoidance of damaging intervention rather than passive inaction for its own sake: ‘Do nothing and everything is done.’ In a world where the impetus is towards perpetual motion and non-ending action, such an argument represents at the very least a challenge to the accepted orthodoxy, if not an outright threat. Furthermore, its implicit criticism of the excesses of a ruling class who oversaw an almost constant state of flux and disharmony renders the Tao Te Ching a much more radical and confrontational text than it might first appear. Consider the barbed nature of its observation: ‘When the Master governs, the people are hardly aware that he exists.’
The first significant reference to Laozi being its author is found in the writings of second- to first-century-BC historian Sima Qian. It has been suggested Laozi may have been a historian himself or that he perhaps worked at the imperial archives. Other later narratives claimed that he had lived for hundreds of years and was the latest in a long line of reincarnations. But in truth, it is hard to discern a genuine biographical figure. Hence increasing support for the idea of the Tao Te Ching as being an anthology. It is thought that the work might have been brought together, edited and refined over perhaps centuries in the latter half of the first millennium BC.
A series of bamboo tablets were discovered in a tomb in the province of Hubei in central China in 1993 that included several parts in common with the Tao Te Ching. Dating from no more recently than 300 BC, these are the oldest-known extant examples of Tao Te Ching text. Other later examples of the book and commentaries based upon it have been found inscribed variously on bamboo, silk and paper. The use of the title Tao Te Ching emerged during the rule of the Han dynasty, which lasted from 202 BC to AD 220. Taoism served as a significant strain of philosophy in Chinese life across the ensuing centuries, competing for space alongside the not entirely unrelated Buddhist belief system, as well as Confucianism and Legalism (which called for strong government rooted in a system of law and order). Even when these philosophical schools seemed at odds with one another, Taoism regularly provided the terms of reference through which their differences could be reconciled.
Taoism blossomed under the Tang dynasty (AD 618–907), with the Tang emperors even claiming Laozi as their ancestor. It would remain a major feature of China’s spiritual landscape for the best part of the next thousand years, although its influence declined from the seventeenth century onwards, particularly in relation to the ongoing influence of Buddhism and Confucianism. It was only in the following century that it significantly entered into the Western consciousness, when it was translated into Latin by Jesuit priests. The first English translation only appeared in 1868.
ZHUANGZI
The other great work of Taoism is Zhuangzi, named after its author who lived in the fourth century BC. Also sometimes referred to as Nanhua zhenjing (The Pure Classic of Nanhua), the collection of anecdotes and fables draws heavily on the Tao Te Ching but is regarded by many critics as exploring its Taoist credo in greater depth. Its author’s character permeates the text and we discover a man who wears old shoes held together with string because the material world matters not to him, who cannot mourn the loss of his wife because her passing is but an expression of the natural way, and who himself declines a coffin for his funeral and cares not whether it is the birds above ground or the worms below it who should feast upon his dead body.
Its death knell seemed to come in the 1950s when the Chinese authorities implemented a ban on formal religion, yet still Taoism has maintained a foothold within the country and more broadly internationally. Today, it can boast adherents in the millions. Its message of seeking to live in harmony with the natural world, so elegantly espoused, is one that resonates now perhaps more than ever before as we come to terms with the effects of the damage our species has wrought on our planet. ‘Love the world as yourself; then you can care for all things,’ runs one of its verses. How thoroughly modern and timeless.