GESC2450

(4c)

Daoism 道家
in Traditional Chinese Thoughts

Dr. Fred Cheung

PhD, University of California, Santa Barbara, U.S.A.
Lao Tzu 老子 & Chuang Tzu 莊
子,
the 2 founders of Daoism:
Only vague and sketchy accounts
(even in Ssu-ma Ch’ien’s Shih Chi)
Lao Tzu was of the
surname Li 李 ,
his formal name
was Erh 耳 , and
his courtesy
name was Tan;
Lao may have
been the clan’s
name.
Lao Tzu – Tao Te Ching 道德經
Authorship was questionable, yet, definitely was
the classic in the thought of Taoism.
It was divided into 2 books:
Book 1 Tao Ching ( 37 Chapters)
Book 2 Te Ching (44 chapters)
Therefore = total of 81 chapters
(In December 1973, the discovery in a Han tomb at Ma
Wang Tui: Book 2 was in the front, and book 1 was
after, thus, more complicated.)
“The Way that can be spoken of is not
the constant Way. ” I(1) D.C. Lau’s tr.
“The name that can be named is not
the constant name.”
“the Way is forever nameless,”
XXXII(72) D.C. Lau’s tr.
“The nameless was the beginning of heaven and
earth;
the named was the mother of the myriad
creatures.
…..
These two are the same but diverge in name as
they issue forth. Being the same they are called
mysteries, mystery upon mystery – the
gateway of the manifold secrets.” I(2…3) D.C.
Lau’s tr.
Because of his mastery of the ancient rites, it was
said that Lao Tzu was appointed keeper of the
archives of the Chou court. Lao Tzu was senior
in age to Confucius, and there were reports
that Confucius had visited Lao Tzu to ask him
about the rites. Nevertheless, Lao Tzu devoted
himself to the study of Tao (the Way), and its
Te (the Virtue & power). Then he resigned his
official post and withdrew from the world, &
nothing is known of the end of his life.
Similarly, Chuang Tzu “lived without leaving any
traces.” His given name was Chou.
He was famous for his “allegorical” (satirical)
writings.
He was also a most skillful writer and user of
phrases.

Cf. Plato (in ancient Greece)

Cf. Lu Hsun (in modern China)

1. “Dreaming of becoming a butterfly;

2. Jokes with the sophist: Hui Shih
Reflection on management
Cf. Confucius attempted to employ positive
governmental methods based on
benevolence and righteousness, to
overcome disorder and restore things to
their proper functioning, thus, “optimistic.”
However, Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu tended
toward negativism, offering the methods
of withdrawal whereby the individual
could preserve his own safety and be at
ease with himself, thus, “pessimistic”.

Reflection
“Weakness or yielding softness” (no-jo) is
the function of Tao.
“Men are soft and weak at birth, rigid and
tough in death; all plants and trees are
yielding and tender in life, & stiff and
brittle in death. Therefore, unyielding
strength is the companion of death, while
yielding softness is the companion of life. ”
(example: willow)

Reflection on management
Cf. T’ai Ch’i Ch’uan
Judo
In K’ung-fu Fighting

Cf. Kenny Roger’s “Coward of the County”

Reflection on management
Lao Tzu believed that the causes of disorder in the world
lay, not in the shortcomings of specific institutions, but
rather in the fact that institutions themselves were an
unsatisfactory method of achieving order.

Therefore:
The reversal or return to p’u 樸 ( the primitive) the
uncarved block of wood) = the movement of Tao.

(return to the original): “let the people revert to the use

of knotted cords” (to remember things) – a method of
recording which was used before writing was
invented.

Reflection on management
“In all the world, there is nothing softer than water, yet
it attacks the unyielding and the firm, nothing can
prevail against it.” This is to say that water conquers
through softness.
Water  stone into sand
For weakness and softness can insure self-preservation,
while the firm and the strong must be broken.
Therefore “softness and weakness conquer firmness and
strength” = the essential art in dealing with life’s
problems.

Reflection on management
Indeed, Lao Tzu accepted the doctrine of yielding and
humility and developed it further. Thus, a political
philosophy of “inaction” (wu-wei 無為 ) or, of taking
no purposive action was developed by Lao Tzu &
Chuang Tzu. Yet, this political thought is not
completely negative. Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu were
skeptical about the government but affirmed the value
of the individual.
Therefore, the preservation of life and the free
expression of man’s nature became the ultimate goal
of Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu’s political philosophy.

Reflection on management
Wu-wei:
Taking no action yet leaving nothing
undone.
“The Way never acts yet nothing is left
undone.” XXXVII(81) D.C. Lau’s tr.
“Do that which consists in taking no
action, and order will prevail.” III (10)
D.C. Lau’s tr.
“When one does nothing at all, there is
nothing that is undone.” XLVIII (108),
D.C. Lau’s tr.
“I take no action and the people are transformed of
themselves.” LVII (133) D.C. Lau’s tr.
The ideal state of the Taoist is one in which the people
are innocent of knowledge and free from “desire”.
“Therefore, in governing the people, the sage empties
their minds but fills theirs bellies, weakens their wills
but strengthens their bones. He always keeps them
innocent of knowledge and free from desire and
ensures that the clever never dare to act.” III (9) D.C.
Lau’s tr.
The aim of the sage is to keep the people in a
childlike state where there is no knowledge and
so no desire beyond the immediate objects of
the senses.
“And if I cease to desire and remain still, the
empire will be at peace of its own accord.”
XXXVII (81) D.C. Lau’s tr.
Lao Tzu’s political philosophy of inaction bears
some resemblance to the laissez faire
doctrines, but it differs from anarchism,
because it “takes no action yet leaves nothing
undone.”

Reflection on management
“The ideal form of political organization: “let
there be a small country with few people.
Let the people revert to the use of knotted
cords.
Through a neighboring state within sight, so
that they hear each other’s cocks crowing
and dogs barking, yet the people will grow
old and die without ever visiting one
another. ” LXXX (193) Mote’s tr.
Therefore, “Blunt the sharpness, untangle
the knots, soften the glare, let your
wheels move only along old ruts.” IV (12)
D.C. Lau’s tr.
The story of “the fighting cock” (“as dull as
a wooden cock”) by Chuang Tzu.

Reflection on management
 Chuang Tzu / Zhuangzi
“Equalizing things” (ch’i-wu) 齊物
“Heaven and earth co-exist with me; all the
myriad thing and I are one.”
“Each thing has its distinct reason for being
as it is; each thing has its individual
appropriateness. There are no things that
are not so; there are no things that are
not appropriate.” Chapter 2 “Ch’i-wu lun”
This principle once established, all
distinctions of things and the self, of noble
and humble, then lose their absolute
boundaries, and all the inequalities of
things bring themselves into positions of
relative equality and unity.
Bigness? Smallness? “Relative only!”
“When we understand that heaven and earth are but as tiny grains of rice, or
that tip of a hair is as a hill or a mountain, then all the rankings and
distinctions have become equal.”
 Cf. “Dust in the Wind” (by The Kansas)

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Vl3lydJy9s
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n8xC-RQ1W3g
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3YEw4a7ixQ

Reflection on management
 When we recognize that east and west
are relative opposites, and that neither
can exist except in relation to the other,
then their separate shares of achievement
can be established.

 Reflection on management
According to Burton Watson, (Columbia
University) (Chuang Tzu)
“the central theme of the Chuang Tzu may be
summed up in a single word: freedom.”
Essentially, all the philosophers of ancient China
addressed themselves to the same problem:
how is man to live a world dominated by chaos,
suffering, and absurdity? Nearly all of them
answered with some concrete plan of action
designed to reform the individual, to reform
society, and eventually to free the world from
its ills.
Chuang Tzu’s answer, however, is radically
different, …
It is the answer of a mystic, …
Chuang Tzu’s answer to the question is:
“free yourself from the world.”
It is the baggage of “conventional values”
that man must first of all discard before
he can be free!
Cf. Buddhism later

Reflection on management
Thus, in Chuang Tzu’s eyes, man is the author of
his own suffering and bondage, and all his
fears spring from the web of values created
by himself alone.
Chuang Tzu employs every resource of rhetoric in
his efforts to awaken the reader to the
essential meaninglessness of conventional
values and to free him from the bondage:
1. paradoxical anecdote/remark
2. pseudo-logical discussion/debate
3. humor
In Chuang Tzu’s view, the man who has freed
himself from conventional standards of
judgment can no longer be made to suffer, for
he refuses to recognize poverty as any less
desirable than affluence, to recognize death as
any less desirable than life. He remains within
society but refrains from acting out of the
motives that lead ordinary men to struggle for
wealth, fame, success, or safety.
Cf. D.H. Lawrence, “The Rocking-Horse Winner”
in Love among the Haystacks
He maintains a state that Chuang Tzu refers to
as wu-wei or inaction, meaning by this term
not a forced quietude, but a course of action
that is not founded upon any purposeful
motives of gain or striving. In such a state, all
human actions become as mindless as those of
the natural world.
Man becomes one with Nature, or Heaven, and
merges himself with Tao, or the Way, the
underlying unity that embraces man, Nature,
and all that is in the universe.
Discussion:
What is
Weak / strong?
Coward / Brave?
Cf. Christianity
“When a man hit you on the cheek, offer him the
other cheek, too.”
Cf. Kenny Rogers,
“The Coward of the County”
https://youtu.be/BbYj3tJRSO8
https://youtu.be/NZK581_rbsc

Reflection on management
Discussion:
“Desire”
Can “desire” be satisfied?
To the Daoists, “NO!”—
The “crave for desire” is never-ending!

Cf. D.H. Lawrence’s short-story:

“The Rocking-Horse Winner”
 “more is less
 & less is more”

 Reflection on management