Laozi (fl. 6th century BCE (traditional))

Laozi (variously spelled; , low-TSUH; Chinese: 老子; pinyin: Lǎozǐ) is the name traditionally given to an ancient Chinese philosopher, also identified as Li Er or Lao Dan, who is regarded as the author or originating teacher associated with the Tao Te Ching (Pinyin: Dào Dé Jīng), one of the foundational texts of Taoism. Traditional accounts place him in the 6th century BC state of Chu during China's Spring and Autumn period (c. 770 – c. 481 BC), describe him as a keeper of archival records at the Zhou court, and remember him as an elder contemporary of Confucius (c. 551 – c. 479 BC). Modern scholars remain divided over his identity, dates, and precise relationship to the received text: some regard the traditional Laozi as largely or wholly legendary, while others consider a historical Lao Dan plausible and accept the tradition that he was a senior contemporary of Confucius.

A central figure in Chinese culture, Laozi is generally regarded as a founder of Taoism. He was claimed and revered as an ancestor of the Tang dynasty (618–907) and has long been honored as a progenitor of the widespread surname Li. In religious Taoist traditions he was increasingly deified and came to be identified with Laojun, a divine manifestation of the Tao. The Dào Dé Jīng profoundly influenced subsequent Chinese philosophy, religion, literature, and political thought.

Name

Lǎozǐ is the pinyin romanization of 老子, a name with various romanized spellings, such as Laotse, Lao Tzu, Lao-Tze, etc., and various pronunciations in English. It is not a personal name, but rather an honorific title or epithet, essentially meaning 'old teacher' or 'venerable master'. Its structure, with the title zǐ, matches that of other ancient Chinese philosophers, such as Kongzi (Confucius), Mengzi, and Zhuangzi.

Traditional accounts give Laozi the personal name Li Er (李耳, Lǐ Ěr), whose Old Chinese pronunciation has been reconstructed as *C.rəʔ C.nəʔ. Li is a common Chinese surname which also has the meaning 'plum' or 'plum tree' when used as a common noun; there is a legend tying Laozi's birth to a plum tree. Laozi has long been identified with the persona Lao Dan (老聃, Lǎo Dān). Dan similarly means "Long-Ear" or "the Long-Eared One". The character 耳 is the Chinese word for 'ear'.

Laozi is recorded bearing the courtesy name Boyang (伯陽, Bóyáng), whose Old Chinese pronunciation has been reconstructed as *pˤrak laŋ. The character 伯 was the title of the eldest son born to the primary wife, or an uncle of the father's family who was older than one's father, also used as a noble title indicating an aristocratic lineage head with rulership over a small to medium domain, and as a general mark of respect. The character 陽 is yang, the solar and masculine life force in Taoist belief. Lao Dan seems to have been used more generally, however, including by Sima Qian in his Shiji (c. 91 BC), in the Zhuangzi, and by some modern scholars.

Identity

The earliest accounts identify Laozi with Lao Dan and Li Er, an elder contemporary of Confucius. Traditions concerning Lao Dan are attested independently of Sima Qian's later biography: the Zhuangzi and other early works preserve accounts of encounters between Lao Dan and Confucius, while the Confucian Liji has Confucius cite Lao Dan on ritual matters. Alan K. L. Chan argues that Lao Dan's favorable appearance in both Confucian and Daoist sources weighs against his having been fabricated simply for polemical purposes, and considers it plausible that a historical teacher known as Lao Dan acquired the honorific title Laozi.

The chronology and historicity of Laozi became major subjects of modern debate. During the 1920s and 1930s, many Chinese and Western scholars rejected the traditional 6th-century BC dating in favor of dates in the 4th or 3rd century BC. Assessments were not uniform, however. In his 1963 A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy, Wing-tsit Chan wrote that Chinese scholarly opinion had been approximately divided and noted a subsequent tendency to return toward the traditional chronology; concerning Laozi's existence, he stated that "the theory that Lao Tzu never existed or is merely a legend compounded of three different accounts is no longer seriously entertained." Later scholarship has continued to contain sharply differing assessments. William G. Boltz, for example, regarded the traditional Laozi figure as probably fictional, whereas Chan's current assessment accepts a historical Laozi senior to Confucius as a reasonable interpretation while emphasizing that the question remains disputed.

A. C. Graham, although skeptical of the later composite biography and of straightforward attribution of the received Dào Dé Jīng to a single historical author, distinguished this problem from the earlier Lao Dan tradition. He identified the Confucius–Lao Dan encounter as the earliest strand in the developing Laozi traditions and dated its circulation to at least the 4th century BC.

The discovery of the Guodian Chu Slips substantially changed the evidentiary basis of the dating debate. The manuscripts, buried around 300 BC, contain approximately 2,000 characters corresponding to about forty percent of the received Dào Dé Jīng, distributed among material corresponding wholly or partly to thirty-one later chapters. Moss Roberts observes that the works deposited in the Guodian tomb were already works of established importance and were therefore probably composed before their burial. He further presents as a working hypothesis that the Guodian Laozi represents material attributable to Lao Dan, a contemporary of Confucius, while other portions of the received text were added subsequently. Edward L. Shaughnessy likewise notes that the Guodian manuscripts may have drawn upon an already existing text with substantially the same chapter sequence as the received Laozi, while cautioning that the manuscripts do not by themselves resolve the history of its composition and transmission.

The historicity of Lao Dan and the formation of the received Dào Dé Jīng are therefore related but distinct questions. Archaeological and textual evidence supports a history of transmission, variation, and accretion, without by itself determining whether a historical teacher stood behind some portion of the tradition. Linguistic dating has also produced differing conclusions. William H. Baxter argues that the language of the text is earlier than that of the Zhuangzi and Chu Ci, placing "the bulk of the Lao-tzu" in the early or middle 4th century BC, while Liu Xiaogan, comparing rhyme patterns, sentence structures, repetition, and related linguistic features, has argued that the Laozi preserves characteristics earlier than those proposed by influential late-dating theories.

Traditional accounts

The earliest biographical reference to Laozi is found in the 1st‑century BC Records of the Grand Historian by Sima Qian. Multiple accounts of Laozi's biography are presented, with Sima Qian expressing various levels of doubt in his sources.

In one account, Sima Qian reports that Laozi was said to be a contemporary of Confucius during the 6th or 5th century BC. His personal name was Er or Dan. He was born in the village of Quren (曲仁里, Qūrén lǐ) in the southern state of Chu, within present-day Luyi in Henan. He was said to be the son of the Censor-in-Chief of the Zhou dynasty and Lady Yishou (益壽氏), and was a scholar who worked as the Keeper of the Archives for the royal Zhou court. This reportedly allowed him broad access to the works of the Yellow Emperor and other classics of the time, and he wrote a book in two parts before departing to the west.

In another, Laozi was a different contemporary of Confucius called Lao Laizi (老莱子), one of the Twenty-four Filial Exemplars, and wrote a book in 15 parts. The story tells of Zong the Warrior who defeats an enemy and triumphs, and then abandons the corpses of the enemy soldiers to be eaten by vultures. By coincidence Laozi, traveling and teaching the way of the Tao, comes on the scene and is revealed to be the father of Zong, from whom he was separated in childhood. Laozi tells his son that it is better to treat respectfully a beaten enemy, and that the disrespect to their dead would cause his foes to seek revenge. Convinced, Zong orders his soldiers to bury the enemy dead. Funeral mourning is held for the dead of both parties and a lasting peace is made.

In a third, he was the court astrologer Lao Dan who lived during the 4th century BC reign of the Duke Xian of Qin who grew weary of the moral decay of life in Chengzhou and noted the kingdom's decline. He ventured west to live as a hermit in the unsettled frontier at the age of 80. At the western gate of the city (or kingdom), he was recognized by the guard Yinxi. The sentry asked the old master to record his wisdom for the good of the country before he would be permitted to pass. The text Laozi wrote was said to be the Dào Dé Jīng, although the present version of the text includes additions from later periods. In some versions of the tale, the sentry was so touched by the work that he became a disciple and left with Laozi, never to be seen again. In some later interpretations, the "Old Master" journeyed all the way to India and was the teacher of Siddartha Gautama, the Buddha. Others say he was the Buddha himself.

The stories assert that Laozi never opened a formal school but nonetheless attracted a large number of students and loyal disciples. There are many variations of a story retelling his encounter with Confucius, most famously in the Zhuangzi. A.C. Graham suggested that the Confucian version of the story presented in the Book of Rites was the original, which was borrowed and re-interpreted by the followers of Zhuang Zhou. His birthday is popularly held to be the 15th day of the second month of the Chinese calendar. In accounts where Laozi married, he was said to have had a son who became a celebrated soldier of Wei during the Warring States period.

Dào Dé Jīng

The Dào Dé Jīng (or "Tao Te Ching", according to an older romanization) is one of the most significant treatises in Chinese cosmogony. It is often called the Laozi, and has always been associated with that name. The identity of the person or people who wrote or compiled the text has been the source of considerable speculation and debate throughout history. As with many works of ancient Chinese philosophy, ideas are often explained by way of paradox, analogy, appropriation of ancient sayings, repetition, symmetry, rhyme, and rhythm. The Dào Dé Jīng stands as an exemplar of this literary form. Unlike most works of its genre, the book conspicuously lacks a central "master" character and seldom references historical people or events, giving it an air of timelessness.

The Dào Dé Jīng describes the Tao as the source and ideal of all existence: it is unseen, but not transcendent, immensely powerful yet supremely humble, being the root of all things. People have desires and free will (and thus are able to alter their own nature). Many act "unnaturally", upsetting the natural balance of the Tao. The Dào Dé Jīng intends to lead students to a "return" to their natural state, in harmony with Tao. Language and conventional wisdom are critically assessed. Taoism views them as inherently biased and artificial, widely using paradoxes to sharpen the point.

Wu wei, literally 'non-action' or 'not acting', is a central concept of the Dào Dé Jīng. The concept of wu wei is multifaceted, and reflected in the words' multiple meanings, even in English translation; it can mean "not doing anything", "not forcing", "not acting" in the theatrical sense, "creating nothingness", "acting spontaneously", and "flowing with the moment".

This concept is used to explain ziran, or harmony with the Tao. It includes the concepts that value distinctions are ideological and seeing ambition of all sorts as originating from the same source. Dào Dé Jīng used the term broadly with simplicity and humility as key virtues, often in contrast to selfish action. On a political level, it means avoiding such circumstances as war, harsh laws and heavy taxes. Some Taoists see a connection between wu wei and esoteric practices, such as zuowang ('sitting in oblivion': emptying the mind of bodily awareness and thought) found in the Zhuangzi.

Alan Chan provides an example of how Laozi encouraged a change in approach, or return to "nature", rather than action. Technology may bring about a false sense of progress. The answer provided by Laozi is not the rejection of technology, but instead seeking the calm state of wu wei, free from desires. This relates to many statements by Laozi encouraging rulers to keep their people in "ignorance", or "simple-minded". Some scholars insist this explanation ignores the religious context, and others question it as an apologetic of the philosophical coherence of the text. It would not be unusual political advice if Laozi literally intended to tell rulers to keep their people ignorant. However, some terms in the text, such as "valley spirit" (谷神, gǔshén) and 'soul' (魄, pò), bear a metaphysical context and cannot be easily reconciled with a purely ethical reading of the work.

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