I love some of the philosophy behind Buddhism and Taoism but oppose their acquired religious elements. In fact, I don't consider the religions of Buddhism and Taoism (at least on the Zhuangzi side) to be following the essence behind either of those. One cannot achieve enlightenment when chained by traditions or possessing an inability to see the world AS IT IS without hating it so much that one creates illusions. That is the path of self-inflicted suffering.
To be fair, some of the books I've studied of Buddhism and Daoism suggest that the traditions of the Daodejing and the Zhuangzi were originally separate, and were only brought together as one school called "Daoism" during a later dynasty.
A historian of the Han also wrote that while he had tried to find a historical basis for the philosopher who wrote the Daodejing, he had also found that very early on, that philosopher's memory, if it had ever existed, had been completely overwritten by the traditions of Daoist mystics who claimed him as their tradition's central figure.
So even going back to the very beginnings of "Daoism" there's no certainty that the texts and traditions we today assume to be part of it were really meant to be associated together at all, or even derive from the same fundamental beliefs.
At little story about Laozi who alleged write Daodejing, once taught Confucius about what's Dao at the time Confucius is about 50 years old. And generally believed that's the sources of Confucius pharse, 五十知天命, - When you are 50, you will know the fate of your life given by the universe.
And Laozi is often used to refer the author, and the book itself. And Zhuangzi as will, the name of the author and the book. And Zhuangzi is an actual historic figure. And a reason why we can't sure about the writing about some old books is due to the language barrier. Chinese characters are very different from region to region before the unification in 221 BC by the first emperor. And the next dynasty - Han trying to collect as much as old texts as possible, and written down in the more modern characters invented in that period. (Basically remain the same for the next 2000 years, and people today, like me can recognized them no problem). But many books were lost during the war between 2 dynasties. And only through some books hidden for century. They are able to documented them. But there are hundreds of years went by (4 to 5 century), those writing no long easily recognizable, so many meanings has to be guessed. Not intentionally altered, people simply couldn't make sense of it. Imagine you are reading a philosophy book written in medieval English, without any references.
A comparison of old characters and new:
At the time between 3 ~ 8 century B.C
After A.D this one 153 AD 乙瑛碑
original picture
since people don't used to negative words written in white, I put it back to positive, the original is an impression (拓本), since ancient writing survived today, are writing carved in stone monument. And the impression will be negative picture like in photography.
Compare to modern writing
You don't see much change in 1858 years
Author
Topic: Religion (Read 34175 times)