The Age of the Sages
Page 25
Han Dynasty
The Qin rulers were succeeded by the Han dynasty, which lasted from 206 bce to 220 ce. These were prosperous times for China and widely considered one of the greatest periods in Chinese history. Many in China today still refer to themselves as the “People of Han.” The Han rulers not only reinstituted Confucianism; they made it the official state religion. It was during this dynasty that government officials were required to study the Confucian texts and pass civil service exams based on them. By the first century ce, sacrifices were offered to Confucius, and temples constructed in his honor.
Around this same time, Mahayana Buddhism was introduced to China, and Daoism began to establish institutional structures. From this point onward, Confucian history is intertwined with that of these other two religions. During the Song dynasty (960–1279 ce), for example, a new philosophical movement called Neo-Confucianism developed that attempted to synthesize Buddhism and Confucianism.
Current Era
Confucius’s prestige has waxed and waned at various points in the last two thousand years, but overall, he has enjoyed overwhelming admiration from the Chinese. His philosophy was also influential in some of the countries with which the Chinese had significant contact, especially Korea, Japan, and Vietnam. In 1906, he was formally declared by imperial decree to be “Co-Assessor with the deities of Heaven and Earth.”[8] That proclamation was made a few decades before the Communist takeover of China, led by Mao Zedong. Under Mao’s rule, Confucius and Confucianism were portrayed as quaint, backward, and antirevolutionary. Mao did much to eradicate Confucianism in China, but now in the post-Mao era, Confucianism seems to be enjoying renewed interest among Chinese and others around the world.[9]
The Rise of Daoism
From Confucianism, we turn now to the last tradition we will consider, Daoism. In a way, our study of Confucianism has been a necessary prerequisite to the exploration of Daoism, because much of early Daoist philosophy was a response to the same social and political conditions addressed by Confucianism. The Daoists, however, took a very different approach to these circumstances. While Confucianism and Daoism shared much in common—such as the conviction that the problems of the Zhou dynasty were rooted in greed and an obsession with power—they proposed almost diametrically opposite solutions. In this way, Daoism emerged as a counterbalance to particular elements of Confucianism.
Philosophical and Religious Daoism
As we examine Daoism, the first item we must address is which Daoism we are talking about. Sinologists have often distinguished between what they called “philosophical Daoism,” known by the Chinese word daojia, which means the school of the Way, and “religious Daoism,” known as daojiao, the teaching of the Way. This distinction was part of the broader division that analysts made between the elite and folk dimensions of the Chinese traditions. Philosophical Daoism was part of the elite form of the tradition, oriented toward the literate and intellectual class, whereas religious Daoism was the folk expression, developed principally for the common people, whose needs and interests differed somewhat from those of a higher social station.
“While Confucianism and Daoism shared much in common—such as the conviction that the problems of the Zhou dynasty were rooted in greed and an obsession with power—they proposed almost diametrically opposite solutions. In this way, Daoism emerged as a counterbalance to particular elements of Confucianism.”
Philosophical Daoism is primarily associated with two classic texts, the Daodejing and the Zhuangzi, which came into being during the later Axial Age. Religious Daoism, which is also called the Daoist “church,” was a later development, beginning around the second century ce, during the Han dynasty, when the tradition began to establish ecclesiastical structures, including priests, temples, rituals, hierarchies, and so on. On the surface, the two forms of Daoism appear quite different from one another, but the extent to which they really are different is an intriguing question in current Daoist studies. The conviction seems to be growing among scholars that the distinction between the two forms of Daoism is not as sharp as once believed. Some have even suggested that the original distinction was a misguided fabrication of Western sinologists who were fascinated by the intellectual dimensions of the tradition but put off by its popular religious manifestations. This is an important issue, but it cannot detain us at this point, since the origins of religious Daoism fall outside the purview of the Axial Age.
Our attention, therefore, will focus on what has been called philosophical Daoism. Despite the terminology, philosophical Daoism had many religious components. What it lacked, as far as we can tell, were rituals, communities, clergy, gods, and similar features that are often associated with religion in the West. But like any religion, it provided a comprehensive view of the world that involved the sacred and a concept of the ultimate.
“Despite the terminology, philosophical Daoism had many religious components. What it lacked, as far as we can tell, were rituals, communities, clergy, gods, and similar features that are often associated with religion in the West. But like any religion, it provided a comprehensive view of the world that involved the sacred and a concept of the ultimate.”
Laozi and the Daodejing
Some have claimed that the origins of philosophical Daoism lie in the Shang dynasty or even before. Most scholars, however, date its beginnings to around the third or fourth century bce, the time when its principal text, the Daodejing, was composed. This would be within or near the Warring States Period. It is evident that the text as we have it today appeared after the rise of Confucianism, because much of it was clearly intended as a refutation of central Confucian ideas.
According to Chinese tradition, the Daodejing was written by a man named Laozi, who lived in the sixth century and was several years older than Confucius. Some traditions suggest that Confucius was at one time a student of Laozi’s, but that seems doubtful. A “biography” of Laozi written in the Han dynasty says he worked in the archives of the Zhou rulers. In his later years, he became increasingly frustrated with society and government and decided to leave the capital city to spend the remainder of his life in solitude and quiet contemplation. As he departed the city on a buffalo, the keeper of the Jade Gate asked him to leave a remembrance of his wisdom before he departed forever. Laozi dismounted, grabbed a brush, and quickly wrote out a text of five thousand characters. Then he got back on his buffalo and rode off. The text he left with the gatekeeper became the Daodejing or, as it is also known, the Laozi. According to one account, Laozi continued his journey to India, where he appeared as the Buddha, and then on to West Asia, where he was known as Mani, the founder of Manichaeism.
Although the figure of the old man sadly departing society is a fitting image for philosophical Daoism, it has no historical basis. Today, virtually every scholar of Daoism believes Laozi to be a fiction, a creation of the early Daoists, intended probably to provide a counterpart to the figure of Confucius and an author for the Daodejing. The evidence for this conclusion is compelling. The stylistic and linguistic differences throughout the text make it quite evident that the Daodejing was the work of many minds, not of a single individual. These differences also suggest that the book was composed and edited over a long period of time, perhaps as long as a century. Furthermore, Laozi is not really a name in Chinese; it means “old master” or “old baby.”
Whether or not Laozi was a historical person hardly matters. Of far greater interest are the ideas contained within the work that bears his name and the role they played in China’s Axial Age. In the next chapter, we will begin our exploration of these novel ideas.
* * *
Charlie Chan in Paris,directed by Lewis Seiler (Los Angeles: Fox Film, 1935).↵
Docks of New Orleans,directed by Derwin Adams (Los Angeles: Monogram Pictures, 1948).↵
“Charlie Chan’s Aphorisms: The Complete Sayings of Charlie Chan,” The Charlie Chan Family Home, n.d. http://charliechanfamily.tripod.com/id6.html. Accessed 27 April 2013.↵
Edward O. Wilson, On Human Nature (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1979).↵
Mengzi 6A8.1, 6A8.4, trans. Brian W. Van Norden (Indianapolis/Cambridge: Hackett, 2008), 152.↵
Ivanhoe, Confucian Moral Self-Cultivation, 32.↵
Hick, An Interpretation of Religion, 257.↵
See Annping Chin, The Authentic Confucius: A Life of Thought and Politics (New York: Scribner, 2007). ↵
21
The Daodejing
The Daodejing is a book of mystery. We are not certain of its origins or authorship, nor is there much certainty about its meaning. The book’s style is poetic, impressionistic, and evocative. And it is very brief, comprising eighty-one chapters, each no longer than a page. It was written, of course, in Chinese, which is notoriously ambiguous and difficult to translate. The combination of these factors resulted in a text that has been interpreted and translated in many, many ways. There are several hundred commentaries on the Daodejing written in Chinese, Korean, and Japanese, and it has been translated into English more times than any other book except the Bible.
The Dao
Fortunately, the book’s title is straightforward. Daodejing is translated as the Classic (Jing) of the Way (Dao) and the Virtue (De). The difficulties begin when we start to parse the words dao and de.
Dao in Chinese Philosophy
Dao was a concept used by all forms of Chinese philosophy, not just the school that incorporated its name. It was often the topic of debate among and within the various schools. Dao is ordinarily translated as the “way” or the “path.” In a formal, philosophical sense, Dao meant the ideal way of things or the manner in which something goes well, but different philosophers employed the word in different ways. When used by Confucius, the term meant the discipline of becoming a sage and the path to social harmony.
The Daodejing also employs the term in this manner but gives it another, more primary significance as well. For Daoists, the Dao meant “the way of nature,” in a sense similar to the concept of ultimate reality. The Daodejing calls the Dao the “universe’s mother,” suggesting it is the source of all things and that which nurtures and sustains them. Of course, the metaphor of “mother” should not be taken too literally. The Dao is not a personal entity; it is not a god or goddess. Yet its jurisdiction is universal. It is the way of all things in the universe.
The Named and the NamelessDao
The Daodejing cautions us from the very beginning not to try to understand the Dao too clearly or concretely. It is not amenable to precise definition or complete understanding. According to the opening lines of the Daodejing, one of the most quoted passages in Chinese literature:
The way that can be spoken of
Is not the constant way;
The name that can be named
Is not the constant name.
The nameless was the beginning of heaven and earth;
The named was the mother of the myriad creatures.
Hence always rid yourself of desires in order to observe its secrets;
But always allow yourself to have desires
in order to observe its manifestations.
These two are the same
But diverge in name as they issue forth.[1]
This rather cryptic passage suggests there are two aspects to the Dao: that which can be talked about and discussed and that which cannot. Both are part of the same reality. The deeper, eternal dimension is the latter, the ineffable and inscrutable Way. Like the Hindu concept of nirguna Brahman, this aspect of the Dao sets limits to human understanding and analysis, but it does not mean that the Dao is absolutely unattainable or unreachable. It simply indicates that observing the Dao goes beyond understanding and speaking of it. As with the idea of saguna Brahman, there is also an aspect of the Dao that can be discussed; the dimension of the Dao that is available to name and concept is its embodied form, its manifestation in the “myriad things,” the many individual entities that make up the world. Despite the liberty to speak of the Dao in this respect, its ultimately inexpressible quality sets restrictions on what and how we may speak of it. The Daoist conception of the Dao well fits the dictum of Irish poet William Butler Yeats: “Man can embody the truth, but he cannot know it.”[2]
“There are two aspects to the Dao: (1) the deeper, eternal dimension is the ineffable and inscrutable Way, and (2) the dimension of the Dao that is available to name and concept is its embodied form, its manifestation in the “myriad things,” the many individual entities that make up the world.”
This tension between the named and the nameless Dao accounts for the form of the Daodejing itself. The medium is an almost perfect reflection of its message. As if heeding the admonition of chapter 1, the entire text is brief and terse, avoiding overanalysis and rational justification. Its poetic style appeals more to intuition and the imagination than to the discursive mind. Its paradoxes and rich imagery often confuse and confound.
In fact, the Daodejing rarely discusses the Dao. To quote chapter 56, “Those who know do not talk [about it]; those who talk [about it] do not know.”[3] Nowhere is it defined. Rather than describe the Dao, the book characterizes the persons or things that follow or possess it. We learn about the Daomainly by reading about those who live in accord with it. When the text does refer to the Dao, it does so obliquely, through rich, multivalent images or through paradoxes, statements that frequently baffle more than they illuminate. Both strategies serve to stress the Dao’s indistinct and mysterious nature. “As for the Way,” says chapter 21, “it is vague and elusive.”[4] Such a statement both reveals and conceals.
The twofold nature of the Dao helps to explain a paradox that runs throughout the Daodejing. Some passages depict the Dao as stable, eternal, and constant. Others describe it as the source of change, or perhaps even change itself. We could easily attribute this discrepancy to a difference of opinion among the various contributors to the text, but what if the difference is deliberate? It is more in keeping with the paradoxical nature of the Dao to affirm both its constant qualities and its changing qualities. The eternal, stable dimension can be identified as the primordial, ineffable Dao, as suggested by chapter 1. The changing Dao can then be understood as that which manifests through the myriad things, the items of the world that come into existence and pass out of it.
A particular Chinese icon may illuminate this paradox, although it will not explain or resolve it. Most Westerners are familiar with the Taijitu, although they may not know it by name. It is the symbol of two curved shapes, one black and one white, swirling around each other, together composing a circle. Inside the white swirl is a black circle; inside the black is a white one. The symbol represents the Chinese ideal of harmony and wholeness by suggesting that all things require an equal and opposite thing to maintain balance. One swirl can represent day, the other night. One can be life, the other death. One is female, the other male. One is hot, the other cold. And so on and on. The Chinese term for the black swirl is yin, and it represents everything that is dark, hidden, passive, receptive, yielding, cool, soft, and feminine. The white swirl is called yang, and it represents everything that is light, open, active, aggressive, controlling, hot, hard, and masculine. Sometimes the emblem is called the yinyang symbol. Like the Dao, the concept of yinyang was shared by Confucianism and Daoism and other Chinese schools of thought, and it probably antedated all of them. The Dao is the power underlying yin and yang.
Yin and yang are indeed opposites, but they are also complementary and interdependent. One cannot exist without the other, and each supports the other. Like all opposites, they have things in common (such as size and shape). And neither is completely what it appears to be. Yin is not wholly yin, and yang is not wholly yang. Each contains the seed of the other, as represented by the circle within each swirl. Life contains the seed of death; death contains the seed of life. Essentially, the relationship between yin and
yang accounts for the phenomenon of change. Yin gives rise to yang; yang gives rise to yin. This is an eternal, harmonious pattern.
“The Chinese term for the black swirl is yin, and it represents everything that is dark, hidden, passive, receptive, yielding, cool, soft, and feminine. The white swirl is called yang, and it represents everything that is light, open, active, aggressive, controlling, hot, hard, and masculine. . . . Yin and yang are indeed opposites, but they are also complementary and interdependent. One cannot exist without the other, and each supports the other.”
The Taijitu icon represents the coexistence of change and constancy within the Dao. The Dao causes—or is—the change in the world, as represented in the swirling movement of yin and yang. Simultaneously, it is the source of balance, harmony, and wholeness, suggested by the circle, the symbol of eternity and completeness. The pattern of constant change is its unvarying quality. Understanding the importance of keeping yin and yang in balance is helpful in understanding the relationship of Daoism to Confucianism. Perhaps one reason for the rise of Daoism was to offset the very strong yang elements in Confucianism. For this reason, the Daodejing valorized many things associated with the yin side of life: depth, mystery, intuition, the feminine, receptivity, darkness, enigma, passivity. Throughout the text, yin items such as these are affirmed, as if to balance the yang emphasis in Confucianism.