Wait a second!
More handpicked essays just for you.
More handpicked essays just for you.
The Philosophy of Taoism from a Western Perspective
the influence of taoism
The Philosophy of Taoism from a Western Perspective
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Recommended: The Philosophy of Taoism from a Western Perspective
1. Laozi was a philosopher, ideologist and a founder of the Taoist school. Also, Laozi has made specific explorations on the origin of the world. He believed that everything in the world functions in accordance with Tao which is everywhere and all-powerful. For Laozi, Tao is particular for the working and generating of everything while being completely unnoticeable. Heraclitus was an ancient Greek ideologist who lived during the period of Laozi. Heraclitus held that the world on its foundation and origin functions in accordance with Logos. Also, he believed that everything remains in a running stage, however, in accordance with a type of invariable law, changes may occur and include the interplay of counterparts, that generates harmony as …show more content…
Above all, Parmenides and Heraclitus support different principles, as well as their doctrines, differ dramatically. In Parmenides and Heraclitus, former affirms vary, shifting and cyclic recurrence of matters and the latter rejects their being. In particular, for Heraclitus real being is circular and in further changes into non-being such as life transforms into death and the change which happens is cyclical and permanent, it absolutely is. On the other hand, for Parmenides, real being is still and static. Basically, it does not modify the vision of change. Both of these philosophers indirectly destroyed the notion of death by marking becoming with the approval of existence. Also, for Parmenides and his followers, the aspects of movement and alteration are only features of a permanent, constant reality. However, this concept could settle due to multiple wrong translations of the certain parts. More specifically, it is not apparent completely whether Parmenides denied which is called perception. Also, Parmenides frequently used the verb noein which is possible to interpret as "to think". In this case, his argument could be reconstructed as, for instance, "a thing can be thought of only if it is" or "anything cannot be thought about if it does not
Taoism was developed by Lao Tzu. Lao Tzu describes the Tao—translated as “Way”—as “one, natural, and eternal” (Lao Tzu pg.474). The Tao is life’s and nature’s course. The Tao consist of bonding energies, known as yin, and expanding energies, known as yang. Yin and yang are opposite forces, but each need one another to exist or make sense. For example, life needs death, the moon needs the sun, and compassion needs suffering. The
Kongzi (Confucius, a Latinized name) was born in 551 B.C.E., to a poor family of the lower nobility. Throughout his life, he relentlessly tried to gain an office with a prominent ruler of the time who was willing to adopt his various concepts. Unfortunately, Confucius died in 479 B.C.E., before such a change ever took place. However, he succeeded in winning over a handful of devote followers who continued his legacy and Confucianism later went on to become one of the most influential thought systems of Chinese history. Of his followers, Mencius and Xunzi became the most renown. Since Confucius did not succeed in completing a manual of his views, these followers had to derive their own interpretations of the system which now formulate, the Analects. The Analects portray an idealized gentleman, and his various duties in terms of the society, family and the rituals. Confucius explains about the way (Dao) which he believed, that if the people accepted its terms and were willing to abide, they would succeed in creating a utopian society.
“Taoism: The Origins of Taoism.” BBC: Religions. BBC. n. pag. 12 Nov. 2009. Web. 9 Nov. 2013.
Over the course of history, individuals have questioned the universe in which we live in and searched for a purpose of our existence. The belief in a higher presence, other than our own, has existed since man can remember. From this belief, religion was established and can survive and flourish. Buddhism and Taoism are two great religious and philosophical traditions in Chinese history. For hundreds of years, these two have shaped Chinese lifestyle and thought. Readings from the Tao Te Ching, Buddhists scriptures, and Herman Hesse’s Siddharta explain the various aspects of Buddhism and Taoism, but in the end there is only one common belief, and that is the existence of a Supreme Being.
Ultimately Capra discovered for himself and argues is the view of the world explained through physics and the view given by philosophies such as Hindusim, Buddhism and Taoism are parallel to each other.
Taoism and Buddhism were born in the same century. Siddhartha reached enlightenment in approximately 535 B.C. and Lao Tzu’s teachings were recorded around 500 B.C. There are many similarities in the basics of these two religions. Some of the similarities can be seen clearly when examining the three meaning of Tao.
Although Daoism and Hinduism are two completely separate religions with the former indigenous to China and the latter to India, both of them encompass striking similarities that undeniably make it seem that one influenced the other. However, no known relations between the two religions exist. Comparing the small, but contextually vital part of the Hindu epic Mahabharata known as Bhagavad Gita with the central text to Daoism, Tao Te Ching offers an unparalleled journey of knowledge and understanding. Tao Te Ching emphasizes the crucial concept of Dao, which is translated as the “Way” while Bhagavad Gita stresses the all-encompassing Brahman. Since no sufficient language can express the full meaning of Dao, the most suitable example that shows its operations is the movement of water (TTC 8). Water simply flows with unity with nature – it can transform itself into whatever form is needed to flow. Dao is essentially an indescribable eternal energy and origin of the entire universe. Fully arriving at the Dao is the main goal of Daoism. Similarly, Brahman is the ultimate end to everything in the universe. In the Bhagavad Gita, Brahman is described as the source from which all beings originate from and eventually return. The fundamental principle of both concepts is, therefore, one and the same. I will specifically focus on vital parts of the two concepts in order to illustrate the parallelism of the eventual goal of the Dao and the Brahman. The emphasis on action with no desire for the “fruit” of the action, Dao and Brahman’s inexpressible essence, and following one’s own duty in order to complement the movement of the universe. These concepts illustrate the similarity between Dao and Brahman and ultimately demonstrate that they are ide...
Unlike Confucius, Lao-tzu believed that the natural order was important to have a peaceful society. His book, Dao de Ching expressed his belief that a universal force, the Dao, guides all things.
Without any doubt, Dao(道) is the most important idea in the book Dao De Jing. However, it seems a little improper to use the character “Dao(道)” compared to many other better options to describe this power. In one explanation, Dao means the reason and order of the whole world. According to this argument, Laozi should use the characters that mean reason, like “理” or “序”. On the other hand, according to Laozi, Dao is the origin of the myriad things that exist now. In this way, Laozi should simply call this power “始”or “源”. Although “Dao” had been used to represent the ultimate truth in Yi Jing, or other books before, Laozi was able to choose any character he preferred, because the Daoism was original by Laozi. According to Laozi’s personality, he will not try to make the content more readable by giving up the accuracy of the language. In Chinese, Dao(道) also means the road or pathway. Laozi doesn’t give too much explanation about pathway idea in his book. However, Laozi chose Dao over other characters, so there must be another idea that Laozi doesn’t want to give directly to the readers. I will try to explain the
The supposed author of the Tao Te Ching, Lao Tzu, is said to be the father of Taoism. It is estimated that Lao Tzu, spelled many other ways including Lao-tsu, Lao Tse, and Lao Tzi, was born under the name of Li Erh in Honan, China, around 604 B.C.E. Myth says that Lao Tzu was born fully developed with a long, white beard and hair the color of snow. He was somewhat of a recluse and withdrew from society to avoid governmental law and rule. He retreated to the Western frontier after the fall of the Zhou dynasty to continue his personal study of metaphysics and philosophy (Taoism 2). The collaborations of his studies and observations are said to be the basis of the Tao Te Ching, although some scholars argue that Lao Tzu’s existence cannot be proved and that the scholar Chuang-tzu played at least a partial role in the authorship. However the Tao Te Ching came to be, it is prized for being the foundation of Taoist belief and should hold merit as a universal guide, not as an author’s accomplishment (De Bary, Chan, and Watson 49).
Religion itself has been around for many centuries, dictating and giving meaning to the life of mortals. With religion comes religious experiences, which has been around just as long with the experiences themselves being vast in terms of differences. There are two texts that explore religious experiences: Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu and The Rumi Collection edited by Kabir Helminski. Being abstract and impersonal in nature, the Tao Te Ching offers the ultimate goal of finding simple oneness with the Tao. With the Tao being everything that exists and everything that doesn’t exist at the same time, finding peace both within yourself and with the Greater Being is what leads to a successful and fulfilled life. Meanwhile, Rumi takes a more personal and
Parmenides pioneered the radical distinction between the Way of Truth and the Way of Belief or Opinion. He failed to believe that what is nothing could have been something and what is something came from nothing, this diverted from Pyhtagoras' belief based on opinion and movement and change. Parmenides felt it was absurd to think that something that exists popped out of existence or something justs pops into existence. He thought that if it exists then it has always existed. This also rejected the "sense-appearance" belief that many Pre-Socratic philosophers had followed. Coplestone briefly states Parmenides' beliefs:
	Heraclitus’ successor, Parmenides, believes that Being must exist virtually in the mind. Because nothing cannot be thought without thinking of it as something, there cannot be "nothing"2, all that can exist is Being. If there is only Being it must be indestructible, uncreated, and eternal. If one agrees that Being is , then there can’t be any place where being is not. According Parmenides’ purely logical view, all perception of vacuous space is an illusion.
to the mid-4th centuries. This philosophy played a social, spiritual and cultural life of Asia.
Lao-Tze founded Taoism around 550 BC. The goal in Taoism is achieve Inner harmony, pea...