ZenExperience-obooko-rel0025

Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu did not see themselves as founders
of any formal religion. They merely described the obvious,
encouraging others to be a part of nature and not its antagonist.
Their movement, now called Philosophical Taoism, was eclipsed
during the Han Dynasty (206 B.C.-A.D. 220) in official circles by
various other systems of thought, most particularly Confucianism
(which stressed obedience to authority—both that of elders and of
superiors—and reverence for formalized learning, not to mention
the acceptance of a structured hierarchy as part of one's larger
social responsibility). However, toward the end of the Han era
there arose two new types of Taoism: an Esoteric Taoism that
used physical disciplines to manipulate consciousness, and a
Popular Taoism that came close to being a religion in the
traditional mold. The first was mystical Esoteric Taoism, which
pursued the prolonging of life and vigor, but this gave way during
later times to Popular Taoism, a metaphysical alternative to the
comfortless, arid Confucianism of the scholarly establishment.
The post-Han era saw the Philosophical Taoism of Lao Tzu
and Chuang Tzu emerge anew among Chinese intellectuals,
actually coming to vie with Confucianism. This whole era
witnessed a turning away from the accepted values of society, as
the well-organized government of the Han era dissolved into
political and intellectual confusion. Government was unstable and
corrupt, and the Confucianism which had been its philosophical
underpinning was stilted and unsatisfying. Whenever a society
breaks down, the belief system supporting it naturally comes
under question. This happened in China in the third and fourth
centuries of the Christian era, and from it emerged a natural
opposition to Confucianism. One form of this opposition was the
imported religion of Buddhism, which provided a spiritual solace
missing in the teachings of Confucius, while the other was a
revival among intellectuals of Philosophical Taoism.
KUO HSIANG: A NEO-TAOIST
In this disruptive environment, certain intellectuals returned again
to the insights of Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu, creating a movement
today known as Neo-Taoism. One of the thinkers who tried to
reinterpret original Taoist ideas for the new times was Kuo Hsiang
(d. ca. 312), who co-authored a major document of Neo-Taoism
entitled Commentary on the Chuang Tzu. It focused on the
important Taoist idea of wu-wei, once explained as follows: " . . .to