The Complete Works of Chuang Tzu (Translations from the Asian Classics)

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Yan Hui said, “My family is poor. I haven’t drunk wine or eaten any strong foods for several months. So can I be considered as having fasted?” Traces of the Zhuangzi 's influence in late Warring States period philosophical texts such as the Guanzi, Han Feizi, Huainanzi, and Lüshi Chunqiu suggest that Zhuangzi's intellectual lineage was already fairly influential in the states of Qi and Chu in the 3rd centuryBC. [9] During the Qin and Han dynasties—with their state-sponsored Legalist and Confucian ideologies, respectively—the Zhuangzi does not seem to have been highly regarded. [9] One exception is Han dynasty scholar Jia Yi's 170BC work " Fu on the Owl" ( 鵩鳥賦; Fúniǎo fù), the earliest definitively known fu rhapsody, which does not reference the Zhuangzi by name but cites it for one-sixth of the poem. [39]

In my interpretation, through this fictional conversation, Zhuangzi does not hope to argue that philosophers should not be in politics, but instead, his suggestion is that one must be a real philosopher to succeed in politics. Politics is useless and dangerous for one who tries to enforce one’s ideal actively or arbitrarily, but a real philosopher follows the Way and is free in politics – just as they are anywhere else. As I understand, although the principle of non-action means that a philosopher is not obliged to rule or be in politics, Zhuangzi’s utopia would also require a ‘philosopher king’ to exist.Zhuangzi's wife died. When Huizi went to convey his condolences, he found Zhuangzi sitting with his legs sprawled out, pounding on a tub and singing. "You lived with her, she brought up your children and grew old," said Huizi. "It should be enough simply not to weep at her death. But pounding on a tub and singing—this is going too far, isn't it?"

The proposals put forward by the Confucians, the Mohists , and the Legalists, to name some of the principal schools of philosophy, all are different but all are based on the same kind of commonsense approach to the problem, and all seek concrete social, political, and ethical reforms to solve it. Herbert Giles (1889), Chuang Tzŭ: Mystic, Moralist and Social Reformer, London: Bernard Quaritch; 2nd edition, revised (1926), Shanghai: Kelly and Walsh; reprinted (1961), London: George Allen and Unwin. The Perfect Man of ancient times made sure that he had it in himself before he tried to give it to others. When you’re not even sure what you’ve got in yourself, how do you have time to bother about what some tyrant is doing? The potter says, “I’m good at handling clay! To round it, I apply the compass; to square it, I apply the T square.” The carpenter says, “I’m good at handling wood! To arc it, I apply the curve; to make it straight, I apply the plumb line.” But as far as inborn nature is concerned, the clay and the wood surely have no wish to be subjected to compass and square, curve and plumb line. Yet generation after generation sings out in praise, saying, “Bo Luo is good at handling horses! The potter and the carpenter are good at handling clay and wood!” And the same fault is committed by the men who handle the affairs of the world! Confucius said, “He is one of those bogus practitioners of the arts of Mr. Chaos. He knows the first thing but doesn’t understand the second. He looks after what is on the inside but doesn’t look after what is on the outside. A man of true brightness and purity who can enter into simplicity, who can return to the primitive through inaction, give body to his inborn nature, and embrace his spirit, and in this way wander through the everyday world—if you had met one like that, you would have had real cause for astonishment. As for the arts of Mr. Chaos, you and I need not bother to find out about them.”divides what is naturally one. Hui Shih’s Tenth Thesis is: Flood concern on all the 10,000 thing-kinds; The cosmos is Words are not just wind. Words have something to say. But if what they have to say is not fixed, then do they really say something? Or do they say nothing? People suppose that words are different from the peeps of baby birds, but is there any difference, or isn’t there? What does the Way rely on that we have true and false? What do words rely on, that we have right and wrong? How can the Way go away and not exist?

Kern, Martin (2010). "Early Chinese Literature, Beginnings through Western Han". In Owen, Stephen (ed.). The Cambridge History of Chinese Literature, Volume I: To 1375. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp.1–115. ISBN 978-0-521-85558-7. Knechtges, David R. (2014). " Zhuangzi 莊子". In Knechtges, David R.; Chang, Taiping (eds.). Ancient and Early Medieval Chinese Literature: A Reference Guide, Part Four. Leiden: Brill. pp.2314–23. ISBN 978-90-04-27217-0. Listening stops with the ears, the mind stops with recognition, but spirit is empty and waits for all things. The Way gathers in emptiness alone. Emptiness is the fasting of the mind.”Do not be an embodier for fame; do not be a storehouse of schemes; do not be an undertaker of projects; do not be a proprietor of wisdom. Embody to the fullest what has no end and wander where there is no trail. Hold on to all that you have received from Heaven, but do not think you have gotten anything. Be empty, that is all. The Perfect Man uses his mind like a mirror—going after nothing, welcoming nothing, responding but not storing. Therefore he can win out over things and not hurt himself. 8 – Webbed Toes Within the gates of the Master, is there any such thing as a prime minister? You take delight in being a prime minister and pushing people behind you. But I’ve heard that if the mirror is bright, no dust will settle on it; if dust settles, it isn’t really bright. When you live around worthy men a long time, you’ll be free of faults. You regard the Master as a great man, and yet you talk like this—it’s not right, is it?” Roth, H. D. (1993). " Chuang tzu 莊子". In Loewe, Michael (ed.). Early Chinese Texts: A Bibliographical Guide. Berkeley: Society for the Study of Early China; Institute of East Asian Studies, University of California, Berkeley. pp.56–66. ISBN 1-55729-043-1.

Study the old and internal to find the Way; do not copy the old without understanding as circumstances have changed. (shoe & path analogy) My interpretation: history doesn’t repeat itself but human nature does. Confucius said to Lao Dan, “ I have been studying the Six Classics—the Odes, the Documents, the Ritual, the Music, the Changes, and the Spring and Autumn, for what I would call a long time, and I know their contents through and through. But I have been around to seventy-two different rulers with them, expounding the ways of the former kings and making clear the path trod by the dukes of Zhou and Shao, and yet not a single ruler has found anything to excite his interest. How difficult it is to persuade others, how difficult to make clear the Way!” Confucius said, “Make your will one! Don’t listen with your ears, listen with your mind. No, don’t listen with your mind, but listen with your spirit. If three men are traveling along and one is confused, they will still get where they are going—because confusion is in the minority. But if two of them are confused, then they can walk until they are exhausted and never get anywhere—because confusion is in the majority. 13 – The Way of Heaven

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The Perfect Man of ancient times used benevolence as a path to be borrowed, righteousness as a lodge to take shelter in. Free and easy, he rested in inaction; plain and simple, it was not hard for him to live; bestowing nothing, he did not have to hand things out. Among level things, water at rest is the most perfect, and therefore it can serve as a standard. It guards what is inside and shows no movement outside. Virtue is the establishment of perfect harmony. Though virtue takes no form, things cannot break away from it.” 6 – The Great and Venerable Teacher