Yin Hsi would not allow Lao-tzu to pass till he had set down his wisdom in a book, lest it be lost. That he was seen and stopped shows that Lao-tzu was well-known. Lao-tzu went west to the border, where Yin Hsi, also known as Kuan-yin-tzu, the Warden of the Mountain Pass of Hsien-ku, saw him. Lao-tzu tired of court politics and retired at an advanced age. At that time, that job involved the keeping of sacred books such as the I-ching and was linked with fortune-telling and star-lore (astrology). During his life, he was employed by the king of Chou as his record-keeper. He was born in Hu-hsien in the state of Chu, now known as Honan Province in south-east central China. In Chinese custom Lao-tzu was born in 604 BCE, and thus was an elder coëval of K’ung-fu-tzu (Confucius), born in 551 BCE. Legend states that he was born with white hair, but it may also refer to his simple nature. The name Lao-tzu means “The Old Child” and was likely given to Lao-tzu after his death. In Chinese custom it was written by Lao-tzu five or six hundred years before the common era, but the teachings of the Tao-te ching are surely much older than the text itself, which is a digest of old teachings going back to the primal proto-Eastern pan-wisdom centre (see “Sacred and Profane Time,” below). Western scholars judge it to have been written no sooner than 400BCE. ” The oldest extant copy is dated to between 195 and 206 BCE, but it is surely older. The title may be rendered as “The Book of the Way and Its Power. L ao-tzu’s Tao-te ching is the chief book of the Tao-tsang, the canon of the Taoist school or sect, made up of 1,476 books in 5,486 volumes. Now is the time … to destroy those who destroy the earth.
There are those who will conquer the worldĪnd make of it what they conceive or desire. Presented to the members of the Buddha Center on Saturday, October 25, 2014.
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