Talk:Taoism/Archive 5

This is an archive of past discussions about Taoism. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

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Archive 3

Spelling normalization

There are some problems with different spellings throughout this article. Can we please choose one scheme and stick to it? I'd make the changes myself, but I don't know enough about the Chinese language to know which set of spellings is "preferable". For example, in the History section, we have both:

Lao Zu/Laozi
Dao De Jing/Tao Te Ching

This can be quite confusing for someone who has little familiarity with Taoism. Brianski 07:35, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Most of the world uses Hanyu Pinyin, the official system used in China. This gives us: Laozi, Zhuangzi, Daodejing, Daojiao, etc. Note that there is no hyphenization. One disclaimer--the real system uses tone markings, which are almost always omitted in English.

Older material uses Wade-Giles, or some bastardized form of it: Lao-tse or Lao Tzu, Chuang Tsu, Tao Te Ching, Taoism, etc. I would say to keep "Tao" and "Taoism" because these have effectively become English words, but to place it alongside Dao (for the Chinese) and so on. Laozi and the Daodejing, I would leave in Hanyu Pinyin, even though many people are used to Wade-Giles. ==== —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Dawud (talk • contribs) 01:37, 13 February 2007 (UTC).

External links

Since it was getting hard to tell which websites were already linked, I cleaned up the external links.

Three were duplicate links from the same domains:

Two weren't about Daoism:

One link was dead:

Taoist Restoration Society

Keahapana 01:44, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

I would like a formal discussion of links to be added. This is to prevent abuse since this is the major taoism article and would like it cleaned up. I do have issues with the 3 links that already added and believe an editor with better skills will find replacements. the second and third link provides translated text but it's also crossposted in the sub articles of the taoism articles which also have better links.

First Link - This appears more to be an article. A well written one with good footnotes and references but I don't particularly see anything notable or meritable that isn't already included in this article. If anything it may or should be incorporated with the main article with a reference link.

Second Link - sacred-texts.com is listed in a few articles but I'm generally not happy with the google ads and the fact they are selling a cd. If someone can find a better link it would be better in general for this article.

Third Link - This looks to be personal webpage. The longevity is questionable. The problem is doubled because it has duplicate data that is found in the tao article (taoist canon links).

StopTaoSpam (talk) 11:04, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

Not much information on Tao philosophy

The article doesn't give much information on taoist philosophy. How come it state Laozi as teacher of Budhdha? Buddha was born before 560 BC, much before Taoism started and he never went to China and life of Buddha is much better known historically to be relegated to such cynicism. -skant

The article says that some people claimed Laozi taught Buddha. Of course it is unlikely, but it still reflects what people believed long ago.Zeus1234 14:15, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

lede changes

I have edited the lede to focus on providing an overview of Taoism, providing more details and removing most of the discussion about the difficulty in categorizing the various groups of Taoism. All of the removed material has been moved to a new section. Since other editors have expressed the importance of the controversy over distinction between Taoist sects, I made it the first section of the article. I think these changes let the lede focus more on an overview of Taoism, while still presenting the categorization difficulties at the beginning of the article. Thoughts? Vassyana 23:53, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

It's much, much better. I slightly modified your edit to correct what I perceived to be an error in the categorization paragraph, but other than that, it is good.Zeus1234 00:01, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Thank you. :) Keep an eye on my edits. You seem to be very familiar with Taoism and any criticisms or corrections are quite welcome. Vassyana 05:32, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Beliefs

I rewrote the beliefs section to better reflect an overview of Taoist beliefs, with subheading structure incluidng main article and more detail links. I moved the section near the top of the article, to present beliefs early on to the reader. I moved the Dedejing discussion present in the original beliefs section to a subsection under the scripture section. Thoughts? Vassyana 06:53, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Good, except that you need more references for the sections. One other thing, I think you should move the 'pu' section into the later Daode Jing section. Pu as a concept, at least in my opinion (I had never even heard of it until I saw it here, and had to look it up), is not important enough to merit its own section, and as a concept is only present in the Daode jing, and not in other texts (as far as I know). If you think otherwise please corect me.Zeus1234 13:05, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm a bit surprised you never came across the "uncarved block" before. It follows the principle-expression form of Taoist thought (yin-yang, wu chi-tai chi, tao-te). Wu wei is the princple, pu (or p'u or p'o) is the expression of it. Literature as diverse as Encyclopedia Brittanica and the Tao of Pooh focus on it. My reasoning is, if the "gold standard" encyclopedia and one of the most popular Western books on Taoism present it as a distinct article and complete chapter (respectively), it's certainly notable enough of a belief to merit its own subsection. Make sense?

On the references, I agree that it needs more citations. I will point out that I am working on that. The old beliefs section, including the Tao Te Ching material, only had one citation. I've worked that up to nine in the current section. I think that's some improvement. ;) I will be adding more references over the next day or so. I will finish referencing the section before I move on to more changes. Vassyana 15:38, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

I trust your judgement. Leave it there if you think it's important.Zeus1234 16:18, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

recent changes

How do other editors feel about my recent edits to Taoism? Am I moving in the correct direction? Does anyone have any comments or concerns? Vassyana 08:35, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

I am going to verify the section about sriptures that you wrote later today. The source seems iffy to me. Also, you really need to use pinyin for everything but 'Tao teching', 'Taoism' and 'Tao' and 'I ching.' I can convert it for you, but the article needs to be consistent in its romanization, and you are using both systems. Otherwise, it's very good.Zeus1234 12:30, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

I modified the scripture section extensively. I disagree with that source you had about what it considered important texts after looking them up. I kept the one that I thought was important enough to merit inclusion. I also added a section about commentaries to the Daodejing.Zeus1234 01:00, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Good revisions. I particularly like the addition of the information about Tao Te Ching commentaries. Why did you disagree with the source? Did you find other sources that contradicted it? I don't necessarily agree with everything I added/revised. I simply went with the sources, particularly in that instance. (Interestingly, most of the unreferenced material you removed was "left over" from the old version of the section. I was trying to accomodate the previous editors and retain some of previous version.) On the romanisation, I'm not sure it should be consistant throughout. I think it should be case by case and go with whatever system is most predominant in common sources, in relation to the particular word or phrase being used. We should use whatever will be most familiar to a reader and allow for the easiest verification. If a word or title predominantly is used with one particular system, that's what we should with, in my opinion. Of course, as always, you're welcome to some grains of salt with my thoughts. :) Vassyana 02:45, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

I didn't trust that source because it was a textbook, and not written by a specialist. The section about the scriptures that I looked at did not have any context, and I had to search through the index of the Daozang to find what he was describing. While they are not unimportant, IMO, there are far more important texts in the Daozang. As for the romanization issue, Wikipedia recommends using Pinyin at [1]. As someone who has looked at a great deal of recent scholarship on China, nearly everyone uses Pinyin for everything (except in a few special cases like, Taoism, Chiang Kai-Shek, Sun Yat-Sen and Tao te Ching). The only people that seem to use Wade-Giles now are people who are unfamiliar with the topic (i.e. writers of textbooks) or who are virulently anti-PRC. Wade-Giles is a bad system, it doesn't correspond with real-life pronuciation (i.e Dao vs. Tao. It is pornounced Dao). I never use Wade-giles in real life and only use it on Wikipedia when I am writing Tao, Taoism, I Ching or Tao Te Ching. There's my rant. Don't feel like I'm forcing to convert stuff you've written, but I will probably convert it myself.Zeus1234 03:06, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

I tend to think textbooks are a bit more reliable, generally speaking, because they are (usually) based on fairly well-established research/facts. However, I can understand your point in this instance. On the W-G/pinyin issue, I will accodomate WP:MOS-ZH and your concerns. I was just explaining my view of why I did what I did. While MOS-ZH is under development, I think it provides a good guideline. Also, thanks for your active feedback, revisions and copyediting. They are sincerely appreciated and will help improve this article. I'm glad you agree with the general direction of the revisions and rewrites I am doing. However, I'm always open to criticisms, improvement on my work and questions. Please keep them coming! Vassyana 03:37, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

I removed a whole section about texts that was in the 6 dynasties section. While the informatio was not bad, I don't think it belongs in a section about history. I think that the section about the apocalyptic text would be better served in an expanded form in its own article.Zeus1234 03:32, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Good thought. Vassyana 03:37, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Brokeness

Somebody broke the page, as this ain't right:

===Tao===

Main article: Tao

of Tao. Tao is compared to what it is not, like the negative theology of Western scholars.^[1] It is often considered to be the source of both existence and non-existence "non action" (wu wei), emptiness (refinement), detachment, the strength of softness (or flexibility), and in the Zhuangzi such as receptiveness, spontaneity, the relativism of human ways re, due to a belief that nature demonstrates the Tao.^[2] The flow of qi, as the essential energy of action and existence, compared to the universal order re are certain core beliefs that all the schools share.^[3] ===Principles===of life, ways of speaking and guiding behavior.^[4]<

first sentence starts in the middle
trailing angle bracket
"re are"
embedded heading

etc. --Belg4mit 23:31, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Fixed.Zeus1234 00:26, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

GA Review results

This article was Kept as a Good article by default because of a 1-1 result of no consensus, the discussion can be viewed at the now archived Good article review. IvoShandor 13:46, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Chronological Disorder

The subsection titled "Yuan Dynasty (1279–1367)" currently contains the following line: "While Taoism suffered a significant setback in 1281 when all copies of the Daozang were ordered burned, this holocaust gave Taoism a chance to renew itself. (...) One of its leaders, Qiu Chuji became a teacher of Genghis Khan..." Clearly this is misleading, as Genghis Khan was long dead by 1279, let along 1281. Dorfl 16:14, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I fixed this part. Qiu Chugi was an advisor to Genghis before the establishment of the Yuan Dynasty.Zeus1234 16:47, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Taoism one religion?

Is Taoism one religion; or rather a group of them? I’m confused. Angel2001 08:11, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

It is a more a group of philosophical and religious movements that share certain core values.Zeus1234 15:58, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

Taoist God???

Do followers of the Taoist religion have several God's; or one, or none at all??? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Angel2001 (talk • contribs) 12:24, 8 May 2007 (UTC).

Like you I'm new to Taoism. I'm under the impression that all three of the above are correct, depending upon the individual Taoist. It's my understanding that the Taoism which involves temples and priests has various divinities, e.g. Kwan Yin. See [2] One thing is certain and that is that the eternal, nameless Tao is not an anthropomorphism. I have read several descriptions of Tao and have found Ellen M. Chen's to be the best: Chen, Ellen M. The Tao Te Ching: A New Translation with Commentary. St. Paul, MN: Paragon House, 1989. ISBN 1-55778-238-5. "Tao is the everlasting rhythem of life -- the unity of the polarity of non-being and being." (p. 52). Here is her translation of chapter 1:

    1. Tao that can be spoken of,
       Is not the Everlasting Tao.
       Name that can be named,
       Is not the Everlasting name.

    2. Nameless, the origin of heaven and earth;
       Named the mother of ten thousand things.

    3. Therefore, always without desire,
       In order to observe the hidden mystery;
       Always with desire,
       In order to observe the manifestations.

    4. These two issue from the same origin,
       Though named differently.
       Both are called the dark.
       Dark and even darker,
       The door to all hidden mysteries. (p. 51).

The book begins with a scholarly introduction, and Chen's commentary follows each chapter of the Tao Te Ching. There is also a comprehensive bibliography, Chinese glossary, and index. Everyone working on this article would benefit by reading this book. I bought mine from Amazon based upon its five-star reader reviews.--Nonpareils 05:35, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

Polytheism?

"Most traditional Chinese Taoists are polytheistic. Nature and ancestor spirits are common in popular Taoism." These two sentences contradict eachother. The beliefs described in the second sentence are more closely related to animism. Also, the world "shamanism" used later in the paragraph supports the use of the term "Animism" rather than "polytheism." I'm going to change it. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by JustinInSpace (talk • contribs) 14:48, 16 May 2007 (UTC).

Animism and polytheism are not mutually exclusive. Shamanism is not dependent upon animism. Additionally, syncretism is widespread to the point of common condition in Asia, blurring traditional distinctions of theology and philosophy from a Western perspective. I have mildly altered the language to reflect that most English-speaking readers expect a distinction. Vassyana 20:48, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

I see, one of the main reasons I wanted to change it was because Taoism's "Pantheon" is far different than the Western ideas of polytheism (i.e. Greek, Norse and Egytian mythology.) I'll have to look up syncretism, I admit. Thank you for your thoughts though.

Big change

I have split the history section from the main article. It is now located at History of Taoism. It is generally well-referenced and has plenty of room for expansion. The main Taoism article was long and needed to be pared down. No information has been lost. Due to the wide availability of sources, notability and already existing structure & referencing, the history material is suitable for a separate article. I have left a summary style section in this main article with a standard main article link. Cheers!

Muddy Thinking and Vague Language

This article needs to be re-researched and rewritten. There is much too much secondary source material by Westerners, some of which is flat out "New Age." There is a big distinction between religious Taoism (Taochiao) and philosophical Taoism (Taochia). Religious Taoism is well organized, has several sects, is China's indigenous religion, originated during the Han Dynasty, and is now international. There is a Taoist temple in Chicago. Philosophical Taoism is much older. It survives in the form of a few texts written in a very old style of Chinese. The meanings of Chinese characters have changed over the millenia. Thus, these texts are difficult to translate even for scholars who are native speakers. In any case, whoever writes the article needs to have a good grounding in these works in order to discuss both Taochia and Taochiao. The Tao Te Ching and the works of Chuang Tzu are especially important. The writer also needs to be able to distinguish between serious, well researched, professional scholarship; works written for a popular readership; and what amounts to head-tripping, for example the so-called translation of the Tao Te Ching on the Jade Purity website. The Taoist Culture and Information Centre (Hong Kong) website is difficult to navigate but well worth the trouble. It has everything you could ever want to know about religious Taoism, and it is the work of religious Taoists. The article should use both the Wade-Giles and Pin Yin methods of transliteration because virtually all the scholarship twenty to twenty-five years old uses Wade-Giles. A great deal of this work has not been superseded by later scholars. Moreover, Wade-Giles continues to be used in Taiwan, which has the largest population of religious Taoists in the world. (In case you're wondering, I am not one of them.) Nonpareils 12:59, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

Much of the article is already referenced using academic sources. I am also not a fan of the 'new-age' Daoist stuff, and firmly believe that it is not reliable information. Unfortunately I completely disagree on your point about Wade-giles transliteration. While it may have been used 25 years ago, it is increasingly irrelavent today, even in Taiwan, where Tongyong Pinyin is becoming more widely used. Nearly every new academic text about Daoism uses Pinyin, and the last Wade-Giles texts were published about 10 years ago. It has no place in this article. Zeus1234 13:21, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

You must also differentiate between Western new-age material and western academic material. There is nothing wrong with using anything from a university publisher or an academic publisher, such as Routledge. These provide reliable information about Daoism. I also disagree with your assertion that there is a difference between Daojia and Daojiao. Most recent scholars disagree (see for example Robinet) with this distinction, which was created in the early part of the 20th century due to misunderstanding about Daoism. Zeus1234 13:24, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Meditation Barely Mentioned

Seeing as I'm almost completely sure that meditation is one of the primary aspects of Taoist practise, I'm totally baffled as to why the only mention of the word is when linking to someone's book, a book about Taoist Meditation. Will come back over the next day or two with something short to add to the practices section, if no-one beats me to it. TeNova 11:15, 24 June 2007 (GMT)

Atman Central Asian concept?

The article says that atman/dharma is a "central asian" concept. Shouldn't it be south asian? Amit 12:32, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

This article needs cleaning

About the 50% of this article is about Chinese folk religion & mythology. Taoism is not a polytheistic religion, but it's pantheistic. It has not a pantheon of deities. Saints, dragons, xians, bai bai and traditional festivals such as the Lunar New Year are part of Chinese folk religion (xian (immortality) in Taoism is just an eschatological concept).

Taoist theology has few concepts: Tao, De (the activity of Tao that emanates the cosmos) and the Three Purities (the three main manifestations of the Tao).

Wu wei?

Taoism, more specifically Wu wei doesn't nessecarily mean inaction, but instead to be happy in whatever you do. Don't avoid doing the dishes, rather try to find the upside in doing them. A refference to Pollyanna also seems to make sense even though the character wasn't really a Taoist. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.153.137.30 (talk) 00:41, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Tao can not be described.

I'm asking permission from the members of this Wikiproject, may I incorporate the first verse of the Tao Te Ching into the section "Tao?" Tao is admittedly indescribable and this should be reflected in this article.--ॐJesucristo301 11:44, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Also, Verse 32, "The Tao is forever undefined"
Verse 4, "Oh, unfathomable source of ten thousand things!"
Verse 21, "The Tao is elusive and intangible."
Verse 35, "..but a description of the Tao seems without substance or flavor. It cannot be seen, it cannot be heard, and yet it cannot be exhausted."
Verse 41, "The Tao is hidden and without name."
Verse 78, "The truth often sounds paradoxical."

Seems like a recurring theme to me. It should probably be mentioned in the beginning that the main text of Taoism defines the Tao as undefinable. --Calibas (talk) —Preceding comment was added at 04:38, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

Taoism in China

I honestly find it hard to believe that

there are restrictions on the practice in China, Taoism is not

a harmful religion. There's a state-influenced body called the Chinese Taoist Association, I've heard its both run by the people and run by the state but I just find it hard that China's government would feel the need to monitor and interfere with Taoism...? I've found good points from the Daodejing Ch.57 With natural justice, people must be ruled The greater the number of laws and restrictions,the poorer the people who inhabit the land.The sharper the weapons of battle and war,the greater the troubles besetting the land.The greater the cunning with which people are ruled,the stranger the things which occur in the land. The harder the rules and regulations,the greater the number of those who will steal. The sage therefore does not contrive,in order to bring about reform, but teaches the people peace of mind, in order that they might enjoy their lives. Having no desires, all he does is natural. Since he teaches self-sufficiency, the people who follow him return to a good, uncomplicated life. Ch.30When leading by the way of the Tao,abominate the use of force,for it causes resistance, and loss of strength,showing the Tao has not been followed well. Achieve results but not through violence, for it is against the natural way,(All from Stan Rosenthal's Tao Te Ching) I realise that the Chinese government is atheist by law but I honestly wonder how Taoist priests can be trained when the government still interferes in religion..? Wouldn't Taoist priests do better to get trained in Taiwan? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Domsta333 (talk • contribs) 12:23, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

In China there is freedom of religion and Taoism is followed by roughly 400 million people. --Esimal 22:59, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Taoism in China is a umbrella term for many loosely associated religious organizations. The activities of those who claim to be Taoist masters but sell quackery may be restricted by the government in China. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 204.108.237.194 (talk) 22:45, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

Inconsistent spelling

I've noticed that the spelling of Tao or Dao is not consistent in the article. Can we make sure to stick to Tao, Taoism and Taoist or Dao, Daoism and Daoist throught the entire article? --lk (talk) 05:22, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

Feel free to change the spelling to be consistent. Zeus1234 (talk) 08:30, 22 November 2007 (UTC)