The text that we know as the Zhuangzi is, as we’ve mentioned throughout our reading group, a collection of other texts. Chris Fraser provides a guide to its history in the introduction to his Zhuangzi: Ways of Wandering the Way. The best hypothesis that we have for its origin is that it was originally a fifty-two-piān collection.1 (You’ll note that we only have 33 chapters in our modern version of Zhuangzi.) This text is mentioned in the 1st-century document the Hàn History, but scholars believe it was compiled before the time of Liú Xiàng, a famous Han imperial archivist. The text did not achieve a finalized, formal structure for some time, however, as material that cites it does not provide formal attribution (as opposed to citations of the Laozi, i.e. the Tao Te Ching). ‘A promising hypothesis…is that the Zhuangzi may have been compiled and edited by the circle of literati gathered at the court of Liú Ān,’ who was a first-century BC king.2 At some point, the text was divided into the divisions we have used in our book club: Inner, Outer, and Mixed. Briefly, the Zhuangzi is a collection that has been written, compiled, edited, and distributed by many hands. It is more like the Bible, particularly certain books of the Old Testament, than it is a modern work of philosophy; it may be more like the book of Genesis than it is the sayings of Confucius, at least from the perspective of textual history and criticism. Given this history, we should not expect a coherent philosophy across the entirety of the text, as I have emphasized several times — though unlike Fraser, I am sympathetic to the idea that the Inner Books express a coherent and compelling philosophy we can call Zhuangzist.3
It is helpful to keep this in mind today, as we are moving on to the final division of the text: the Mixed Books. The scholars A.C. Graham and Kuan Feng, along with later thinkers who made some slight variations to the thesis, believe that this set of books is primarily authored by a group of syncretists ‘who seemingly attempted comprehensiveness by combining all points of view into a single complete dào.’4 As we enter the Mixed Books, we must keep this in mind. If there is such a thing as ‘pure’ Zhuangzist thought, it won’t be found here — it was never meant to be found here. The Zhuangzi refuses to be interpreted as a single coherent work because it was never meant to be one. Asking for a coherent interpretation of the Zhuangzi would be like looking at the Penguin Book of Romantic Poetry and asking for a single interpretation. The texts should not be read this way, even if they’ve been bound together as a single volume.
Maybe that is the better analogue for us. We shouldn’t read the Zhuangzi like a work by, say, Heidegger, but a little more like a poet — which might be the best way to read Nietzsche, too. One of the most faithful commenters during our book club, Raymond, has compared Zhuangzi and Nietzsche in terms of content (perspectivism, a debate we’ve had in the comments several times), but there might also be a helpful comparison in terms of style. Nietzsche’s aphorisms frequently contradict each other; the point isn’t for each one to be a building block in a systematic vision of the world (though I do think Nietzsche has a vision of the world), but rather to shake you out of your dogmatic slumber. Last week, I wrote of reading Zhuangzi:
Instead, we might ask: what assumption is the pericope, or the book, trying to free us from? What habit of mind must we break? That may be the Zhuangzist message: free yourselves of these unnatural habits, where ‘habits’ is very broadly construed. So, each passage finds a habit to break.
This may be even more helpful as we move on to the Mixed Books with their syncretist origins. We have entered the final stretch. Here’s the full schedule:
The Inner Books
August 11: Books 1 - 4
August 17: Members-Only Zoom Call, 8-9:30 PM Eastern (we’ll discuss all the Inner Books)
August 18: Books 5 - 7
The Outer Books
August 25: Books 8-12
September 1: Books 13 - 16
September 8: Books 17 - 22
September 12:
Members-Only Zoom Call, 2-3:30 PM Eastern(CANCELLED)
The Mixed Books
September 15: Books 23 - 25
September 19: Members-Only Zoom Call, 2-3:30 PM Eastern (RESCHEDULED)
September 22: Books 26 - 29
September 28: Members-Only Zoom Call, 8-9:30 PM Eastern
September 29: Books 30 - 33
Zoom calls are for paid subscribers. By subscribing, you’ll be able to join the conversation, read everything I write on Commonplace Philosophy, and help me keep making videos on YouTube.
Please note that I have rescheduled the Zoom call from September 12 to September 19. That’s because my daughter Aletheia was born last Friday, making it difficult to run a Zoom call for everyone.
Book 23: Gēngsāng Chǔ
There is a temptation when reading a text like this to look for wisdom as if we were consulting a sage. We want to see what it is that Zhuangzi really thought so that we can assume those beliefs for ourselves, and in so doing, we will become wise. (Wisdom here is understood as the accumulation of the right beliefs, I suppose.) This is similar to how the people of Sheerwall treat Gēngsāng Chǔ, someone they presume to be nearly a sage. The simple people, whom he has sought out on purpose, say:
Surely he’s virtually a sage! Why don’t we worship him like an ancestor and build a shrine to him as we do for the gods of soil and grain?
But Gēngsāng Chǔ does not want this to occur. When the people of the village say that this is natural, that placing people above others has been done since ancient times, he still resists. They appeal to the examples of Yao and Shun. Emperor Yao is a legendary emperor, apparently the son of a goddess; along with Shun, he is associated with the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors. Yao and Shun may be stand-ins for an ancient disposition to impose hierarchy and order onto the world, as when Yao helped to control flooding.
But Gēngsāng Chǔ says:
Elevate the worthy, and the people strive against each other; employ the knowledgeable, and the people rob each other. These several things aren’t fit for edifying the people.
Instead, if someone – the would-be student Nánróng Chú in this chapter – wishes to follow him, they should follow his example, and he distills that down to:
‘Keep your bodily form whole, preserve your life, and don’t let your thoughts fret and fuss. If you can do this for three years, you can attain what we’ve talked about’.
When Nánróng Chú goes to see Laozi, he is presented with a strange question: ‘Why did you come with such a crowd of people?’ Laozi sees that Nánróng Chú is bewildered, that he is being pulled in many directions. He’s ‘a lost person, perplexed and adrift.’ Laozi eventually gives him instructions in the form of a poem:
Lǎozǐ said, ‘The guidelines for preserving life—
Can you embrace the One? Can you keep from losing it?
Can you know the auspicious and inauspicious without divination?
Can you stop [where you should stop]?
Can you end [where you should end]?
Can you set it aside in others and instead seek it in yourself?
Can you be carefree?
Can you be pure and simple?
Can you be a child? A child howls all day without becoming hoarse, the ultimate in harmony.* It clutches things all day without its hands cramping, because it concentrates its Virtue. It stares all day without its eyes blinking, as it is not partial towards anything outside it. It walks without knowing where it is going, dwells without knowing what it is doing, complying with things as it shares the same wave with them. Just these are the guidelines for preserving life’.
These are the ‘melting of the ice and thawing of the frost,’ Laozi says — the things we need to do before the work begins. Nánróng Chú has much to unlearn so that he can eventually stop learning. This will make him capable of carefree wandering, we might say. As he is told:
Those who thoroughly go along with things induce things to turn to them. Those who resist things are unable to accommodate even themselves—how can they accommodate others? Those who are unable to accommodate others have no one close to them; those with no one close to them have cut themselves off from other people. No weapon is more lethal than the intent; even the legendary sword Mò Yé ranks below it. No enemy is greater than the yīn and yáng energies; nowhere in the world can you escape them. But it’s not yīn and yáng that harm us; it’s our own mind that causes it.
The state of having unlearned so much and having learned to wander in a carefree manner may culminate in these words from Laozi:
The ultimate propriety is sometimes not to treat others as people.
The ultimate righteousness doesn’t thing.
The ultimate wisdom doesn’t plan.
The ultimate benevolence holds no one close.
The ultimate trust dispenses with collateral.
In this book, I think we see a more Laozi-inspired Daoism, not the radical perspectivism (or, to make Raymond happy, I’ll simply say perspectivism) of the Inner Books. While there is an emphasis on not drawing distinctions, it does not seem to be founded on a view of language and perspective as we saw as early as Book 1. Rather, the emphasis is on adopting a certain carefree posture — the arguments based on language are not deemed necessary in Book 23.
Book 24: Ghostless Xú
I used the word ‘primitivism’ to describe some of the pericopes throughout the Zhuangzi. What I mean here is that there is a default to the natural position — not the traditional position, as we saw in the discussion of Yao and Shun, but the natural position. We see this with Ghostless Xú as he seemingly chastises Marquis Wǔ:
When I assess horses, if they make straight tracks that match a measuring line, arcs that match a curve, angles that match the set square, and circles that match the compass, these qualify as the finest horses in the state, but they don’t compare with the finest horses in the world. The finest in the world are complete in their capacities; they look still and vacant, as if they’ve lost their identity; horses like these gallop so fast they rise above the dust, without knowing where they run to.
I like the example of horses because it is the same example Socrates uses in the Apology, but there Socrates is concerned to show how a horse trainer brings out the best in horses; thus, for Socrates, an educator is needed to bring out the best in students. In the example from Ghostless Xú, the thought is reversed. The horse trainer makes the horses seem impressive, but they are deficient when compared to wild horses. Ghostless Xú speaks to the Marquis Wǔ in a genuine manner, he says, and this is good for him — he’s been away from the genuine world for far too long. He provides comfort for spirit and bodily form. When Wǔ asks for guidance on how to be a better rule, Xú offers hard truths, truths which may be discomforting at first, but these truths should allow him to better resemble the wild horses rather than the well-trained horses who can match the compass.
Xú, like the Yellow Emperor from the next example, is confined by things. Indeed, all of us as readers of ancient texts may be confined by things as described in 24.3:
Learned scholars are unhappy without pursuing the turns of thought; disputers are unhappy without following the sequences of discussion; inquirers are unhappy without investigating the details of affairs. All of them are confined by things.
These things – turns of thought, sequences of discussion – are like our compass and ruler. We’re the well-trained horses.
Unlike in Book 23, we see some of the classic Zhuangzi arguments for perpsectivism in Book 24, specifically in 24.4 where some of the arguments against objective standards are repeated. While the Mixed Books may be syncretic, we still see arguments against the Ruists. (Syncretists may take on thoughts from other schools of thought, but they don’t adopt new schools of thought entirely. That would make them converts, not syncretists.)
But this is all very hard to do. In 24.7, we see the story of the King of Wǔ who kills a monkey who flaunts his agility. He tells his friend Yán Bùyí that the monkey was killed for letting his appearance display arrogance to others. Yán Bùyí spends three years learning to free himself of haughty displays, and eventually ‘the people of the state praised him.’ What do we think happens to a man praised by everyone for his humility? Is it not likely that he suffers the same fate as the haughty monkey?
Book 25: Zéyáng
‘Sage’ is said in at least two ways throughout this text. Sometimes it refers to ancient sages who possessed some kind of special knowledge; in this sense, the text is mostly condemnatory of sages. Sometimes it refers to someone who follows the Way; in this sense, the text is mostly laudatory of sages. So, when we encounter a tale or saying about sages, we need to clarify which sort of sage the text has in mind. The sage at the beginning of Book 25 is being praised, and one of the reasons why the sage is praised is because of the power to make others forget:
So the sage when facing hardship makes their family forget their poverty and when enjoying success makes kings and dukes forget rank and salary and become humble. In dealing with things, they enjoy themselves together with them; in dealing with people, they take pleasure in connecting with them while preserving themself. So at times without speaking they fill others with harmony and merely by standing alongside them transform them, relations between fathers and sons returning to their proper places, all this being accomplished with ease. This is how far-reaching their effect on people’s hearts is.
Instead of possessing special knowledge, like the knowledge of what is benevolent or righteous, the sage is praised because of the effect that he has one people’s hearts. This is an interesting view of sages for me personally, because it parallels how I shifted in thinking about Christian saints as I entered the Orthodox Church. Instead of thinking of saints as particularly great scholars (though there are great, scholarly saints), I began to see wise elders as the archetypal saint — these men and women are notable the effects that their inner stillness has on others. ‘Acquire the Spirit of Peace and a thousand souls around you will be saved,’ St Seraphim of Sarov is reported to have said. Acquiring the spirit of peace is what is essential. The Zhuangzist sage has a similar approach. Those saints and sages are also disruptive because they challenge unnatural things we take for granted.
There are differences, of course, and we shouldn’t extend the analogy too far — yet, I found this comparison helpful for my own understanding.
This post has gotten very long, and I’m once again approaching the lengh limit of email. But let me address one concern I have about a story from Book 25: the words of Dài Jìnrén. When a treaty has been violated, the king wishes to retaliate. His counselors disagree about what they must do, and the king consults Dài Jìnrén, who tells him a story.
‘There is a state on the snail’s left horn called the House of Bump, and there is a state on the snail’s right horn called the House of Rude, and they regularly go to war with one another over territory, leaving tens of thousands of dead on the ground. The winners pursue the losers for fifteen days before turning back… Do you think there are any limits to the four directions, up, and down …Knowing how to let the mind wander in the limitless, when you return to the world as we know it, does it seem barely to exist?
This is a very normal sort of argument that you find in the Zhuangzi based on the possiblity of taking different perspectives. But the counsel of Dài Jìnrén seems to be that the king’s actions are unimportant because, seen from another perspective, they are very small. I think this is a fallacious way to reason. Just because a problem is unimportant from one perspective does not mean that it is unimportant from all perspectives. Unless we are privileging the larger, cosmic perspective (in a way that, say, Marcus Aurelius often does in the Meditations), why should the king draw this conclusion?
A piān is something like a chapter.
Fraser 2024, pg 11
My understanding of Fraser’s position is that he believes the Inner Books hold no special status to authenticity. He may believe they have a coherent and compelling philosophy. Fraser is, of course, the expert here.
Hansen 2024: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/zhuangzi/#EvolTextTheo. Hansen cites a 1979 article by Graham; however, the bibliography contains no article by Graham from that year. Kuan Feng is not formally cited. Proceed with caution.
Because these posts are getting longer, it has been harder to add and respond to comments. I might send a bonus post out for paid subscribers this week with some more thoughts.
I am also working to compile a list of resource about Zhuangzi and Daoism for anyone who wishes to study further after we conclude this reading group.
“I imagine future thinkers in whom European-American indefatigability is combined with the hundredfold-inherited contemplativeness of the Asians: such a combination will bring the riddle of the world to a solution. In the meantime the reflective free spirits have their mission: they are to remove all barriers that stand in the way of a coalescence of human beings.”
(Friedrich Nietzsche, 1876)
If you want to further explore similarities between Zhuangzi and Nietzsche, the following book is a good resource: NIETZSCHE AND ASIAN THOUGHT, edited by Graham Parkes. The article “Zhuang Zi and Nietzsche: Plays of Perspectives” by Chen Guying is particularly interesting. Chen, a famous scholar and professor currently at Peking University, published a book decades ago that compares the two philosophers, but it has not yet been translated into English. There is another article entitled “Nietzsche’s ‘Will to Power’ and Chinese ‘Virtuality’ (De): A Comparative Study” by Roger T. Ames that is also useful.
Graham Parkes edited a similar collection of articles called HEIDEGGER AND ASIAN THOUGHT which contains a fascinating description of Heidegger’s collaboration with a Chinese philosopher to translate the Tao Te Ching. I hope the finished chapters will be published someday.
There is another set of resources I want to share.
Brook Ziporyn, a professor at the University of Chicago, has also translated Zhuangzi in its entirety. I like his translations more than Fraser’s. In addition to his useful introductory comments, his publisher, Hackett Publishing, also has a webpage that offers clear and enlightening articles by Ziporyn on various aspects of both the text and philosophy of Zhuangzi. Here’s the address:
https://hackettpublishing.com/zhuangzisup
For your reference, I am reproducing Ziporyn’s comments on the text of Zhuangzi below.
"This text, known simply as the Zhuangzi or sometimes as Nanhuazhenjing ("The Genuine Classic of the Blossoming from the South," the honorific title given to the text by Emperor Xuanzong in 742 C.E.) in Chinese, is reported by Ban Gu (32–92) to have once consisted of fifty-two chapters, but no such version is now extant. The current text took its shape, size, and arrangement from Guo Xiang (c. 252–312), who edited it down to thirty-three chapters. Guo also appended his own commentary, which became the foundation for all further exegesis on the text throughout Chinese history.
Guo's version is divided into three parts: The Inner Chapters (1–7), the Outer Chapters (8–22), and the Miscellaneous Chapters (23–33). The two most powerful modern attempts to classify the various strains of thought in the text are surely those of A. C. Graham and Liu Xiaogan. These two scholars agree that only the Inner Chapters were actually authored by the historical Zhuang Zhou, while most of the traditional Outer and Miscellaneous Chapters are not his work. This is by now a widely accepted scholarly consensus. Liu, unlike Graham, considers all the remaining chapters to be the work of actual followers of Zhuang Zhou. The two scholars also differ in the way they divide the remaining chapters according to philological, stylistic, and philosophical characteristics. Liu divides the authors of the Outer and Miscellaneous Chapters into three distinct groups: the Transmitters, the Huang-Lao School, and the Anarchists, viewing the work of the Transmitters (responsible for Chapters 17–27 and 32) as most closely resembling the Inner Chapters of Zhuang Zhou, and coming closest to him in time. The Huang-Lao School, who synthesize Confucian, Daoist, and Legalist ideas, are, in Liu's schema, responsible for Chapters 12–16, 33, and the latter part of 11. The work of the Anarchists can be found in Chapters 8–10, 28–29, 31, and the first part of 11.
Graham also identifies several distinct groups of writers for the Outer and Miscellaneous Chapters, calling them the School of Zhuangzi, the Syncretists, the Primitivists, and the Yangists. Within the writings of the School of Zhuangzi—closely comparable to what Liu calls the Transmitter School, to which Graham attributes Chapters 17–22 and some passages in Chapter 25—Graham further distinguishes a Rationalizing strain (for example, the opening dialogue in Chapter 17 and the final dialogue in Chapter 25) and an Irrationalizing strain (for example, Chapter 22). In both cases Graham believes a significant philosophical departure from Zhuang Zhou has occurred—a position I share. Liu, on the contrary, seems to approve of the traditional consensus that, for example, the Autumn Floods chapter (Chapter 17) is a faithful systematic exposition of the ideas of the Inner Chapters, a view I reject. Graham's Syncretists are represented by Chapters 12–14, the end of 11, 15 and 33, corresponding approximately to Liu's category of Huang-Lao. Graham's Primitivists are represented by Chapters 8–10 and the beginning of 11, and his Yangists—followers of the "egoist" Yang Zhu—whom he considers "non-Taoist," are represented by Chapters 28–31. These two categories together correspond to Liu's category of Anarchists. Whichever scheme we may adopt, we can safely assume that the traditional book known as the Zhuangzi is the work of many different people working at different times, and reflective of a broad variety of distinct but related points of view."