The book Lao Tzu (aka Tao Te Ching ) is a book originated in the sixth century BCE in China. Unlike most writings of that time, it embodies an intgrated work of philosophy. Furthermore, it encompasses themes on religion, political science, social science and traditional thoughts(e.g. I Ching) before Lao Tzu.
All the original Taoism created by Lao Tzu are manifested in a simple book of about five thousand Chinese characters. From a modern prospective his profound thought is expressed in compressed expressions. Even Confucius, like numerous Chinese, treated sayings of Lao Tzu as adages. Hardly any punctilious Chinese intellectual, including antagonists of this book, could argue successfully that the whole text does not deserved to be painstakingly examined. For example, the famous aphorism “A journey of one thousand miles started out from one single step” was initially in this book. This translation and introduction of Tao Te Ching was aimed to be both philosophically and linguistically closest to the original Tao of Taoism.
Sir Karl Popper, the author of The Open Society and Its Enemies, has strongly recommended the translator of this version. When the first attempt on translation was made in 1985 Sir Alfred J. Ayer commented “Your work on Lao Tzu promises to be very interesting”.
About the Author
Lee Sun Chen Org is a self-help, self-taught and self-critical pursuer of truth, embellished with a B.A. degree in philosophy from Taiwan University, M.A. degree in linguistics from University of California, and having had done graduate research in philosophy about Bertrand Russell and A.J.Ayer in Oxford University.
