The circular Chinese worldview originates from the notion of Tao in the proposition “Tao consists of Yin and Yang” in the Book of Changes (about 600 BC). Lao-tzu, who lived about 500 years before Christ, further enunciated the concept of Tao in chapter 42 of his Tao Te Ching: “Tao gave birth to the One; the One gave birth successively to two things, three things, up to ten thousand. These ten thousand creatures cannot turn their backs to the shade (Yin) without having the sun (Yang) on their bellies, and it is on this blending of the breaths (both Yin and Yang) that their harmony depends” (Arthur Maley’s translation). It is obviously the One, the blending, and the harmony that are emphasized in the explanation of Tao.
Two centuries after Lao-tzu, Chuang-tzu (369 –286 BC) used orderly philosophic discussion rather than poetic intuition to clarify the concept of Tao. He believed in “the One reality which is all men, gods, and things: complete, all-embracing, and the whole; it is an all-embracing unity from which nothing can be separated” (Gardener Murphy’s translation). When it comes to the relationship between humanity and Nature, he proposes that “the perfect man has no self because he has transcended the finite and identified himself with the universe.” Thus the concept that human beings are part of Nature is rooted in the minds of the Chinese people. Dong Zhongshu (179 –104 BC), a philosopher of the West Han dynasty, again developed the Oneness worldview. He assumed that “the energy of heaven and earth is a unified one. It consists of Yin and Yang and manifests itself in four seasons and five elements.”
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