The story of how the Tao Te Ching came to be composed is a well-known story. In 492 BC, round about the demise of the Eastern Zhou Dynasty (770 BC-256 BC) and the catastrophic series of wars that that involved, Lao Tzu, by then a very aged man, resolved to depart from worldly contentions. Legend has it that he sat astride a black ox, with purple mist all around him as he wound his way through the mountains of west Henan. The well-known Chinese idiom “From the east comes the purple mist” derives from this journey and the motto adorns the doorways of countless Chinese families even today. Hangu Pass is a high mountain passage, which connects the Central Plains with the western Qinling Mountains. Facing a vast plateau to the west, a steep gully to the east, Qinling Mountains to the south, and the Yellow River to the north, the remote fortress of Hangu Pass, famous even 2,500 years ago, is where most Chinese people believe that Lao Tzu committed to writing the 5,000 or so characters that constitute the eternal wisdom of the Tao Te Ching. The story of how this came to pass is legendary.
The chief guard posted at the border crossing was a man of unusually high education. He was named Yin Xi, and was said to be somewhat of a scholar, astronomy being among his many areas of interest and no little expertise. One day, while scanning the eastern horizons, he espied a faint bloom of purple mist rising from the eastern hills. He took it as a propitious omen and informed his subordinates that it meant that a man of great spiritual learning would soon pass. Thus when Lao Tzu arrived at the Hangu Pass several days later on his black ox he was expected.
The elderly sage sought passage to the western lands but Yin Xi would not let him pass. He knew that this aged holy man was a living repository of spiritual wisdom and teaching and to allow such a treasure to depart from the world of men without passing on something of his learning would be a most terrible crime. He implored the old man to pause a while and set down the essential ideas of his wisdom. Lao Tzu, at first resistant to the guard’s pleas eventually relented and thus one of the greatest treasures of Chinese and indeed human civilization came to be produced, the Tao Te Ching.
Facing the eternal flow of the great Yellow River, Lao Tzu gathered his thoughts, and sought a means to define that which was undefinable, describe something that defied description and outline something that was intangible and infinite. This he termed the “Tao”: a force that existed before the universe; a force that brought the universe into existence; a force that sustained and sustains that universe. The Tao: The way. Gazing at the brilliant moon perched in the Heavens, the old man pondered over the relationship between this force and human beings. That which cannot be rendered using mere words was fashioned into a philosophical poem numbering only 5,000 or so characters. Although Lao Tzu would no doubt have chuckled at the grand notion, the essential ideas of Taoism had been preserved for future generations, and a major foundation stone of Chinese civilization had been set in place. His duty done, Yin Xi let the old man pass and as he slowly rounded the corner on his black ox, he was never again seen by human eyes.
Today, as people read through the wisdom contained in the Tao Te Ching, they may not pay much attention to its author. Nevertheless the influence of this man is beyond calculation. The rays reflected by his thoughts have already shined upon the inner world of the modern people of the entire planet. And in today’s China, the old adages still radiating with the same undimmed light of philosophy and wisdom that burned so brightly two millennia ago. “The net of the Heavens has large meshes, but it lets nothing through,” “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step,” and “Great minds mature slowly” are not only absolutely familiar to Chinese people but indeed to all the people of the world and will in the future, be handed down from one generation to the next.
Our great legacy from the wise old man is the Tao Te Ching, but Lao Tzu has gone. Along the arduous mountain path, he trod a journey to the west. Where has he gone? How many years has he lived? Even the historian Si Ma Qian did not know his ending. However, people know, we know, his thoughts are still with us; his soul has rooted itself deeply in the boundless space between the Heavens and the Earth; and his wisdom endures in the minds and hearts of millions of people living on the Earth today. The story of his riding a black ox and passing the Hangu Pass will never be forgotten: son shall hear from father and shall in turn pass it on to his son. It was always thus and always thus shall be.