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Taoism

Zhuangzi

莊子 · 莊周 · 南華真人

c. 369 BCE – c. 286 BCEHistoricity debated

Chinese thinker of the 4th century BCE, from Meng in the state of Song, about whom almost everything we know comes from the book that bears his name. The seven inner chapters of the Zhuangzi are attributed to him with good reason; the rest is the work of disciples and later schools. Through parables, humour and paradox he dismantled the certainties of Confucians and Mohists and proposed a free wandering in harmony with the ceaseless transformation of things. With Laozi, he is the literary founder of Daoism.

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Zhuangzi en el álbum de retratos de soberanos sabios y ministros virtuosos

Zhuangzi en el álbum de retratos de soberanos sabios y ministros virtuosos · Public domain

In their words

«The universe and I came into being together; and I, and everything therein, are One.»

Zhuangzi, cap. 2 «Qiwu lun» (trad. inglesa de Giles, 1889; la española es propia, del chino)

Zhuangzi (Chuang Tzu). The True Classic of Nanhua — Zhuangzi

Their central idea

Free and easy wandering (xiaoyao you): Title of the first chapter and emblem of the whole book.

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Biography

5 min read

A man behind a book

Of Zhuang Zhou, whom tradition calls Zhuangzi, "Master Zhuang", ancient historiography preserves a single paragraph. Sima Qian wrote it around 94 BCE, in chapter 63 of his Records of the Grand Historian, and in a few lines it says what matters: that he came from Meng, in the small state of Song; that he served as an official of the local "lacquer garden"; that he lived in the time of King Hui of Liang and King Xuan of Qi, that is, in the second half of the 4th century BCE. The dates usually given, around 369–286 BCE, are a modern reconstruction from those synchronisms and appear in no ancient source.

The historian adds that he wrote "more than a hundred thousand words", mostly in the form of allegories, and that in chapters such as "The Old Fisherman", "Robber Zhi" and "Rifling Trunks" he mocked the followers of Confucius in order to exalt the teachings of Laozi. He closes the notice with an anecdote: King Wei of Chu offered him the post of chief minister and he refused it, comparing himself to the sacrificial ox, fattened and adorned for years only to be slaughtered. The irony is that the three chapters Sima Qian cites as his are, for modern scholarship, among the latest in the book.

A book of many hands

The Zhuangzi we read is not the one Sima Qian knew. The catalogue of the Han imperial library records a version in fifty-two chapters; around the year 300 CE the commentator Guo Xiang cut it to thirty-three, removing what he considered spurious additions, and his recension is the only one to have survived complete. Guo Xiang also fixed the division into three blocks: seven inner chapters, fifteen outer and eleven miscellaneous. In 742 Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang granted Zhuang Zhou the title "True Man of Nanhua", and the book came to be called the True Classic of Nanhua.

Twentieth-century philology confirmed what ancient commentators had already sensed. A. C. Graham distinguished several voices in the whole: the inner chapters, attributable to Zhuang Zhou; those of his immediate followers; a "Primitivist" group that exalts life before civilisation; a "Yangist" group centred on preserving one's own life; and a "Syncretist" layer of Han date, to which the final chapter, "Under Heaven", belongs, with its first survey of the Chinese schools. Liu Xiaogan argued on linguistic grounds for the greater antiquity of the inner core, and Esther Klein has pointed out that there is no evidence that this core circulated as a block before the Han. Prudence therefore requires us to speak of the thought of the inner chapters rather than of the doctrine of an individual.

The portrait drawn by the disciples

The anecdotes that made the character famous come almost entirely from the outer and miscellaneous chapters: the poor Zhuangzi who appears before a king in patched clothes and shoes tied with string, and replies that this is poverty, not misery; the one who fishes in the river Pu and dismisses the envoys of Chu by saying he would rather drag his tail in the mud like a living tortoise; the one who sings, drumming on a bowl, after his wife's death; the one who, about to die, refuses a lavish burial because heaven and earth are coffin enough. They are school narratives, composed to illustrate an attitude; their biographical value is uncertain, but their value as a portrait of the ideal is immense.

Among these scenes his friendship with Hui Shi, or Huizi, stands out: a logician of the School of Names and a minister in the kingdom of Wei. On the bridge over the river Hao they argue whether one can know the joy of fish; they argue about a useless tree and an oversized gourd; and when Huizi has died, Zhuangzi stops at his grave and tells the story of the mason of Ying, who could only exercise his skill with a partner who did not flinch: since his interlocutor died, he says, he has no one left to talk to. The book's final chapter lists Huizi's paradoxes, which confirms that he was a historical figure.

What the inner chapters teach

The first chapter opens with an immense fish, Kun, which turns into the bird Peng and flies to the southern ocean, while a cicada and a dove laugh at so much effort. From the first page the book plays with scale and relativises points of view. The second, "On the Equality of Things", is its densest philosophical piece: each school affirms "this is so" and denies what the other affirms, but "this" and "that" depend on where one speaks from; the sage takes no side but stands at the "pivot of the Way", from which oppositions are illuminated without being cancelled. The chapter ends with the butterfly dream.

The following chapters carry that intuition into practical life. Cook Ding carves an ox without dulling his blade in nineteen years because he follows the animal's natural interstices; Confucius teaches his disciple Yan Hui the "fasting of the heart", which empties the mind so that the Way can lodge in it; mutilated men, hunchbacks and punished criminals parade whose inner fullness disarms the powerful; the "true man" of antiquity is described, who neither loved life nor hated death, as is the practice of "sitting and forgetting". The last inner chapter ends with the death of Hundun, Chaos, whose friends bore seven openings in him so that he will look like everyone else.

An immense posterity

The book's influence is already visible in the Huainanzi in the 2nd century BCE. It was central to the "Learning of the Mysterious" in the 3rd and 4th centuries, lent vocabulary to the first translators of Buddhism and nourished the sensibility of Chan, later Zen. Poets such as Tao Yuanming, Li Bai and Su Shi read it as a classic of inner freedom, and the Daoist religion incorporated it into its canon.

In the West, Herbert Giles's 1889 translation earned an enthusiastic review from Oscar Wilde, who saw in the Chinese sage a relentless critic of philanthropy and government; James Legge published it in 1891 in the Sacred Books of the East, Martin Buber rendered it into German in 1910 and Léon Wieger into French in 1913. Thomas Merton rewrote it in 1965 in free versions, and Borges made the butterfly dream one of the central images of his literature. In Spanish it was translated by the Jesuit Carmelo Elorduy in 1967 and by Iñaki Preciado, who in 1996 published the complete version of all thirty-three chapters; the inner chapters also have the version of Pilar González España and Jean Claude Pastor-Ferrer.

Sources: Sima Qian. Shiji (Memorias históricas), juan 63, «Laozi Han Fei liezhuan», noticia sobre Zhuang Zhou. c. 94 a. C. Ed. Zhonghua shuju, Pekín, 1959. · Graham, A. C. (trad.). Chuang-tzŭ: The Seven Inner Chapters and Other Writings from the Book Chuang-tzŭ. Londres: George Allen & Unwin, 1981 (reimpr. Hackett, 2001, como Chuang-tzu: The Inner Chapters). ISBN 9780042990101. · Watson, Burton (trad.). The Complete Works of Zhuangzi. Nueva York: Columbia University Press, 2013 (1.ª ed. The Complete Works of Chuang Tzu, 1968). ISBN 9780231164740. · Ziporyn, Brook (trad.). Zhuangzi: The Essential Writings, with Selections from Traditional Commentaries. Indianápolis: Hackett, 2009. ISBN 9780872209114. · Roth, Harold D. «Chuang tzu 莊子». En Michael Loewe (ed.), Early Chinese Texts: A Bibliographical Guide. Berkeley: Society for the Study of Early China / Institute of East Asian Studies, 1993, pp. 56–66.

Timeline

A life, year by year

Each point is a documented event. Click to read it, with its source and degree of certainty.

  1. c. 369 BCE

    Birth (conventional date)

    Modern date inferred from the Shiji's synchronisms, which make him a contemporary of King Hui of Liang and King Xuan of Qi. No ancient source gives the year. Years BCE are expressed as negative numbers.

    Tradition

  2. c. 340 BCE

    Official of the lacquer garden

    According to Sima Qian, Zhuang Zhou held a minor post as official of the "lacquer garden" (qiyuan) of Meng. When and for how long is unknown; the date is merely indicative.

    Probable

  3. c. 335 BCE

    Refuses to become minister of Chu

    The Shiji relates that King Wei of Chu (r. c. 339–329 BCE) offered him wealth and the post of chief minister, and that he refused with the parable of the sacrificial ox. Chapter 17 of the Zhuangzi gives another version, that of the sacred tortoise that would rather drag its tail in the mud.

    Tradition

  4. c. 310 BCE

    Death of his friend Huizi

    Hui Shi, logician and minister to King Hui of Wei, was his favourite interlocutor. Chapter 24 relates Zhuangzi's visit to his grave and the parable of the mason of Ying. The date of Hui Shi's death is approximate.

    Tradition

  5. c. 286 BCE

    Death (conventional date)

    Approximate modern date; Wikidata records -288. Chapter 32 of the Zhuangzi relates that, close to death, he refused a lavish burial; it is a school narrative, not a testimony.

    Tradition

  6. c. 139 BCE

    Influence on the Huainanzi

    Liu An presents the Huainanzi at the Han court, which incorporates ideas and passages parallel to the Zhuangzi: the first extensive literary reception of the work.

    Documented

  7. c. 94 BCE

    Sima Qian writes his notice

    In chapter 63 of the Shiji, Sima Qian devotes to Zhuang Zhou the only ancient biographical note that survives.

    Documented

  8. c. 111

    The Han catalogue records 52 chapters

    The "Yiwen zhi" of the Hanshu, based on the catalogue of Liu Xiang and Liu Xin, records a Zhuangzi in 52 chapters (pian).

    Documented

  9. c. 300

    Guo Xiang's 33-chapter recension

    Guo Xiang (c. 252–312) reduces the text to 33 chapters, divides it into inner, outer and miscellaneous and writes a commentary. Every surviving complete copy derives from his edition.

    Documented

  10. 742

    Title of "True Man of Nanhua"

    Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang grants Zhuang Zhou the title Nanhua zhenren and elevates the book to Nanhua zhenjing, "True Classic of Nanhua".

    Documented

  11. 1889

    First complete English translation

    Herbert A. Giles publishes Chuang Tzŭ: Mystic, Moralist, and Social Reformer (Quaritch). Oscar Wilde reviews it in The Speaker in February 1890.

    Documented

  12. 1891

    Legge in the Sacred Books of the East

    James Legge includes the complete Zhuangzi in The Texts of Taoism (SBE XXXIX–XL).

    Documented

  13. 1910

    Martin Buber translates Zhuangzi

    Buber publishes Reden und Gleichnisse des Tschuang-Tse with Insel, a selection that spreads the book in the German-speaking world.

    Documented

  14. 1965

    Thomas Merton's The Way of Chuang Tzu

    The Trappist monk publishes free versions of passages from the Zhuangzi, bringing the book to Christian and contemplative readers.

    Documented

Works

Essential works

The works without which their legacy cannot be understood.

Zhuangzi (Chuang Tzu). The True Classic of Nanhua — Zhuangzi

Later compilation · c. 250 BCE

Zhuangzi (Chuang Tzu). The True Classic of Nanhua

莊子 (南華真經)

One of the two founding classics of Daoism and one of the summits of Chinese prose. In some sixty-five thousand characters it alternates fables, dialogues, aphorisms and paradoxical arguments with a humour rare in ancient literature. Its protagonists are giant birds, craftsmen, cripples, bandits, a Confucius sometimes mocked and sometimes turned into a Daoist mouthpiece, and Zhuangzi himself arguing with his friend Huizi. Its central teaching is that points of view are relative, that life and death are part of a ceaseless transformation and that freedom lies in wandering unfettered in harmony with the Way.

Not available View the book Read the full text

18 editions

Traditional attribution · c. 300 BCE

Zhuangzi, ch. 1: "Free and Easy Wandering" (Xiaoyao you)

《莊子·逍遙遊》

It opens with the fish Kun turning into the bird Peng and flying to the southern ocean while the cicada and dove mock its effort. It plays with scales of size and time to relativise viewpoints, presents the perfect man "without self", Xu You refusing the empire, and ends with the dialogues with Huizi on the giant gourd and the useless tree.

Not available View the book

3 editions

Traditional attribution · c. 300 BCE

Zhuangzi, ch. 2: "Discussion on Making All Things Equal" (Qiwu lun)

《莊子·齊物論》

The densest philosophical chapter of the book. Ziqi of Nanguo has "lost himself" and hears the piping of heaven; the schools entangle themselves in asserting "this is" and "this is not"; the sage settles at the pivot of the Way and lets things take their course. It contains the fable of the monkeys and "three in the morning", the dialogue of penumbra and shadow, and the butterfly dream.

Not available View the book

3 editions

Complete works (34)

See all 34 works in the library

Quotations

Quotations located in a specific work. Each carries its provenance and its level of confidence.

The universe and I came into being together; and I, and everything therein, are One.

天地與我並生，而萬物與我為一。

VerifiedZhuangzi, cap. 2 «Qiwu lun» (trad. inglesa de Giles, 1889; la española es propia, del chino)

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Apocryphal quotes or disputed attributions (2)

  • «"Flow with whatever may happen and let your mind be free: stay centred by accepting whatever you are doing. This is the ultimate."»

    It circulates online as a literal quotation from Zhuangzi. It is a free modern paraphrase of a sentence in chapter 4 (乘物以遊心，託不得已以養中，至矣: "let your mind wander by riding on things, entrust yourself to the unavoidable to nourish your centre: that is the highest"), part of Confucius's counsel to the Duke of She. It matches no recognisable published translation.

  • «"Happiness is the absence of the striving for happiness."»

    A self-help line attributed to Zhuangzi. It distantly echoes chapter 18 (an outer chapter, not his work), which says 至樂無樂, "supreme happiness is having no happiness" or "not seeking it"; the popular wording is not a translation.

Last words

Traditional attribution

«"With Heaven and Earth for my coffin and shell; with the sun, moon, and stars as my burial regalia; and with all creation to escort me to the grave,—are not my funeral paraphernalia ready to hand?" […] "Above ground I shall be food for kites; below I shall be food for mole-crickets and ants. Why rob one to feed the other?"»

吾以天地為棺槨，以日月為連璧，星辰為珠璣，萬物為齎送。吾葬具豈不備邪？何以加此！……在上為烏鳶食，在下為螻蟻食，奪彼與此，何其偏也！

Scene from chapter 32, "Lie Yukou", one of the miscellaneous chapters written by the later school: the disciples want to give him a lavish burial and he refuses; when they fear crows will devour his body, he answers with the second sentence. It is not an eyewitness account but an exemplary tale; no other ancient source describes his death. The English is Giles's (1889); the Spanish is our own, from the Chinese.

Source: Giles, Herbert A. (trad.). Chuang Tzŭ: Mystic, Moralist, and Social Reformer. Londres: Bernard Quaritch, 1889. Texto íntegro en Wikisource (por capítulos) y en Project Gutenberg n.º 59709.

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What their work answers

Twelve great human questions and what their texts allow us to answer, with references. We never put words in their mouth.

  • What is the Absolute? Does God exist?

    The Dao has reality but no form: it can be pointed to, not defined

    The unnameableStated explicitly

    In the inner chapters, the only ones scholars attribute with good grounds to Zhuang Zhou, the Dao is not a personal god. Chapter 6, «The Great and Venerable Teacher», describes it as something that has reality and signs but lacks action and form; it can be transmitted but not possessed, and it precedes heaven and earth. Chapter 2 asks whether there is a «true lord» governing body and mind, and concludes that, although it seems to act, no trace of it can be found. When the book speaks of the «Maker of things», it does so as an image of the process of transformation, not of a being that wills or judges. The ultimate can be pointed to, but every definition fixes it in one point of view; hence the text prefers parable, paradox and irony to concepts.

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  • Who am I? Is there a true self?

    «I have lost myself»: the perfect man has no self and transforms with things

    There is no permanent selfStated explicitly

    The inner chapters of the Zhuangzi return again and again to the dissolution of the self. Chapter 1 states that the perfect man has no self. Chapter 2 opens with Nanguo Ziqi who, seated like a withered tree, declares that he has lost himself, and closes with the butterfly dream, where Zhou no longer knows whether he is a man who dreamt of being a butterfly or a butterfly dreaming of being a man; the passage from one to the other is called the transformation of things. In chapter 6, Yan Hui attains sitting and forgetting: he lets go of body and knowledge and joins the great thoroughfare. The self here is not a substance but a provisional form in the course of change; clinging to it, and to its judgements of this and not-this, is what binds.

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  • Why do we suffer?

    We suffer by resisting transformation: accepting it unties the bond

    Craving and attachmentStated explicitly

    In the inner chapters, suffering arises above all from resisting the course of things. In chapter 3, at Lao Dan's death, Qin Shi reproaches those who weep without measure for fleeing from heaven: the master came when it was his time and left following the order; whoever accepts the moment and settles into the order lets neither grief nor joy enter. The ancients called this being untied by the Lord. Chapter 6 repeats the idea with the four friends who receive illness and death as transformations. To this resistance are added the disputes of chapter 2: attachment to a point of view, to what each calls «this» and «not this», shuts one into a perspective and sets people against one another.

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  • What happens after death?

    What comes is unknown, but death is another transformation to welcome

    Silence or reserveStated explicitly

    The inner chapters treat death with a serenity that does not depend on knowing what comes afterwards. In chapter 2, the story of Lady Li, who wept on being taken to the palace and later regretted her tears, serves to ask how one knows that the dead do not regret having clung to life. In chapter 6, the Great Clod burdens us with a form, wearies us with life, eases us with old age and rests us with death; therefore what makes life good will make death good. When Zilai lies dying, his friend wonders whether the Creator will turn him into a rat's liver or an insect's leg. Zhuangzi neither affirms personal survival nor denies it: he accepts transformation and laughs at those who weep.

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  • How is liberation or salvation attained?

    Fast the heart, sit and forget: wander freely in step with the Dao

    Through virtue and harmonyStated explicitly

    The inner chapters speak not of salvation but of free and easy wandering, the title of chapter 1. That state is reached by emptying oneself, not by accumulating. In chapter 4, Confucius teaches Yan Hui the fasting of the heart: listening not with the ears but with the heart, and not with the heart but with the breath, which is empty and receives things. In chapter 6, Yan Hui forgets benevolence, righteousness, rites and music, and at last sits and forgets until he joins the great thoroughfare. In chapter 3, Cook Ding carves the ox without blunting his knife because he follows the natural joints. To be freed is to keep pace with the course of things with the spontaneity of one who has stopped forcing them.

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  • Is a teacher necessary?

    Teachers guide, but the great teacher is the Dao, and disciples may surpass them

    Helpful but not indispensableInferred from their doctrine

    The inner chapters are full of teachers, but none is untouchable. In chapter 4, Confucius, turned into a Daoist spokesman, guides Yan Hui towards the fasting of the heart; in chapter 6, the same Yan Hui attains sitting and forgetting, and Confucius asks to be allowed to follow him. Tradition thus appears inverted: the disciple can go further than the master. The title of chapter 6, «The Great and Venerable Teacher», ultimately refers to the Dao itself. And chapter 2 warns against the most insidious teacher: the already formed heart, that of one's own prejudices, which each person takes as guide. Teachers help one to empty oneself, but the work of forgetting belongs to each and no one can do it for another.

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  • Is the world real?

    Everything ceaselessly transforms; the ten thousand beings are one with me

    Natural order in transformationStated explicitly

    For the inner chapters, the real is the ceaseless course of transformation. Chapter 2 holds that distinctions between this and that depend on point of view; seen from the pivot of the Dao, things are equalised, and heaven and earth were born together with me, and the ten thousand beings are one with me. The same chapter ends with the butterfly dream: between Zhou and the butterfly there must be some difference, and this is called the transformation of things. The world is not an illusion: differences exist, but they are not fixed. Chapter 6 shows its characters receiving illness and death as stages of that same process. Wisdom consists in keeping pace with it, not in halting it.

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  • What is love?

    Great benevolence is not benevolent: better to forget each other in rivers and lakes

    What appears when the self ceasesStated explicitly

    Zhuangzi distrusts love turned into a virtue to be cultivated and displayed, the benevolence (ren) of the Confucians. In chapter 2 he states that great benevolence is not benevolent: affection that proclaims itself has already lost something. In chapter 6 he offers a memorable image: when the spring dries up, the fish are left on land and moisten one another with their breath and spittle, but it would be better to forget one another in the rivers and lakes. The same chapter tells how four men become friends on discovering that they share the acceptance of life and death: they look at one another, smile, and there is no disagreement in their hearts. True bonding neither strains nor claims; it appears when no one turns it into a merit of their own.

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  • Are we free, or is everything determined?

    Accepting what cannot be changed as fate is the height of virtue

    Destiny and responsibilityStated explicitly

    The inner chapters often speak of destiny (ming). In chapter 4, Confucius advises an anxious envoy that knowing what cannot be helped and accepting it calmly as destiny is the height of virtue. In chapter 6, Zisang, sick and poor, searches for who has brought him to that state and finds no one, neither his parents, nor heaven, nor earth: «it is destiny», he concludes. But this acceptance is not passivity. In the same chapters, freedom appears as unfettered wandering within what is given: Cook Ding moves with ease between the ox's joints, and the sage uses his mind like a mirror that responds without retaining. Responsibility consists in not adding resistance to the inevitable.

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  • Why meditate or pray?

    Fast the heart and forget: empty oneself, not accumulate techniques

    Meditation is not a techniqueStated explicitly

    The inner chapters describe two states that later tradition would turn into methods but which in the text are rather ways of emptying oneself. In chapter 4, Yan Hui proposes to Confucius a series of strategies to reform a cruel ruler; Confucius rejects them all and teaches him the fasting of the heart: listening not with the ears but with the heart, and not with the heart but with the breath, which is empty and receives things. In chapter 6, Yan Hui forgets benevolence, righteousness, rites and music, and at last sits and forgets: he lets go of body and knowledge and joins the great thoroughfare. What is practised is unlearning. The sage uses the mind like a mirror, which responds and does not retain.

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  • Can reason know the ultimate?

    Pursuing the limitless with the limited is perilous; all knowing is perspective

    Thought is limitedStated explicitly

    The inner chapters are a sustained critique of the pretension to know. Chapter 3 opens by warning that life has a limit and knowledge does not, and that pursuing the limitless with the limited is perilous. Chapter 2 shows that the disputes between Confucians and Mohists depend on point of view: each affirms what the other denies, and there is no neutral arbiter. When Nie Que asks Wang Ni whether he knows what all agree on, Wang Ni answers with questions: how can I know that what I call knowing is not ignorance? But Zhuangzi does not scorn all knowledge: Cook Ding and other craftsmen possess a know-how that does not fit into words. What reasoning does not reach is reached in skill and ease.

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  • Withdraw from the world or transform it?

    Roam the world of men without being harmed: the usefulness of the useless

    Contemplation in actionStated explicitly

    The inner chapters propose neither fleeing the world nor reforming it. Chapter 4, «In the World of Men», deals precisely with how to live among dangerous rulers: Confucius dissuades Yan Hui from going to correct the lord of Wei with principles, and teaches him the fasting of the heart so as to enter his cage without being moved by renown. The same chapter ends with the song of the madman of Chu: all know the usefulness of the useful and none that of the useless; the tree that is no good for timber lives to old age. Chapter 1 tells how Xu You refused the empire Yao offered him. The sage neither retires to a monastery nor seeks office: he lives among others with the ease of Cook Ding.

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Affinities & tensions

Affinities and tensions

Calculated question by question from their positions. The reason for each agreement or clash, on click.

Anecdotes and stories

Anecdotes and stories

Oral traditions. IV a. C. (redacción)

The butterfly dream

At the end of the second chapter, the most philosophical of the inner set, Zhuang Zhou relates in the first person that he once dreamed he was a butterfly fluttering happily, unaware that he was Zhou. On waking he found himself Zhou again, startled, and no longer knew whether he was Zhou who had dreamed of being a butterfly or a butterfly dreaming of being Zhou. The story closes with a decisive sentence: between Zhou and the butterfly "there must be a difference", and this is called "the transformation of things". The scene is not a biographical anecdote but a parable composed to close a chapter devoted to showing that all distinctions depend on a point of view. That is why it has been read in opposite ways: as scepticism about reality, as an affirmation that each state is complete while it lasts, or as a celebration of passing from one form to another. Herbert Giles translated it in 1889 speaking of "metempsychosis"; Borges included it in his Anthology of Fantastic Literature and made it an emblem of doubt about identity.

Origin of the story: Zhuangzi, ch. 2 (inner), final passage. It is a literary first-person parable, attributable to the oldest core of the book; there is no way of knowing whether it reflects a real dream.

Source: Giles, Herbert A. (trad.). Chuang Tzŭ: Mystic, Moralist, and Social Reformer. Londres: Bernard Quaritch, 1889. Texto íntegro en Wikisource (por capítulos) y en Project Gutenberg n.º 59709.

Oral traditions. IV a. C. (redacción)

Cook Ding and the ox

Cook Ding carves an ox before Lord Wenhui. Every movement of his hand, shoulder, foot and knee, every hiss of flesh coming apart, follows the rhythm of a dance. The lord marvels at such skill, and the cook corrects him: what he loves is the Way, which goes beyond technique. At first he saw only whole oxen; after three years he no longer saw them so; now he works with his spirit and not his eyes, following the natural joints, hollows and interstices, never touching a tendon or a bone. A good cook changes his blade every year because he cuts; an ordinary one every month because he hacks. His has lasted nineteen years and looks freshly sharpened, because he inserts what has no thickness into what has room. Even so, at a difficult knot he stops, looks carefully and moves slowly. The lord concludes that he has learned how to nourish life. The parable became the Chinese model of mastery turned spontaneous.

Origin of the story: Zhuangzi, ch. 3 (inner). A literary fable; the identification of Lord Wenhui with King Hui of Liang comes from the commentators.

Source: Giles, Herbert A. (trad.). Chuang Tzŭ: Mystic, Moralist, and Social Reformer. Londres: Bernard Quaritch, 1889. Texto íntegro en Wikisource (por capítulos) y en Project Gutenberg n.º 59709.

Oral traditionc. 339–329 a. C. (según el Shiji)

The tortoise in the mud and the sacrificial ox

Zhuangzi is fishing in the river Pu when two high officials of the King of Chu arrive to entrust him with the government of the kingdom. Without turning his head, he asks them: in Chu there is a sacred tortoise dead three thousand years, which the king keeps wrapped in silk in a chest in his ancestral temple; would that tortoise rather be dead and venerated, or alive and dragging its tail in the mud? The envoys reply: alive. "Go away," says Zhuangzi, "I too will drag my tail in the mud." Sima Qian records another version: King Wei of Chu offers him a thousand pieces of gold and the post of chief minister, and Zhuangzi reminds him of the sacrificial ox, fattened for years and draped in embroidery to enter the temple, which at that moment would like to be an abandoned piglet and no longer can. He would rather amuse himself in a filthy ditch than be bound by a ruler. Both versions sustain the image of Zhuangzi as the sage who refuses power.

Origin of the story: The tortoise version is in ch. 17 (outer) and the ox version in ch. 32 (miscellaneous) and in Shiji 63, which adopts it as a biographical fact. The agreement of sources does not make it documented: Sima Qian draws on the book itself.

Source: Sima Qian. Shiji (Memorias históricas), juan 63, «Laozi Han Fei liezhuan», noticia sobre Zhuang Zhou. c. 94 a. C. Ed. Zhonghua shuju, Pekín, 1959.

Oral traditions. IV a. C. (escena); s. III a. C. (redacción probable)

The joy of the fish

Zhuangzi and Huizi are strolling on the bridge over the river Hao. "See how the fish swim about, calm and at ease," says Zhuangzi: "that is the joy of fish." Huizi, a logician by trade, objects: "You are not a fish; how do you know the fish are happy?" Zhuangzi replies: "You are not me; how do you know I don't know the fish are happy?" Huizi presses the argument: "I am not you, so I don't know what you know; you are not a fish, so you don't know what a fish feels: the reasoning is complete." Zhuangzi goes back to the start: "You asked me 'how' I know, which already assumed that I knew. I know it from here, from above the Hao." For centuries the dialogue has fed discussions on knowledge of other minds, on whether Zhuangzi wins with a pun —Chinese an means both "how" and "from where"— and on the difference between knowledge by argument and situated knowledge, from shared experience.

Origin of the story: Zhuangzi, ch. 17 (outer), last passage. A school composition; Hui Shi is a historical figure, but the dialogue is literary.

Source: Giles, Herbert A. (trad.). Chuang Tzŭ: Mystic, Moralist, and Social Reformer. Londres: Bernard Quaritch, 1889. Texto íntegro en Wikisource (por capítulos) y en Project Gutenberg n.º 59709.

Oral traditions. IV a. C. (escena)

The bowl and his wife's death

When Zhuangzi's wife dies, Huizi comes to offer condolences and finds him sitting on the ground with his legs spread, drumming on a bowl and singing. Scandalised, he reproaches him: you lived with her, she raised your children, she grew old at your side; not weeping would be bad enough, but singing and drumming on a bowl? Zhuangzi answers that at first he too felt the loss. But then he reflected on her origin: in the beginning she had no life, not even form or breath; in the indistinct confusion something changed and there was breath, breath changed and there was form, form changed and there was life; now it has changed again and reached death, as spring, autumn, winter and summer follow one another. She rests in peace in the great dwelling, and if he went on wailing he would show that he did not understand destiny. So he stopped. The scene is Daoism's classic text on mourning and the acceptance of death as transformation.

Origin of the story: Zhuangzi, ch. 18 (outer). There is no other source on Zhuangzi's wife; the scene is exemplary and comes from the school.

Source: Giles, Herbert A. (trad.). Chuang Tzŭ: Mystic, Moralist, and Social Reformer. Londres: Bernard Quaritch, 1889. Texto íntegro en Wikisource (por capítulos) y en Project Gutenberg n.º 59709.

Oral traditionc. 310 a. C. (escena)

At Huizi's grave: the mason of Ying

On his way to a burial, Zhuangzi passes Huizi's grave and turns to his companions. He tells how a man of Ying had on the tip of his nose a smear of plaster as thin as a fly's wing and asked a mason, Master Shi, to remove it. The mason whirled his adze with a whoosh and the smear vanished without grazing the nose, while the man of Ying stood unmoved. Prince Yuan of Song, hearing of it, summoned the mason to repeat the feat on him. "I used to be able to," the mason replied, "but my partner died long ago." Zhuangzi concludes: "Since Master Hui died, I too have had no partner; I have no one to talk to." It is the book's most affectionate page towards its great dialectical adversary, and a reflection on friendship as a condition of thought: the skill of one needs the unmoving trust of the other.

Origin of the story: Zhuangzi, ch. 24 (miscellaneous). A school narrative presupposing that Huizi died before Zhuangzi.

Source: Giles, Herbert A. (trad.). Chuang Tzŭ: Mystic, Moralist, and Social Reformer. Londres: Bernard Quaritch, 1889. Texto íntegro en Wikisource (por capítulos) y en Project Gutenberg n.º 59709.

Oral traditions. IV a. C. (redacción)

The death of Hundun

The ruler of the Southern Sea was called Shu, "Sudden"; the ruler of the Northern Sea, Hu, "Abrupt"; the ruler of the centre, Hundun, "Chaos" or "Formless". Shu and Hu often met in Hundun's lands, and he treated them very generously. They wanted to repay him and said: "All men have seven openings for seeing, hearing, eating and breathing; he alone has none. Let us bore some for him." Each day they bored one, and on the seventh day Hundun died. With this fable of just a few lines the last of the inner chapters ends. It is one of the most commented images of the tradition: praise of the undifferentiated against the mania for giving form, a critique of kindness that imposes its own measures and, for many readers, a warning about the civilisation that destroys what it claims to improve.

Origin of the story: Zhuangzi, ch. 7 (inner), final passage. A literary mythological fable.

Source: Giles, Herbert A. (trad.). Chuang Tzŭ: Mystic, Moralist, and Social Reformer. Londres: Bernard Quaritch, 1889. Texto íntegro en Wikisource (por capítulos) y en Project Gutenberg n.º 59709.

Teachings

Teachings

The notions that structure their thought, explained in context.

Free and easy wandering (xiaoyao you)xiaoyao-you
Title of the first chapter and emblem of the whole book. Xiaoyao designates a carefree, aimless movement, and you wandering or roaming. The chapter illustrates it with the bird Peng, which needs ninety thousand li of wind to rise, and with the cicada laughing at it from its branch: both depend on something, one on the immense wind and the other on the nearby tree. Not even Liezi, who rides the wind, is wholly free, for he still depends on it. Full freedom belongs to whoever "rides the truth of heaven and earth" and depends on nothing; therefore "the perfect man has no self, the spiritual man has no merit and the sage has no name". It is not a flight from the world but a way of being in it without being trapped by goals, uses or reputations.

Inner chapters, above all ch. 1; taken up by the Learning of the Mysterious (Guo Xiang) as "each thing content in its own nature".

Source: Ziporyn, Brook (trad.). Zhuangzi: The Essential Writings, with Selections from Traditional Commentaries. Indianápolis: Hackett, 2009. ISBN 9780872209114.

Equalising things (qiwu)qiwu
The second chapter, Qiwu lun, can be read as "discourse on the equality of things" or as "equalising the discourses on things". It starts from the disputes between Confucians and Mohists: each school calls "this" (shi) what the other calls "not-this" (fei). Zhuangzi shows that such valuations depend on the speaker's position, just as "this" and "that" depend on where one stands. He denies not distinctions but their absolute character. The sage "illuminates by heaven", stands at the "pivot of the Way" (daoshu), at the centre of a circle from which he can respond to each perspective without being imprisoned by any, and practises the "adaptive this" (yinshi). Interpreters debate whether this is scepticism, relativism or a perspectivism that grants each viewpoint local validity.

Chapter 2 (inner), in critical dialogue with Mohist logic and with Hui Shi.

Source: Hansen, Chad. «Zhuangzi». En Edward N. Zalta (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Publicado el 17-12-2014; revisión sustancial del 24-03-2024.

The transformation of things (wuhua)wuhua
The expression that closes the butterfly dream: between Zhou and the butterfly there is a difference, and the passage from one to the other is "the transformation of things". The Zhuangzi conceives the world as a ceaseless flow in which every being is a passing phase of a larger process. In chapter 6 the sick Zilai, close to death, wonders what the great Maker-Transformer will turn him into: perhaps a rat's liver or an insect's leg, and he does not resist. The ethical consequence is serenity before death: if life and death belong to the same transformation, clinging to one particular form is as absurd as metal insisting on becoming a famous sword. The idea recurs in chapter 18, with the wife's death and a chain of metamorphoses of beings.

Chapters 2 and 6 (inner) and 18 (outer).

Source: Graham, A. C. (trad.). Chuang-tzŭ: The Seven Inner Chapters and Other Writings from the Book Chuang-tzŭ. Londres: George Allen & Unwin, 1981 (reimpr. Hackett, 2001, como Chuang-tzu: The Inner Chapters). ISBN 9780042990101.

Fasting of the heart (xinzhai)xinzhai
In chapter 4 Yan Hui announces to Confucius that he will go and reform the young, cruel lord of Wei. Confucius, here a Daoist mouthpiece, warns him he will fail as long as he acts from his own plans, and prescribes the "fasting of the heart" (or mind, xin). It is not abstaining from wine and meat, as in ritual fasting, but unifying the will: listening not with the ears but with the heart, and not with the heart but with qi, the breath. The ear stops at what it hears and the mind at what fits it, but qi is empty and waits for things; the Way gathers in emptiness. That emptiness is the fasting of the heart. Yan Hui then understands that before the instruction he "was full of Hui", and now there is no Hui. It is one of the earliest Chinese descriptions of an inner discipline of emptying.

Chapter 4 (inner); a forerunner of Daoist meditative practices and of their Chan reading.

Source: Ziporyn, Brook (trad.). Zhuangzi: The Essential Writings, with Selections from Traditional Commentaries. Indianápolis: Hackett, 2009. ISBN 9780872209114.

Sitting and forgetting (zuowang)zuowang
In chapter 6 Yan Hui tells Confucius of his progress: first he has forgotten benevolence and righteousness; then rites and music. Confucius says it is not enough. At last Yan Hui announces that he "sits and forgets". Confucius, disconcerted, asks what that means, and he answers: I let limbs and body fall away, dismiss the sharpness of the senses and intelligence, separate from form, cast off knowledge and become one with the Great Thoroughfare; this I call sitting and forgetting. Confucius, the roles of master reversed, asks to become his disciple. The passage, with its sequence of ever more radical forgettings, inspired a whole treatise in later Daoism (Sima Chengzhen's Zuowang lun, 8th century) and is a constant reference in the dialogue between Daoism and Chan Buddhism.

Chapter 6 (inner).

Source: Graham, A. C. (trad.). Chuang-tzŭ: The Seven Inner Chapters and Other Writings from the Book Chuang-tzŭ. Londres: George Allen & Unwin, 1981 (reimpr. Hackett, 2001, como Chuang-tzu: The Inner Chapters). ISBN 9780042990101.

The usefulness of the useless (wuyong zhi yong)wuyong-zhi-yong
A motif running through the book from the first chapter, where Huizi complains of a tree so twisted no carpenter wants it, and Zhuangzi tells him to plant it in the field of nothingness and lie in its shade: no one will cut it down. In chapter 4 a sacred oak appears in a dream to Carpenter Shi to explain that it has grown old precisely by being good for nothing; the hunchback Shu escapes conscription and receives alms. Chapter 20 qualifies the lesson: a tree is saved by being useless, but the goose that cannot cackle is the one killed for dinner; Zhuangzi says he places himself "between the useful and the useless". The idea criticises measuring all value by its service to power and defends a space of life that escapes instrumentalisation.

Chapters 1 and 4 (inner) and 20 (outer).

Source: Watson, Burton (trad.). The Complete Works of Zhuangzi. Nueva York: Columbia University Press, 2013 (1.ª ed. The Complete Works of Chuang Tzu, 1968). ISBN 9780231164740.

Goblet words and imputed words (zhiyan, yuyan)zhiyan
Chapter 27, a late preface, describes the book's way of writing. Nine words in ten are yuyan, "words lodged in another": they are put in the mouths of characters —Confucius, Laozi, the Yellow Emperor, animals, cripples— because nobody believes someone who praises himself. Seven in ten are chongyan, "weighty words", attributed to respected elders. And zhiyan, "goblet words", spill out every day and adapt to everything, like a ritual vessel that tips over when full and rights itself when empty: a language that fixes no positions but adapts to the situation. This theory explains the paradoxical, humorous and polyphonic character of the Zhuangzi and its distrust of language, which culminates in the image of the fish trap forgotten once the fish is caught.

Chapters 27 and 26 (miscellaneous), applied to the whole book.

Source: Ziporyn, Brook (trad.). Zhuangzi: The Essential Writings, with Selections from Traditional Commentaries. Indianápolis: Hackett, 2009. ISBN 9780872209114.

Videos

Videos

Recordings, interviews and documentaries. Videos play from YouTube; they are not hosted here.

  • Professor Michael Puett on Zhuangzi in Relation to Confucius

    Lecture· EN· 2013· 44 min

    China X (HarvardX)Official channel

  • The Greatest Daoist Philosopher: Zhuangzi

    Lecture· EN· 2021· 58 min

    Bryan Van Norden

  • Brook Ziporyn - Losing the Self in the Philosophy of Zhuangzi

    Lecture· EN· 2017· 93 min

    School of History Tel Aviv UniversityOfficial channel

  • Finding a Way Together: Interpersonal Ethics in the Zhuāngzǐ

    Lecture· EN· 2022· 106 min

    4TH SPACE Concordia UniversityOfficial channel

  • Zhuangzi and the Tragedy of Personal Freedom in Chinese History

    Lecture· EN· 2021· 102 min

    Department of Classics & Religion UCalgaryOfficial channel

  • Zhuangzi In-Depth: Professor Edward Slingerland

    Interview· EN· 2020· 55 min

    George Thompson

  • Zhuangzi - The Sage of Uncertainty

    Analysis· EN· 2020· 24 min

    Let's Talk Religion

  • France culture - Du jour au lendemain - Notes sur Tchouang-Tseu de J.F. Billeter

    Interview· FR· 2011· 34 min

    EditionsAlliaOfficial channel

  • 《逍遥游》流传两千多年 里面到底藏着哪些人生道理？《百家讲坛》 崆峒论道 2 吾心安处

    Lecture· ZH· 2026· 38 min

    CCTV百家讲坛官方频道Official channel

  • 读懂庄子的《人间世》《百家讲坛》 崆峒论道 4 人间处世

    Lecture· ZH· 2026· 38 min

    CCTV百家讲坛官方频道Official channel

  • 老子与庄子 | 易中天讲先秦诸子百家争鸣 第六部《继往开来》| CCTV《百家讲坛》

    Lecture· ZH· 2013· 38 min

    CCTV百家讲坛官方频道Official channel

  • Ding el cocinero Zhuang Zi

    Third-party recording· ES· 2016· 3 min

    Pilar Gonzalez EspañaOfficial channel

Gallery

Gallery

Images with verified licences. Each keeps its authorship and attribution.

Manuscripts

Manuscripts

Manuscript witnesses and ancient texts, with their custodian and conditions of access.

  • ZH · Caracteres chinos (escritura regular) · Copias de época Tang (ss. VII–VIII)

    莊子 (fragmentos de Dunhuang)

    Surviving witness
    Fragmentos manuscritos que cubren aproximadamente doce capítulos de la edición de Guo Xiang
    Custodian
    British Library (Londres) y Bibliothèque nationale de France (París), entre otras colecciones

  • ZH · Caracteres chinos · Periodo Muromachi según la fuente consultada (datación pendiente de confirmar)

    莊子 (高山寺本)

    Surviving witness
    Manuscrito con siete secciones completas de los capítulos exteriores y misceláneos, emparentado con la edición comentada de Cheng Xuanying (s. VII)
    Custodian
    Kōzan-ji (Kioto)

  • ZH · Caracteres chinos (impresión xilográfica) · Dinastía Song (s. XIII según la ficha de Commons)

    莊子 (edición Song, 宋刊本)

    Surviving witness
    Edición impresa; la imagen conocida reproduce el comienzo del capítulo 19, «Dasheng»
    Custodian
    Seikadō Bunko (Tokio)
    Digitisation
    commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Zhuangzi_Song_Ed…
Manuscripts →

Connections

Connections

Influences, discipleships and affinities. Documented relations are distinguished from similarities identified by analysis.

  • Influenced by

    Laozi

    Sima Qian states that Zhuang Zhou's doctrine "goes back in essence to the words of Laozi". In the book itself, Lao Dan appears as Confucius's teacher in several outer chapters; chapter 33 presents them as distinct currents.

    Documented relation

  • Disagreed with

    Confucius

    According to the Shiji, Zhuang Zhou attacked Confucius's disciples. In the book, Confucius is sometimes mocked and sometimes a mouthpiece for Daoist ideas (chs. 4 and 6).

    Documented relation

  • Met

    Hui Shi (Huizi)

    Friend and dialectical adversary; protagonist of several dialogues in the book (chs. 1, 5, 17, 18, 24), and his paradoxes are listed in chapter 33. The relationship is documented only by the Zhuangzi itself.

    Documented relation

  • Influenced

    Martin Buber

    Buber published Reden und Gleichnisse des Tschuang-Tse in 1910, a translated selection with an afterword on the teaching of the Tao.

    Documented relation

  • Influenced

    Thomas Merton

    Merton published The Way of Chuang Tzu in 1965, free versions based on existing translations.

    Documented relation

  • Ideas akin to

    Huineng

    The Zhuangzi's critique of language, praise of spontaneity and paradoxical humour are part of the Chinese background of Chan; the relation is one of affinity, not documented direct influence.

    Similarity identified by analysis

  • Ideas akin to

    Dōgen

    Both think of reality as ceaseless transformation and distrust fixed concepts; an affinity noted by modern interpreters, not documented influence.

    Similarity identified by analysis

  • Ideas akin to

    Heraclitus

    A frequent comparison: the flux of all things and the unity of opposites. No historical contact.

    Similarity identified by analysis

  • Ideas akin to

    Diogenes of Sinope

    The refusal of power, chosen poverty and mockery of conventions bring the literary figure of Zhuangzi close to the Greek Cynic. No historical contact.

    Similarity identified by analysis

Linked from other profiles

Sources

Sources

Bibliography and catalogues consulted for this profile.

  1. Wikidata, entidad Q47739 «Zhuang Zhou» (P31=Q5; 98 enlaces entre wikis; nombre nativo 莊子; nacimiento -369, muerte -288 con precisión de año). Entidad del libro: Q1074987 «Zhuangzi».
  2. Sima Qian. Shiji (Memorias históricas), juan 63, «Laozi Han Fei liezhuan», noticia sobre Zhuang Zhou. c. 94 a. C. Ed. Zhonghua shuju, Pekín, 1959.
  3. Graham, A. C. (trad.). Chuang-tzŭ: The Seven Inner Chapters and Other Writings from the Book Chuang-tzŭ. Londres: George Allen & Unwin, 1981 (reimpr. Hackett, 2001, como Chuang-tzu: The Inner Chapters). ISBN 9780042990101.
  4. Watson, Burton (trad.). The Complete Works of Zhuangzi. Nueva York: Columbia University Press, 2013 (1.ª ed. The Complete Works of Chuang Tzu, 1968). ISBN 9780231164740.
  5. Ziporyn, Brook (trad.). Zhuangzi: The Essential Writings, with Selections from Traditional Commentaries. Indianápolis: Hackett, 2009. ISBN 9780872209114.
  6. Hansen, Chad. «Zhuangzi». En Edward N. Zalta (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Publicado el 17-12-2014; revisión sustancial del 24-03-2024.
  7. Roth, Harold D. «Chuang tzu 莊子». En Michael Loewe (ed.), Early Chinese Texts: A Bibliographical Guide. Berkeley: Society for the Study of Early China / Institute of East Asian Studies, 1993, pp. 56–66.
  8. Liu Xiaogan. Classifying the Zhuangzi Chapters. Trad. de William E. Savage. Ann Arbor: Center for Chinese Studies, University of Michigan, 1994 (Michigan Monographs in Chinese Studies, 65).
  9. Klein, Esther. «Were there "Inner Chapters" in the Warring States? A New Examination of Evidence about the Zhuangzi». T'oung Pao 96, n.º 4/5 (2010): 299–369. doi:10.1163/156853210X546825.
  10. Giles, Herbert A. (trad.). Chuang Tzŭ: Mystic, Moralist, and Social Reformer. Londres: Bernard Quaritch, 1889. Texto íntegro en Wikisource (por capítulos) y en Project Gutenberg n.º 59709.
  11. Legge, James (trad.). The Texts of Taoism, partes I–II (The Writings of Kwang-ze). Sacred Books of the East, vols. XXXIX–XL. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1891.
  12. Wieger, Léon (trad.). Les Pères du système taoïste: Lao-tzeu, Lie-tzeu, Tchoang-tzeu. Hien-hien: Imprimerie de Hien-hien, 1913. «Œuvre de Tchoang-tzeu» en Wikisource francés, por capítulos y en texto completo.
  13. 莊子 (recensión de Guo Xiang en 33 capítulos), texto chino en Wikisource, con índice de capítulos interiores, exteriores y misceláneos.
  14. Wikipedia en inglés. «Zhuangzi (book)», secciones «Textual history» y «Manuscripts» (Fuyang, Zhangjiashan, Dunhuang, manuscrito del Kōzan-ji). Consultado el 25-10-2026; usado solo como orientación y contrastado con Roth (1993).
  15. Ban Gu. Hanshu (Libro de los Han), juan 30, «Yiwen zhi» (catálogo bibliográfico), entrada «莊子五十二篇». c. 111 d. C.
  16. Mair, Victor H. (trad.). Wandering on the Way: Early Taoist Tales and Parables of Chuang Tzu. Nueva York: Bantam Books, 1994. ISBN 9780553374063.
  17. Billeter, Jean François. Leçons sur Tchouang-tseu. París: Allia, 2002. ISBN 9782844850805.
  18. Buber, Martin. Reden und Gleichnisse des Tschuang-Tse. Leipzig: Insel, 1910.
  19. Wilde, Oscar. «A Chinese Sage» (reseña de la traducción de Giles). The Speaker, 8 de febrero de 1890.
  20. Merton, Thomas. The Way of Chuang Tzu. Nueva York: New Directions, 1965 (reed. 2010, ISBN 9780811218511).
  21. Borges, Jorge Luis; Ocampo, Silvina; Bioy Casares, Adolfo (eds.). Antología de la literatura fantástica. Buenos Aires: Sudamericana, 1940 (incluye «Sueño de Chuang Tzu», en versión de los antólogos a partir de Giles).
  22. Editorial Kairós. Ficha de «Zhuang Zi. Maestro Chuang Tsé», trad. de Iñaki Preciado Idoeta (col. Clásicos), ISBN 9788472453357.
  23. Open Library: Elorduy, Carmelo (trad.), Chuang-Tzu: literato, filósofo y místico taoísta, Manila, East Asian Pastoral Institute, 1967; y Lao Tse, Chuang Tzu, Dos grandes maestros del taoísmo, ed. de Carmelo Elorduy, Madrid, Editora Nacional, 1977 (ISBN 9788427603912).
  24. Editorial Trotta. Ficha de «Los capítulos interiores de Zhuang Zi», trad. de Pilar González España y Jean Claude Pastor-Ferrer (col. Pliegos de Oriente), ISBN 9788481642391.
Rights holder
Obra en dominio público; cada traducción moderna pertenece a su traductor o editorial

Pending confirmation

What this profile has not yet been able to settle. We would rather say so than fill it in.

  • Fechas de nacimiento y muerte (c. 369–286 a. C.) convencionales: no constan en ninguna fuente antigua; Wikidata da -369 y -288.
  • Sala de lectura: la traducción de James Legge (SBE XXXIX–XL, 1891) no está transcrita en Wikisource ni en Gutenberg como texto limpio separado; solo hay escaneos del volumen completo.
  • Sala de lectura: no hay traducción española del Zhuangzi en dominio público localizada en línea.
  • Manuscritos: confirmar con bibliografía especializada los fragmentos Han de Fuyang (Shuanggudui) y Zhangjiashan que menciona la bibliografía divulgativa, y la datación y la condición de Tesoro Nacional del manuscrito del Kōzan-ji (la fuente consultada lo sitúa en el periodo Muromachi). No se han incorporado como datos firmes.
  • Clasificación de los capítulos según Graham: verificada en líneas generales (interiores, escuela de Zhuangzi 17–22, primitivista 8–11, yangista 28–31, sincretista 12–15 y 33); la adscripción del capítulo 16 queda abierta.
  • Ediciones: ISBN de la traducción rusa de V. V. Maliavin y de ediciones en árabe e hindi no verificados; la edición de Elorduy de 1967 (Manila) consta en Open Library sin ISBN.
  • Vídeos: no se ha localizado una conferencia universitaria en español específica sobre Zhuangzi en canal institucional; se incluye la lectura de su traductora.
  • Comprobar en la colección del Museo Nacional del Palacio la datación del álbum 聖君賢臣全身像冊 (imagen principal).

Researched on 2026-10-25