ABSTRACT
Little is known about Lao Tzu. His enigmatic but deeply venerated figure represents the rise of Taoist thought in China. Taoism is one of the three philosophical and ethicoreligious systems that dominated Chinese culture until the early years of the twentieth century. The other two great systems, Confucianism and Buddhism, used the word ‘tao’ (pronounced ‘dow’) to refer to a way to right living or to spiritual development within the universe, but in Taoism the Tao is the Way and also the universal principle that is in all things. It is the unchanging source of the universe and of all that takes place in it.
