Tracing the Way (Yuan Dao)

Introduction

Han Yu, one of the great prose writers of the Tang dynasty and a champion of the plain “ancient style”, wrote this essay around 805. He defines the Way of the sages as humaneness (ren) and rightness (yi) practised in the ordinary relations of ruler and subject, father and son, and attacks Daoists and Buddhists for an empty “Way” that abandons family and state. He traces a line of transmission of the Way from the ancient sage kings through Confucius to Mencius, after whom it was lost – a model for the later Neo-Confucian idea of the “succession of the Way” (daotong). In 819 his memorial against the veneration of a relic of the Buddha led to his banishment.

Connections

Builds on

• Mengzic. 300 BCE · Mengzi (Mencius)

Criticizes

• Daodejingc. 400 BCE · Laozi