The Relationship Between Confucius And Laozi

The relationship between Confucius and Laozi has been one of the most complicated issues argued back and forth without coming to an agreement in the academic history.The main reason correlating with this lies in two factors.Firstly, the historical records themselves was controversial which made it difficult to be solved.Scondly,some documents are thought to be difficult to be trusted. Since 20th seventies, a series of bamboo and silk documents have been unearthed.This have offered more possibilities for a settlement.For a long time, " records of Confucius'family" has been regarded as typical ancient books of dubious authenticity. Some of Confucius words were considered to be the Wei or Jin Dynasty periods.In the excavated bamboo and silk documents,the "speeches of the Confucianists"buried in Xi Han Dynasty is very similar to the "records of Confucius' family".This have caused the educational circles to rethink Wang Su's forging ti\e"records of Confucius'family". A lot of contemporary scholars have already proved the historical authenticity of the book from different angles;The historical value of Xian Qin has been approve by a certain number scholars. So, to investigate the source and course of "records of Confucius' family"and to reappreciate the thought of the book have very important meanings in resolving the old relationship beteew Confucius and Laozi.In addition, the bamboo document Guo Dian " Laozi" in the middle period of Zhan Guo has no thought of criticizing the Confucianists which shocked the entire academic word! So, exploring the early relationship between Confucianism and Taoist has become a new subject which demands a prompt solution.This text has investigated the source and course of "records of Confucius'family" on the basis of the achievements that have already been achieved by some eminent scholars. By combining the unearthed documents with the documents handed down from ancient times, this article has reached the following points:The spring and autumn stage was a important transition period in which the religious authority was being took over by humanism.Both Confucius and Laozi got rid of the religious authority idea of God on the basis of traditional chlture,and formed their own natural philosophy characterized with the concept of Tian Dao Guan.Because of the division in their Tian Dao Guan,their outline of political reforming was different.But they all took the political reforming as their own duty and put forward a series of schemes.Out of their differences in Tian Dao Guan, the political reform schemes of the two masters are strikingly different though facing the same realistic problem. Based on traditional culture, Confucius strived to make some "increases and decreases ". Laozi made severe criticism to realistic politics,and proposed human being "returning to nature". They both cherished the notion of Wu Wei", but it is remarkable to realize the way and content difference concretely: Similar though their characteristics of thought may be, the essence is often different.The thoughts of Confucius and Laozi have both reflected Chinese nation' s vast existence intelligence.Their cultivating one's moral character theory and political ideology are entities that complemented each other. Laozi'thought of cultivating one's moral character can not be interpreted as the thought of escaping from the relity.From the point of view of root, cultivating one's moral character theory serve for political ideology.So, it is not a symbol of Laozi' ideology,nor does Confucius.in summary, because Confucius and Laozi have their common cultural origin, therefore there are consistency in some aspects of their thoughts. But on the other hand,from the very beginning, Confucius and Laozi have displayed different method of reasoning and value standard.Thus, they initiated the two different schools of Confucianism and Taoist.