On Chuang-Tzu's Philosophy Of Life

Chuang-Tzu is a profound book, in which the most important subject is to explore the philosophy of life. There is expatiation of Chuang-Tzu's philosophy of life in every part of the book, but the core idea is mainly expressed in the inner part, and A Great Master is the chapter that Chuang-Tzu expounds his philosophy of life comparatively fully and intensively.Chuang-Tzu's philosophy is based on Taoism. Chuang-Tzu thinks that Tao is not really exist, but soaks into everything on earth and is the origin and end of everything, which shows that Chuang-Tzu inherits thoughts from Lao Tzu. However, Chuang-Tzu's Taoism puts emphasis on discussing not the noumenon of Tao but the pursuit and realm of "a Tao-gained man", which shows the improvement of Chuang-Tzu's philosophy compared with Lao-Tzu's. From the evolution of the nature, Chuang-Tzu realizes that everything with Tao in it is prosperous and natural, so nature is the most radical feature of Tao. And this is the footstone of Chuang-Tzu's philosophy of life. He thinks that an ideal realm of life is like nature, disregarding fame and gain, disregarding right and wrong and also disregarding life and death.For this ideal, in Chuang-Tzu's view, man should discard reality constantly because only in completely transcending the reality, can a person let his heart be. Therefore to transcend becomes the main way of realizing one's ideal. Chuang-Tzu divides what should be transcended into two types. What should be transcended first is "kismet" which is outside the body itself. Here kismet means all kinds of gains and losses and encounters containing fame and gain, life and death. If a person is lost in chasing his kismet, he will lose his selfhood and get lost on the way of life. This is why Chuang-Tzu puts forward that man should obey his kismet. What should be transcended secondly is episteme or notion, which is inside the soul. Chuang-Tzu thinks that to reach the realm of letting everything be, one must forget all the mundane things completely, because the pursuit of all these things or notions will restrain a person, when thinking over a problem, in some point of view (with oneself in the center), in some time (between life and death), in some field (for example, social ethic of Confucianism and episteme). This will lead people into the trap of egoism, preventing people from obtaining the real truth of life and world. Only FORGET all these thoroughly, can man reach the thoroughfare leading to the truth of life.The realm that man forgets everything is called "ZUO WANG" by Chuang-Tzu. "ZUO WANG" is also a realm that is completely natural. Man who reaches this realm is called "a real man", according to Chuang-Tzu. The fundamental character of "a real man" is "YU TIAN WEI TU", because "TIAN" in Chuang-Tzu's philosophy is the pronoun of naturalness. Primarily speaking, so-called "YU TIAN WEI TU" means according with nature, which leads to the exploration of the perspective, that is, "sky accords with man Archetype", which is a big proposition in Chinese traditional philosophy. But Chuang-Tzu's perspective has its particularity. Master Chuang thinks...