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Dao (道, Chinese dào, Japanese dō) means “way”. The same character appears in Karate-dō, Budō and Dōjō. Daoism (道家 dàojiā, “school of the way”) is a Chinese philosophy attested before the 4th century BC which, through Chinese culture, also influenced the martial arts of East Asia.
Laozi and the Daodejing
Laozi (老子, “Old Master”) is considered the founder of Daoism. His historicity is unresolved: the first biographical source, the records of the chronicler Sima Qian (1st century BC), itself admits contradictory traditions. Tradition places Laozi in the 6th century BC.
Legend: Laozi, weary of the court, is said to have travelled west and, at the border pass, written down his teaching at the request of the guard. This story is not historically confirmed.
The Daodejing attributed to him (道德經, “classic of the way and its power”, 81 chapters) is the main work of Daoism. The oldest excavated manuscripts (Guodian, c. 300 BC) show that parts of the text already existed in the 4th century BC; authorship and origin are disputed.
Key concepts
- Dao (道): the “way”, the unnameable original principle from which everything emerges and which all things follow.
- De (德): the “power” or virtue a person gains by being in accord with the Dao.
- Wu wei (無為): literally “non-action”; interpreted as “effortless” or “unforced” action in harmony with circumstances – not idleness.
- Yin and Yang (陰陽): two interrelated, complementary forces; originally the shady and sunny sides of a mountain. They do not fight each other but depend on each other.
In the Daodejing, water in particular appears as a model: it is soft and yielding, yet overcomes the hard (ch. 78); according to chapter 76, the hard and strong belong to death, the soft and weak to life. Chapter 31 calls weapons “instruments of ill omen”, to be used only in an emergency. This idea found its way in Japan into Article 1 of the Buke Shohatto (1615), a central legal code of the Tokugawa period.
Connection to Gō and Jū
The name of Gōjū-Ryū is based on a line of the Bubishi taken from a text of Chinese origin: hard (Gō, 剛) and soft (Jū, 柔) belong together like inhaling and exhaling. This idea is close to Daoist yin-yang thinking: hardness and softness are not opponents but mutually dependent poles. In the Meibukan, this duality is represented in the character 明 (sun 日 and moon 月). A direct, historically documented line from the Daodejing to karate cannot be drawn, however; the relationship describes a shared way of thinking in Chinese cosmology, not a direct teacher–student lineage.
Connection to training
- Gō and Jū: Sanchin (hard, tense) and Tenshō (soft, flowing) train both poles on the same breathing (see Heishu kata).
- Wu wei: techniques succeed when tension is not forced; relaxation, breathing and timing take precedence over strength.
- Water as an image: yielding, evading and redirecting (Kake-Te, kata Bunkai) instead of pure confrontation.
Sources
- further reading: Wikipedia, article “Daoismus”
- further reading: Wikipedia, article “Laozi”
- Xiaogan Liu (Hg.): Dao Companion to Daoist Philosophy. Springer, Dordrecht 2015, S. 27–29, ISBN 978-90-481-2927-0.
- Scott Cook: The Bamboo Texts of Guodian. A Study and Complete Translation. Cornell East Asia Series, Ithaca 2012, S. 195–197, ISBN 978-1-933947-84-6.
- Edward Slingerland: Effortless Action. Wu-wei as Conceptual Metaphor and Spiritual Ideal in Early China. Oxford University Press, Oxford/New York 2007, S. 6–7, ISBN 978-0-19-513899-3.
- Hans Steininger: Das fernöstliche Bildungsverständnis und sein Verfall in der Neuzeit. In: Winfried Böhm, Martin Lindauer (Hg.): „Nicht Vielwissen sättigt die Seele“. Klett, Stuttgart 1988, S. 107–128, ISBN 3-12-984580-1.
- Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Laozi
- Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Daoism
- From the Art of Victory to the Art of Keeping Peace: The Dao De Jing and Early 17th Century Tokugawa Bakufu Military Strategy (2022)
- Patrick McCarthy: Bubishi. The Classic Manual of Combat. Tuttle Publishing, Tokio 1995.
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