The A to Z of Taoism

“Dao” is usually translated as “the way” in English. For many in the West the term is interpreted in individual terms – getting body and spirit in harmony, living in harmony with nature and with other people, and managing physical and spiritual energy. Yet, throughout the long history of Daoism or Taoism (both are used), “dao” has represented all created things, the wider world of nature, collective destiny, social harmony, freedom from the disharmony of war and competitive striving, and understandings of cosmogony and eschatology, as well as that individual view.

Historically, it arose in the period between the fifth...