Daojia 道家 (tao-chia) literally means “Family of the Dao,” but is sometimes rendered
as “School of the Dao.” In terms of contextualized meanings, daojia is an Early Han
dynasty (206 BCE-8 CE) bibliographic category, which was used as a taxonomic classification
for texts. Historically speaking, its earliest known usage appears in Early Han historiography,
specifically in Sima Tan 司馬談 (d. 110 BCE) and Sima Qian’s 司馬遷 (145-86 BCE) Shiji
史記 (Records of the Historian). In that work, daojia is used as a veiled reference
to the Huang-Lao 黃老 school, a syncretist movement combining “Daoist” and Legalist
elements, and as one category in a six-part taxonomic classification system. Later
daojia became employed in the bibliographic chapter of Ban Gu’s 班固 (32-92 CE) Hanshu
漢書 (History of the Former Han). Here the term is only one among a large number of
bibliographical categories; daojia is a way of classifying texts.
However, recent revisionist scholarship has suggested that daojia might best be interpreted
as “lineage of the Dao.” This claim is supported by a deeper familiarity with the
historical context of the Warring States period (480-222 BCE) and a closer reading
of the texts of classical Daoism, including the fact that the content and redactive
history of the texts supports a vision of classical Daoism as composed of master-disciple
lineages and cultivation communities. Such details have led Harold Roth (Brown University)
to refer to the earliest Daoist communities as “inner cultivation lineages.”
In later usage, both within elite Chinese society and by Daoists, daojia eventually
came to refer to texts on any subject concerning Daoism that were housed in imperial
libraries—writings on alchemy, hygiene, ritual, and so forth. It was also applied
as a designation for ordained Daoist priests at least through the Six Dynasties period
(316-589). That is, from a historical contextualist perspective, daojia encompassed
everything that Daoists included in their religious tradition. It might best be understood
as the “Daoist community,” which would include the early master-disciple lineages
of the Warring States period through the emergence of organized Daoism during the
early and early medieval periods.
In the modern world, the term daojia is used inaccurately as a designation for so-called
“philosophical Daoism,” which is often misidentified as “pure” or “original” Daoism.
Preliminary research indicates that that usage begins in the mid to late nineteenth
century in the context of Western colonist and Christian missionary interests in
China. Under that modern construction, classical Daoism (Warring States period to
Early Han) is characterized by a certain set of “ideas” or “thought” extracted from
selective readings of the Laozi 老子 (Book of Venerable Masters; a.k.a. Daode jing)
and Zhuangzi 莊子 (Book of Master Zhuang). In fact, many passages in these texts emphasize
quietistic meditation aimed at mystical union with the Dao. The “philosophical” aspects
of Daoism cannot be separated from Daoist “soteriology” and “theology” or from embodied
activity in the world (“practice”). In addition, those who would reduce classical
Daoism to a “philosophy”, whether modern philosophers, historians of “Chinese thought,”
or “seekers of the Way,” fail to provide a comprehensive, close reading of the texts,
texts which, in content and redactive history, suggest master-disciple communities
in which emphasis was placed on specific forms of practice.
More research needs to be done on both historical constructions of “Daoism” as well
as indigenous Daoist referents for “Daoism” and the ways in which Daoists set parameters
for inclusion in their tradition. In any case, there are no theoretically grounded,
historically accurate, or anthropologically relevant referents for the Western distinction
between “philosophical Daoism” and “religious Daoism.” “Philosophical Daoism” is
wholly a modern fiction.
Further Reading: “Chronology of Daoist History”/Louis Komjathy; Daoism Handbook/Livia
Kohn (ed.); Daoist Identity/Livia Kohn and Harold Roth (eds.); “On the Word ‘Taoist’
as a Source of Perplexity”/Nathan Sivin; Original Tao/Harold Roth; “Periodization
of Daoist History”/Louis Komjathy; Taoism: The Enduring Tradition/Russell Kirkland;
The Encyclopedia of Taoism/Fabrizio Pregadio (ed.); “The Establishment of the Taoist
Religion (Tao-chiao) and Its Structure”/Kobayashi Masayoshi; “The Historical Contours
of Taoism in China”/Russell Kirkland; “The History of Taoism: A New Outline”/Idem.;
The Tao of the Tao Te Ching/Michael LaFargue; The Taoist Canon/Kristofer Schipper
and Franciscus Verellen (eds.).
See also Dao, Daoism (Historical), Daojiao, and Philosophical Daoism.
