So-of-Itself: Wu-wei in the Laozi

Abstract Laozi is the pre-Qin thinker who is most often associated with the ideal of wu-wei, and as a term of art wu-wei certainly plays a greater role in the Laozi than in any other of the texts we will be considering. In this text, wu-wei becomes something of a polemical barb aimed at the Confucians: “not-doing” is held up as an ideal in order to pointedly contrast with the incessant and harmful “doing” or “regarding” of those acting with the false assurance conveyed by conventional knowledge. It is thus in the Laozi that the ideal of wu-wei comes closest to being adequately rendered literally as “non-doing” rather than metaphorically as “effortless action.” Even for Laozi, however, this wu-wei is still not to be understood as a state of genuine passivity, but rather represents an ideal state of harmony with the cosmos that brings with it personal efficacy and ultimately universal salvation. In addition, as we shall see, even in the Laozi wu-wei is ultimately understood figuratively and has its own metaphorical structure.