The Tao that can be named is not the eternal Tao. So begins one of the most enigmatic texts in the history of thought. Taoism is neither a religion nor a system: it is a way of being in the world without doing violence to it and without being violated by it. Laozi and Zhuangzi spoke of different things — but both about one and the same thing: that thinking runs up against a wall which cannot be broken through, only walked around.
Laozi — or whoever it is the "Tao Te Ching" is ascribed to. Eighty-one verses on wu wei, on water that defeats stone, on the ruler who rules by doing nothing. This is not mysticism: it is a political and personal philosophy built on the observation of nature.
Zhuangzi is a philosopher-poet who proves his ideas with parables: the cook carving up an ox, the butterfly that dreams it is a man, death as transformation. His method is not the argument but the image: truth cannot be formulated, but it can be shown.
If the Tao cannot be named, why was a whole book written about it?