The Book of Han Feizi Daoist Classic 韩非子

The Hanshu·Yiwenzhi (Book of Han·Treatise on Literature and Arts) recorded fifty-five chapters of the Hanzi, a collection of works by Han Fei, a renowned scholar of the Legalist School at the end of the Warring States Period.

Among the existing editions of this book, the one printed in the Qiandao reign period of the Song Dynasty is regarded as the superior version, yet it still contains some missing and corrupted texts.

The Book of Han Feizi

The Daozang (Daoist Canon) includes Han Feizi in twenty volumes in its Taiqing (Supreme Purity) section; it is also one of the ancient editions, complete and intact, and can be used for textual collation. Although Han Feizi is a Legalist work, two of its chapters—Jie Lao (Explaining the Laozi) and Yu Lao (Illustrating the Laozi)—expound the thoughts of the Laozi through the philosophy of Huang-Lao and the study of names and actualities, with detailed and comprehensive elaborations. In fact, these two chapters are the earliest surviving annotations on the Laozi. The version of the Daode Jing seen by Han Fei places the De Jing (Virtue Classic) before the Dao Jing (Way Classic), which is consistent with the silk manuscript version of the Laozi unearthed from Mawangdui dating back to the early Han Dynasty, but different from various popular editions of later generations.