The Guiguzi Ancient Chinese Taoist Scriptures 鬼谷子

Traditionally attributed to Su Qin of the Warring States Period, who apocryphally claimed it was the work of his teacher, Master Guigu.

However, the Hanshu·Yiwenzhi (Book of Han·Treatise on Literature and Arts) only recorded "Thirty-one Chapters of Suzi" and did not mention the Guiguzi by name. The Suishu·Jingji Zhi (Book of Sui·Treatise on Classics and Records) was the first to record the Guiguzi in three volumes, with annotations by Huangfu Mi and Le Yi of the Jin Dynasty. The Daozang (Daoist Canon) includes this book in three volumes in its Taixuan (Supreme Mystery) section. Its first and second volumes contain twelve chapters from Baihe to Fuyan; the third volume comprises seven chapters of Benjing Yinfu and two chapters of Chishu and Zhongjing, totaling twenty-one chapters. It mainly expounds the art of vertical and horizontal alliance, as well as the tactics of political maneuvering and intrigue, whose ideological connotation has subtle connections with the strategic thinking in the theoretical system of Taoism and the dialectical propositions of Laozi. Scholars of successive dynasties mostly denounced it as shallow and vulgar.

The Guiguzi

The Siku Quanshu Zongmu Tiyao (Annotated Bibliography of the Complete Library in the Four Branches of Literature) stated: "The wonderful variations and magnificent subtleties of its prose are certainly not something that later generations could have produced."