>go to sinosphere >tell them I'm interested in taoism

>you

white pig devil please

Does anyone here evn know much about Taoism? all I know is that it started out as a philosophy and gradually absorbed a mix of folk religon, susperstitions, alchemy, and primitive medicine.

>>1768590
I've read the Tao Te Ching and the Chuang Tzu, and from what I can tell OP is right. Taoism as a philosophy, is largely dead among the native populations.

File: stirner laozi.jpg (28KB, 288x420px) Image search: [Google]

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Taoism as a philosophy is fascinating. Just read Benjamin Hoff's The Tao of Pooh.

That aside, it's probably the philosophical aspect of Taoism that's become increasingly esoteric and obscure over time, especially as it's become consumed by masses without the capacity or need to fully appreciate Taoism. Like Confucianism, it's just become something that they are taught to venerate and abide by without really thinking about it, rife with all the spooks of Chinese society today.

However, unlike Confucianism, its basis is antithetical to any notion of the nation-state or other similarly empowered entity, and thus it never achieved the same level of eminence, prominence, or importance in Chinese society today.

>>1768347
>How did Taoism end up like this?
Daoism didn't end with the Zhuangzi. It's a millennia old religion.

Yes, Daoist priests do perform liturgies and exorcisms, Laozi became Lord Lao who was divinized and had a miraculous birth in heaven, Daoism isn't just a panentheistic panenhenic (all is in one) system of belief, but it has a polytheistic pantheon with statues too, etc.

Don't forget that present-day China is full of atheists, and I suspect internet-using mainland Chinese are quite the fedoras.

>>1768590
>Does anyone here evn know much about Taoism?
If you need an easy but substantial introduction to Daoism - as in the whole thing and not just the philosophy of Laozi and Zhuangzi - read Introducing Daoism by Kohn.

>>1768347
Because in the west people generally think Taoism is just the Tao Te Ching and Zhuangzi, while in China it was historically a full-on religion associated with mystics, gods, ghosts, alchemy, immortality elixirs, etc. Taoism is much broader than the idea of wu wei.

>>1768347

buddhist propaganda

>>1769026
>Taoism as a philosophy, is largely dead among the native populations.

I was once classmates with a native of some Southeast-Asian shithole, she was Taoist and did the whole cauldron sacrifice thing.

>>1770199
>mystics, gods, ghosts, alchemy, immortality elixirs

this religion is so cool, how are there not more people totally into it?

>>1770278
Because it's the Chinese ancestral religion. So before you do all the superstitious Chinese things you have to think like one. I guess a nice place to start is the I-Ching as translated by Alfred Huang.

Converting to actual religious Daoism is not unlike coverting to Orthodox Judaism or Hinduism. Notice how none of the three religions are actively, aggressively seeking proselytes.

Conversion is not impossible, but you have to "become" a Chinese, Jew or Hindu.