[8] Terminology originating within the text has been reinterpreted and elaborated upon by Legalist thinkers, Confucianists, and particularly Chinese Buddhists, which had been introduced to China significantly after the initial solidification of Taoist thought.

[8] The title Tao Te Ching, designating the work's status as a classic, was only first applied during the reign of Emperor Jing of Han (157–141 BC).

[17] Other titles for the work include the honorific Sutra of the Way and Its Power (道德真經; Dàodé zhēnjing) and the descriptive Five Thousand Character Classic (五千文; Wǔqiān wén).

[21] In 1993, the oldest known version of the text, written on bamboo slips, was found in a tomb near the town of Guodian (郭店) in Jingmen, Hubei, and dated prior to 300 BC.

[8] Both the Mawangdui and Guodian versions are generally consistent with the received texts, excepting differences in chapter sequence and graphic variants.

[32] Benjamin I. Schwartz still considered the Tao te Ching remarkably unified by the time of the Mawangdui, even if these versions swap the two halves of the text.

[36] Sinologist Chad Hansen does not consider the Outer Zhuangzi entirely accurate chronologically, but still discusses Shen Dao as part of the theoretical framework of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Daoism, as "Pre-Laozi Daoist Theory".

He was an official in the imperial archives, and wrote a book in two parts before departing to the West; at the request of the keeper of the Han-ku Pass, Yinxi, Laozi composed the Tao Te Ching.

Third, Laozi was the grand historian and astrologer Lao Dan (老聃), who lived during the reign of Duke Xian of Qin (r. 384–362 BC).

Some Taoists see a connection between wu wei and esoteric practices, such as zuowang ('sitting in oblivion': emptying the mind of bodily awareness and thought) found in the Zhuangzi.

While the ideas are singular, the style is poetic, combining two major strategies: short, declarative statements, and intentional contradictions, encouraging varied, contradictory interpretations.

[46] With a partial reconstruction of the pronunciation of Old Chinese spoken during the Tao Te Ching's composition, approximately three-quarters rhymed in the original language.

"[50] The first English translation of the Tao Te Ching was produced in 1868 by the Scottish Protestant missionary John Chalmers, entitled The Speculations on Metaphysics, Polity, and Morality of the "Old Philosopher" Lau-tsze.

Many translations are written by people with a foundation in Chinese language and philosophy who are trying to render the original meaning of the text as faithfully as possible into English.

[53] Russell Kirkland goes further to argue that these versions are based on Western Orientalist fantasies and represent the colonial appropriation of Chinese culture.

[54][55] Other Taoism scholars, such as Michael LaFargue[56] and Jonathan Herman,[57] argue that while they do not pretend to scholarship, they meet a real spiritual need in the West.

These Westernized versions aim to make the wisdom of the Tao Te Ching more accessible to modern English-speaking readers by, typically, employing more familiar cultural and temporal references.

As Holmes Welch notes, the written language "has no active or passive, no singular or plural, no case, no person, no tense, no mood.

[60] Some translators have argued that the received text is so corrupted due to[citation needed] its original medium being bamboo strips[62] linked with silk threads—that it is impossible to understand some passages without some transposition of characters.