Laozi

Laozi is the sage credited with the Daodejing, the founding text of Daoism, traditionally placed in the sixth century BCE as an older contemporary of Confucius, though many historians date the text later and regard the man as partly or wholly legendary. The work's teaching of the dao, the ungraspable way of nature, and of effortless action shaped Chinese philosophy, religion and statecraft for more than two millennia, and Daoism grew into one of China's great religious traditions with Laozi venerated at its head.