09/05) I Ching (Classic of Changes)

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I Ching

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I-Ching Classic of Changes
The I Ching
Author(s)	Fu Xi
Country	China
Media type	Book

This article contains Chinese text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Chinese characters.

I Ching

Traditional Chinese

易經

Simplified Chinese

易经

Hanyu Pinyin

Yì Jīng

Literal meaning

"Classic of Changes"

[show]Transcriptions
Mandarin
- Hanyu Pinyin	Yì Jīng
- Wade–Giles	Ì Chīng
Min
- Hokkien POJ	e̍k-keng
Wu
- Romanization	yi cin
Cantonese (Yue)
- Jyutping	jik6 ging1
- IPA	[jìːk kíːŋ]
- Yale Romanization	Yihk Gīng

The I Ching (Wade-Giles) or "Yì Jīng" (pinyin), also known as the Classic of Changes, Book of Changes or Zhouyi, is one of the oldest of the Chinese classic texts.^[1] The book contains a divination system comparable to Western geomancy or the West African Ifá system; in Western cultures and modern East Asia, it is still widely used for this purpose.

Traditionally, the I Ching and its hexagrams were thought to pre-date recorded history,^[2] and based on traditional Chinese accounts, its origins trace back to the 3rd to the 2nd millennium BCE.^[3] Modern scholarship suggests that the earliest layers of the text may date from the end of the 2nd millennium BCE, but place doubts on the mythological aspects in the traditional accounts.^[4] Some consider the I Ching the oldest extant book of divination, dating from 1,000 BCE and before.^[5] The oldest manuscript that has been found, albeit incomplete, dates back to the Warring States period (475–221 BCE).^[6]

During the Warring States Period, the text was re-interpreted as a system of cosmology and philosophy that subsequently became intrinsic to Chinese culture. It centered on the ideas of the dynamic balance of opposites, the evolution of events as a process, and acceptance of the inevitability of change.

The standard text originated from the Old Text version (古文經) transmitted by Fei Zhi (费直, c. 50 BCE-10 CE) of the Han Dynasty, which survived Qin’s book-burning. During the Han Dynasty this version competed with the bowdlerised new text (今文經) version transmitted by Tian He at the beginning of the Western Han. However, by the time of the Tang Dynasty the Old Text version became accepted as standard.

Contents

 [hide] 

• 1 History
  • 1.1 Traditional view
  • 1.2 Modernist view
• 2 Structure
  • 2.1 Trigrams
  • 2.2 Hexagram lookup table
  • 2.3 The hexagrams
    • 2.3.1 Hexagram table references
• 3 Unicode
• 4 Implications of the title
• 5 Philosophy
  • 5.1 Binary sequence
• 6 Divination
• 7 Symbolism
• 8 Influence
• 9 Commentary
• 10 Translations
• 11 See also
• 12 Footnotes
• 13 References
• 14 External links

History[edit source | editbeta]

Traditional view[edit source | editbeta]

Traditionally it was believed that the principles of the I Ching originated with the mythical Fu Xi (伏羲 Fú Xī).^[7] In this respect he is seen as an early culture hero, one of the earliest legendary rulers of China (traditional dates 2800 BCE-2737 BCE), reputed to have had the 8 trigrams (八卦 bā guà) revealed to him supernaturally. By the time of the legendary Yu (禹 Yǔ) 2194 BCE – 2149 BCE, the trigrams had supposedly been developed into 64 hexagrams (六十四卦 lìu shí sì gùa), which were recorded in the scripture Lian Shan (《連山》 Lián Shān; also called Lian Shan Yi). Lian Shan, meaning "continuous mountains" in Chinese, begins with the hexagram Bound (艮 gèn), which depicts a mountain (¦¦|) mounting on another and is believed to be the origin of the scripture's name.

After the traditionally recorded Xia Dynasty was overthrown by the Shang Dynasty, the hexagrams are said to have been re-deduced to form Gui Cang (《歸藏》 Gūi Cáng; also called Gui Cang Yi), and the hexagram responding (坤 kūn) became the first hexagram. Gui Cang may be literally translated into "return and be contained", which refers to earth as the first hexagram itself indicates. At the time of Shang's last king, Zhou Wang, King Wen of Zhou is said to have deduced the hexagram and discovered that the hexagrams beginning with Initiating (乾 qián) revealed the rise of Zhou. He then gave each hexagram a description regarding its own nature, thus Gua Ci (卦辭 guà cí, "Explanation of Hexagrams").

When King Wu of Zhou, son of King Wen, toppled the Shang Dynasty, his brother Zhou Gong Dan is said to have created Yao Ci (爻辭 yáo cí, "Explanation of Horizontal Lines") to clarify the significance of each horizontal line in each hexagram. It was not until then that the whole context of I Ching was understood. Its philosophy heavily influenced the literature and government administration of the Zhou Dynasty (1122 BCE-256 BCE).

Later, during the time of Spring and Autumn Period (722 BCE-481 BCE), Confucius is traditionally said to have written the Shi Yi (十翼 shí yì, "Ten Wings"), a group of commentaries on the I Ching. By the time of Han Wu Di (漢武帝 Hàn Wǔ Dì) of the Western Han Dynasty (c. 200 BCE), Shi Yi was often called Yi Zhuan (易傳 yì zhùan, "Commentary on the I Ching"). Together with the commentaries by Confucius, I Ching is also often referred to as Zhou Yi (周易 zhōu yì, "Changes of Zhou"). All later texts about Zhou Yi were explanations only, due to the classic's deep meaning.

Modernist view[edit source | editbeta]

Replica of an oracle turtle shell

In the past 50 years a "Modernist" history of the I Ching emerged based on research into Shang and Zhou dynasties' oracle bones, Zhou bronze inscriptions and other sources (Marshall 2001, Rutt 1996, Shaughnessy 1993, Smith 2008). In the 1970s, Chinese archaeologists discovered intact Han dynasty-era tombs in Mawangdui near Changsha, Hunan province. One of the tombs contained the Mawangdui Silk Texts, a 2nd-century BCE new text version of the I Ching, the Dao De Jing and other works, which are mostly similar yet in some ways diverge from the received, or traditional texts preserved historically. This version of the I Ching, despite its textual form, belongs to the same textual tradition as the standard text, which suggests it was prepared from an old text version for the use of its Han patron.

Rather than being the work of one or several legendary or historical figures, the core divinatory text is now thought to be an accretion of Western Zhou divinatory concepts. According to Daniel Woolf, the text reached a "definitive form" at the end of the 2nd millennium BCE.^[8] As for the Shi Yi commentaries traditionally attributed to Confucius, scholars from the time of the 11th century CE scholar Ouyang Xiu onward have doubted this, based on textual analysis, and modern scholars date most of them to the Warring States period (475 BCE-256 or 221 BCE),^[6] with some sections perhaps being as late as the Western Han period (206 BCE-9 CE).

Structure[edit source | editbeta]

The text of the I Ching is a set of oracular statements represented by 64 sets of six lines each called hexagrams (卦 guà). Each hexagram is a figure composed of six stacked horizontal lines (爻 yáo), each line is either Yang (an unbroken, or solid line), or Yin (broken, an open line with a gap in the center). With six such lines stacked from bottom to top there are 2⁶ or 64 possible combinations, and thus 64 hexagrams represented.

The hexagram diagram is composed of two three-line arrangements called trigrams (卦 guà). There are 2³, hence 8, possible trigrams. The traditional view was that the hexagrams were a later development and resulted from combining two trigrams. However, in the earliest relevant archaeological evidence, groups of numerical symbols on many Western Zhou bronzes and a very few Shang oracle bones, such groups already usually appear in sets of six. A few have been found in sets of three numbers, but these are somewhat later. Numerical sets greatly predate the groups of broken and unbroken lines, leading modern scholars to doubt the mythical early attributions of the hexagram system, (Shaugnessy 1993).

When a hexagram is cast using one of the traditional processes of divination with I Ching, each yin and yang line will be indicated as either moving (that is, changing), or fixed (unchanging). Sometimes called old lines, a second hexagram is created by changing moving lines to their opposite. These are referred to in the text by the numbers six through nine as follows:

• Nine is old yang, an unbroken line (—θ—) changing into yin, a broken line (— —);
• Eight is young yin, a broken line (— —) without change;
• Seven is young yang, an unbroken line (———) without change;
• Six is old yin, a broken line (—X—) changing into yang, an unbroken line (———).

The oldest method for casting the hexagrams, the yarrow stalk method, was gradually replaced during the Han Dynasty by the three coins method and the yarrow stalk method was lost.^[9] With the coin method, the probability of yin or yang is equal while with the recreated yarrow stalk method of Zhu Xi (1130–1200),^[10] the probability of old yang is three times greater than old yin.^[11]

There have been several arrangements of the trigrams and hexagrams over the ages. The bā gùa is a circular arrangement of the trigrams, traditionally printed on a mirror, or disk. According to legend, Fu Xi found the bā gùa on the scales of a tortoise's back. They function like a magic square with the four axes summing to the same value, using 0 and 1 to represent yin and yang: 000 + 111 = 101 + 010 = 011 + 100 = 110 + 001 = 111.

The King Wen sequence is the traditional (i.e. "classical") sequence of the hexagrams used in most contemporary editions of the I Ching.

Trigrams[edit source | editbeta]

The eight trigrams

The solid line represents yang, the creative principle. The open line represents yin, the receptive principle. These principles are also represented in a common circular symbol (☯), known as taijitu (太極圖), but more commonly known in the west as the yin-yang (陰陽) diagram, expressing the idea of complementarity of changes: when Yang is at top, Yin is increasing, and vice versa.

In the following lists, the trigrams and hexagrams are represented using a common textual convention, horizontally from left-to-right, using '|' for yang and '¦' for yin, rather than the traditional bottom-to-top. In a more modern usage, the numbers 0 and 1 can also be used to represent yin and yang, being read left-to-right. There are eight possible trigrams (八卦 bāguà):

The first 3 lines of the hexagram, called the lower trigram, are seen as the inner aspect of the change that is occurring. The upper trigram (the last three lines of the hexagram), is the outer aspect. The change described is thus the dynamic of the inner (personal) aspect relating to the outer (external) situation. Thus, hexagram 04 ¦|¦¦¦| Enveloping, is composed of the inner trigram ¦|¦ Gorge, relating to the outer trigram ¦¦| Bound.

Hexagram lookup table[edit source | editbeta]

Upper → Lower ↓	☰ 乾 Qián Heaven	☳ 震 Zhèn Thunder	☵ 坎 Kǎn Water	☶ 艮 Gèn Mountain	☷ 坤 Kūn Earth	☴ 巽 Xùn Wind	☲ 離 Lí Flame	☱ 兌 Duì Lake
☰ 乾 Qián Heaven	01 ䷀	34 ䷡	05 ䷄	26 ䷙	11 ䷊	09 ䷈	14 ䷍	43 ䷪
☳ 震 Zhèn Thunder	25 ䷘	51 ䷲	03 ䷂	27 ䷚	24 ䷗	42 ䷩	21 ䷔	17 ䷐
☵ 坎 Kǎn Water	06 ䷅	40 ䷧	29 ䷜	04 ䷃	07 ䷆	59 ䷺	64 ䷿	47 ䷮
☶ 艮 Gèn Mountain	33 ䷠	62 ䷽	39 ䷦	52 ䷳	15 ䷎	53 ䷴	56 ䷷	31 ䷞
☷ 坤 Kūn Earth	12 ䷋	16 ䷏	08 ䷇	23 ䷖	02 ䷁	20 ䷓	35 ䷢	45 ䷬
☴ 巽 Xùn Wind	44 ䷫	32 ䷟	48 ䷯	18 ䷑	46 ䷭	57 ䷸	50 ䷱	28 ䷛
☲ 離 Lí Flame	13 ䷌	55 ䷶	63 ䷾	22 ䷕	36 ䷣	37 ䷤	30 ䷝	49 ䷰
☱ 兌 Duì Lake	10 ䷉	54 ䷵	60 ䷻	41 ䷨	19 ䷒	61 ䷼	38 ䷥	58 ䷹

The hexagrams[edit source | editbeta]

The text of the I Ching describes each of the 64 hexagrams, and later scholars added commentaries and analyses of each one; these have been subsumed into the text comprising the I Ching.

In the table below, each hexagram's translation is accompanied by a form of R. Wilhelm translation (which is the source for the Unicode names), followed by a retranslation.

Hexagram	R. Wilhelm	Modern Interpretation
01. |||||| ䷀ Force (乾 qián)	The Creative	Possessing Creative Power & Skill [hex 1]
02. ¦¦¦¦¦¦ ䷁ Field (坤 kūn)	The Receptive	Needing Knowledge & Skill; Do not force matters and go with the flow [hex 2], [hex 3]
03. |¦¦¦|¦ ䷂ Sprouting (屯 zhūn)	Difficulty at the Beginning [hex 4]	Sprouting [hex 5]
04. ¦|¦¦¦| ䷃ Enveloping (蒙 méng)	Youthful Folly	Detained, Enveloped and Inexperienced [hex 6], [hex 7]
05. |||¦|¦ ䷄ Attending (需 xū)	Waiting	Uninvolvement (Wait for now), Nourishment [hex 8]
06. ¦|¦||| ䷅ Arguing (訟 sòng)	Conflict	Engagement in Conflict [hex 9]
07. ¦|¦¦¦¦ ䷆ Leading (師 shī)	The Army	Bringing Together, Teamwork [hex 10]
08. ¦¦¦¦|¦ ䷇ Grouping (比 bǐ)	Holding Together	Union [hex 11]
09. |||¦|| ䷈ Small Accumulating (小畜 xiǎo chù)	Small Taming	Accumulating Resources
10. ||¦||| ䷉ Treading (履 lǚ)	Treading (Conduct)	Continuing with Alertness
11. |||¦¦¦ ䷊ Pervading (泰 tài)	Peace	Pervading
12. ¦¦¦||| ䷋ Obstruction (否 pǐ)	Standstill	Stagnation
13. |¦|||| ䷌ Concording People (同人 tóng rén)	Fellowship	Fellowship, Partnership
14. ||||¦| ䷍ Great Possessing (大有 dà yǒu)	Great Possession	Independence, Freedom
15. ¦¦|¦¦¦ ䷎ Humbling (謙 qiān)	Modesty	Being Reserved, Refraining
16. ¦¦¦|¦¦ ䷏ Providing-For (豫 yù)	Enthusiasm	Inducement, New Stimulus
17. |¦¦||¦ ䷐ Following (隨 suí)	Following	Following
18. ¦||¦¦| ䷑ Corrupting (蠱 gǔ)	Work on the Decayed	Repairing
19. ||¦¦¦¦ ䷒ Nearing (臨 lín)	Approach	Approaching Goal, Arriving [hex 12]
20. ¦¦¦¦|| ䷓ Viewing (觀 guān)	Contemplation	The Withholding
21. |¦¦|¦| ䷔ Gnawing Bite (噬嗑 shì kè)	Biting Through	Deciding
22. |¦|¦¦| ䷕ Adorning (賁 bì)	Grace	Embellishing
23. ¦¦¦¦¦| ䷖ Stripping (剝 bō)	Splitting Apart	Stripping, Flaying
24. |¦¦¦¦¦ ䷗ Returning (復 fù)	Return	Returning
25. |¦¦||| ䷘ Without Embroiling (無妄 wú wàng)	Innocence	Without Rashness
26. |||¦¦| ䷙ Great Accumulating (大畜 dà chù)	Great Taming	Accumulating Wisdom
27. |¦¦¦¦| ䷚ Swallowing (頤 yí)	Mouth Corners	Seeking Nourishment
28. ¦||||¦ ䷛ Great Exceeding (大過 dà guò)	Great Preponderance	Great Surpassing
29. ¦|¦¦|¦ ䷜ Gorge (坎 kǎn)	The Abysmal Water	Darkness, Gorge
30. |¦||¦| ䷝ Radiance (離 lí)	The Clinging	Clinging, Attachment
31. ¦¦|||¦ ䷞ Conjoining (咸 xián)	Influence	Attraction
32. ¦|||¦¦ ䷟ Persevering (恆 héng)	Duration	Perseverance
33. ¦¦|||| ䷠ Retiring (遯 dùn)	Retreat	Withdrawing
34. ||||¦¦ ䷡ Great Invigorating (大壯 dà zhuàng)	Great Power	Great Boldness
35. ¦¦¦|¦| ䷢ Prospering (晉 jìn)	Progress	Expansion, Promotion
36. |¦|¦¦¦ ䷣ Brightness Hiding (明夷 míng yí)	Darkening of the Light	Brilliance Injured
37. |¦|¦|| ䷤ Dwelling People (家人 jiā rén)	The Family	Family
38. ||¦|¦| ䷥ Polarising (睽 kuí)	Opposition	Division, Divergence
39. ¦¦|¦|¦ ䷦ Limping (蹇 jiǎn)	Obstruction	Halting, Hardship
40. ¦|¦|¦¦ ䷧ Taking-Apart (解 xiè)	Deliverance	Liberation, Solution
41. ||¦¦¦| ䷨ Diminishing (損 sǔn)	Decrease	Decrease
42. |¦¦¦|| ䷩ Augmenting (益 yì)	Increase	Increase
43. |||||¦ ䷪ Parting (夬 guài)	Breakthrough	Separation
44. ¦||||| ䷫ Coupling (姤 gòu)	Coming to Meet	Encountering
45. ¦¦¦||¦ ䷬ Clustering (萃 cuì)	Gathering Together	Association, Companionship
46. ¦||¦¦¦ ䷭ Ascending (升 shēng)	Pushing Upward	Growing Upward
47. ¦|¦||¦ ䷮ Confining (困 kùn)	Oppression	Exhaustion
48. ¦||¦|¦ ䷯ Welling (井 jǐng)	The Well	Replenishing, Renewal
49. |¦|||¦ ䷰ Skinning (革 gé)	Revolution	Abolishing the Old
50. ¦|||¦| ䷱ Holding (鼎 dǐng)	The Cauldron	Establishing the New
51. |¦¦|¦¦ ䷲ Shake (震 zhèn)	Arousing	Mobilizing
52. ¦¦|¦¦| ䷳ Bound (艮 gèn)	The Keeping Still	Immobility
53. ¦¦|¦|| ䷴ Infiltrating (漸 jiàn)	Development	Auspicious Outlook, Infiltration
54. ||¦|¦¦ ䷵ Converting The Maiden (歸妹 guī mèi)	The Marrying Maiden	Marrying
55. |¦||¦¦ ䷶ Abounding (豐 fēng)	Abundance	Goal Reached, Ambition Achieved
56. ¦¦||¦| ䷷ Sojourning (旅 lǚ)	The Wanderer	Travel
57. ¦||¦|| ䷸ Ground (巽 xùn)	The Gentle	Subtle Influence
58. ||¦||¦ ䷹ Open (兌 duì)	The Joyous	Overt Influence
59. ¦|¦¦|| ䷺ Dispersing (渙 huàn)	Dispersion	Dispersal
60. ||¦¦|¦ ䷻ Articulating (節 jié)	Limitation	Discipline
61. ||¦¦|| ䷼ Centre Confirm‎ing (中孚 zhōng fú)	Inner Truth	Staying Focused, Avoid Misrepresentation
62. ¦¦||¦¦ ䷽ Small Exceeding (小過 xiǎo guò)	Small Preponderance	Small Surpassing
63. |¦|¦|¦ ䷾ Already Fording (既濟 jì jì)	After Completion	Completion
64. ¦|¦|¦| ䷿ Not-Yet Fording (未濟 wèi jì)	Before Completion	Incompletion

Hexagram table references[edit source | editbeta]

1. ^ Wilhelm (trans.), Richard; Cary Baynes (trans.). "The I Ching or Book of Changes". Retrieved 30 March 2010. 
2. ^ Xiaochun, Tan (1993). The I Ching: An Illustrated Guide to the Chinese Art of Divination. Retrieved 16 October 2008. 
3. ^ Legge, James. "The I Ching". Retrieved 16 October 2008. 
4. ^ Wilhelm, R. "The I Ching on the Net". Retrieved 16 October 2008. 
5. ^ Kinnes, Tormod. "I Ching Hexagram Drawings". Retrieved 16 October 2008. 
6. ^ Benson, Robert G. (2003). I Ching for a New Age. Retrieved 16 October 2008. 
7. ^ Merritt, Dennis L. "Use of the I Ching in the Analytic Setting". Retrieved 16 October 2008. 
8. ^ Lofting, Chris J. "05 Waiting (Nourishment)". Retrieved 16 October 2008. 
9. ^ Michael Drake, Michael Drake (1997). I Ching: The Tao of Drumming. Retrieved 16 October 2008. 
10. ^ Secter, Mondo; Chung-Ying Cheng (2002). The I Ching Handbook: Decision-Making with and Without Divination. Retrieved 16 October 2008. 
11. ^ Sloane, Sarah Jane (2005). The I Ching for Writers: Finding the Page Inside You. Retrieved 16 October 2008. 
12. ^ Moran, Elizabeth; Joseph Yu (2001). The Complete Idiot's Guide to the I Ching. Retrieved 16 October 2008. 

The hexagrams, though, are mere mnemonics for the philosophical concepts embodied in each one. The philosophy centres around the ideas of balance through opposites and acceptance of change.

Unicode[edit source | editbeta]

I Ching trigrams were added to the Unicode Standard in June, 1993 with the release of version 1.1. The other encoded I Ching symbols were added to the Unicode Standard in April, 2003 with the release of version 4.0.

The symbols are spread out between Unicode blocks:

• Miscellaneous Symbols (U+2600–U+26FF):
  • Monograms: U+268A (⚊) and U+268B (⚋)
  • Digrams: U+268C–U+268F (⚌ ⚍ ⚎ ⚏)
  • Trigrams: U+2630–U+2637 (☰ ☱ ☲ ☳ ☴ ☵ ☶ ☷)
• Yijing Hexagram Symbols (U+4DC0–U+4DFF):
  • Hexagrams: U+4DC0–U+4DFF

Yijing Hexagram Symbols[1] Unicode.org chart (PDF)

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

A

B

C

D

E

F

U+4DCx

䷀

䷁

䷂

䷃

䷄

䷅

䷆

䷇

䷈

䷉

䷊

䷋

䷌

䷍

䷎

䷏

U+4DDx

䷐

䷑

䷒

䷓

䷔

䷕

䷖

䷗

䷘

䷙

䷚

䷛

䷜

䷝

䷞

䷟

U+4DEx

䷠

䷡

䷢

䷣

䷤

䷥

䷦

䷧

䷨

䷩

䷪

䷫

䷬

䷭

䷮

䷯

U+4DFx

䷰

䷱

䷲

䷳

䷴

䷵

䷶

䷷

䷸

䷹

䷺

䷻

䷼

䷽

䷾

䷿

Notes 1.^ As of Unicode version 6.1

There is an extension of the "Yi Jing" Unicode characters for the Tài Xuán Jīng (太玄經: Canon of Supreme Mystery) by Yáng Xióng (揚雄/扬雄; 53 BCE-18 CE), from U+1D300 through U+1D356. Their Chinese aliases most accurately reflect their interpretation;^[13] for example, the Chinese alias of code point U+1D300 (𝌀) is "rén", which translates into English as man and yet the English alias is "MONOGRAM FOR EARTH". Five additional digrams cover code points U+1D301 to U+1D305 (𝌁 𝌂 𝌃 𝌄 𝌅) and eighty–one tetragrams cover code points U+1D306 to U+1D356.

Implications of the title[edit source | editbeta]

• 易 (yì) used as an adjective, means "easy" or "simple", whilst as a verb it indicates "change" or "the exchange or substitution of one thing for another".
• 經 (jīng) here means "classic (i.e. text)". It is a post-Qin Dynasty term later added to any text that had been officially canonised, hence the same character was later appropriated to translate the Sanskrit word 'sūtra' into Chinese in reference to Buddhist scripture. In this sense the two concepts, in as much as they mean 'treatise,' 'great teaching,' or 'canonical scripture,' are equivalent.

The usual reading of its title is "The Classic of Changes" in reference to the divinatory usage of its hexagram figures. The other senses of yi are secondary, but still informed its sense. Thus, a punning reading as "The Easy Classic", reflects the ease of milfoil divination in contradistinction to the older systems of plastromancy and scapulamancy. Similarly, the sense of "the exchange or substitution of one thing for another" alludes to the posing of a question and the receiving of an answer.

Philosophy[edit source | editbeta]

Yin and yang, whilst common expressions associated with many schools of classical Chinese culture, are especially associated with the Taoists.

Another view holds that the I Ching is primarily a Confucianist ethical or philosophical document. This view is based upon the following:

• The Wings or Appendices are attributed to Confucius.
• The study of the I Ching was required as part of the Civil Service Exams in the period that these exams only studied Confucianist texts.
• It is one of the Five Confucian Classics.
• It does not appear in any surviving editions of the Daozang.
• The major commentaries were written by Confucianists, or Neo-Confucianists.
• Taoist scripture avoids, even mocks, attempts at categorizing the world's myriad phenomena and forming a static philosophy. However, Taoist ritual frequently uses the eight trigrams, and they are fundamental for alchemical practice, both internal and external.
• Wú wéi (无为), is an important concept of Taoism with regard to understanding when to act and when not to act. The understanding is one of instinctive wisdom rather than exemplified by natural action, such as the planets orbiting the Sun; they do without doing — without ends or means, effort or error. Thus, understanding when and how to act is not knowledge in the sense of calculating the right time and way, what is free of toil and care does not hesitate and cannot falter. Action without action, "wu wei wu", is effortless action.

Although the work's popularity diminished due to the rise of Chinese Buddhism during the Tang dynasty, the I Ching returned to prominent attention of scholars during the Song dynasty. This was concomitant with the reassessment of Confucianism by Confucians in the light of Taoist and Buddhist metaphysics, and is known in the West as Neo-Confucianism. The book, unquestionably an ancient Chinese scripture, helped Song Confucian thinkers to synthesize Buddhist and Taoist cosmologies with Confucian and Mencian ethics. The end product was a new cosmogony that could be linked to the so-called "lost Tao" of Confucius and Mencius.

Binary sequence[edit source | editbeta]

In his article Explication de l'Arithmétique Binaire (1703) Gottfried Leibniz wrote that he found in the hexagrams a base for claiming the universality of the binary numeral system.^[14] He took the layout of the combinatorial exercise found in the hexagrams to represent binary sequences, so that ¦¦¦¦¦¦ would correspond to the binary sequence 000000 and ¦¦¦¦¦| would be 000001, and so forth.

The binary arrangement of hexagrams is associated with the famous Chinese scholar and philosopher Shao Yung (a neo-Confucian and Taoist) in the 11th century. He displayed it in two different formats, a circle, and a rectangular block. Thus, he clearly understood the sequence represented a logical progression of values. However, while it is true that these sequences do represent the values 0 through 63 in a binary display, there is no evidence that Shao understood that the numbers could be used in computations such as addition or subtraction.

Richard S. Cook states that the I Ching demonstrated a relation between the golden ratio (aka the division in extreme and mean ratio) and "linear recurrence sequences" (the Fibonacci numbers are examples of "linear recurrence sequences") :

...the hexagram sequence, showing that its classification of binary sequences demonstrates knowledge of the convergence of certain linear recurrence sequences ... to division in extreme and mean ratio... that the complex hexagram sequence encapsulates a careful and ingenious demonstration of the LRS (linear recurrence sequences)/DEMR (division in the extreme mean ratio relation), that this knowledge results from general combinatorial analysis, and is reflected in elements emphasized in ancient Chinese and Western mathematical traditions. ^[15]

Divination[edit source | editbeta]

Main article: I Ching divination

In imperial China the I Ching had two distinct functions. The first was as a compendium and classic of ancient cosmic principles. The second function was that of divination text. As a divination text the world of the I Ching was that of the marketplace fortune teller and roadside oracle. These individuals served the illiterate peasantry. The educated Confucian elite in China were of an entirely different disposition. The future results of our actions were a function of our personal virtues. The Confucian literati actually had little use for the I Ching as a work of divination. In the collected works of the countless educated literati of ancient China there are actually few references to the I Ching as a divination text. Any eyewitness account of traditional Chinese society, such as S. Wells Williams The Middle Kingdom, and many others, can clarify this very basic distinction. Williams tells us of the I Ching, "The hundreds of fortune- tellers seen in the streets of Chinese towns, whose answers to their perplexed customers are more or less founded on these cabala, indicate their influence among the illiterate; while among scholars, who have long since conceded all divination to be vain..". (The Middle Kingdom, vol. 1, p. 632)

Symbolism[edit source | editbeta]

The flag of South Korea, with Taegeuk in the centre with four trigrams representing Heaven, Water, Earth, and Fire (beginning top left and proceeding clockwise).

Flag of the Empire of Vietnam used Trigram Li – Fire

The Flag of South Korea contains the Taiji symbol, or tàijítú, (yin and yang in dynamic balance, called taegeuk in Korean), representing the origin of all things in the universe. The taegeuk is surrounded by four of the eight trigrams, starting from top left and going clockwise: Heaven, Water, Earth, Fire. In addition, the Republic of Korea Air Force aircraft roundel incorporates the Taiji in conjunction with the trigrams representing Heaven.

The flag of the Empire of Vietnam used the Li (Fire) trigram and was known as cờ quẻ Ly (Li trigram flag) because the trigram represents South. Its successor the Republic of Vietnam connected the middle lines, turning it into the Qián (Heaven) trigram. (see Flag of the Republic of Vietnam).

Influence[edit source | editbeta]

Main article: I Ching's influence

The I Ching has influenced countless Chinese philosophers, artists and even businesspeople throughout history. In more recent times, several Western artists and thinkers have used it in fields as diverse as psychoanalysis, music, film, drama, dance, eschatology, and fiction writing.^[16]

Prior to the Tokugawa period (1603–1868 CE) in Japan, the I Ching was little known and used mostly for divination until Buddhist monks popularized the Chinese classic for its philosophical, cultural and political merits in other literate groups such as the samurai.^[17] The Hagakure, a collection of commentaries on the Way of the Warrior, cautions against mistaking it for a work of divination.^[18]

Commentary[edit source | editbeta]

Chinese civilization, as with early Western civilization, accepted various pre-scientific explanations of natural events, and the I Ching has been cited as an example of this. As a manual of divination it interpreted natural events through readings based on symbols expressed in the trigrams and hexagrams. Thus any observation in nature could be interpreted as to its significance and cause. This might be compared to the Roman practice of basing decisions on the state of animals' livers. While usually sympathetic to the claims of Chinese culture and science, Joseph Needham, in his second volume of Science and Civilization in China (p. 311) stated: "Yet really they [Han dynasty scholars] would have been wiser to tie a millstone about the neck of the I Ching and cast it into the sea".^[19]

Abraham (1999) states that Confucius' ten commentaries, called the Ten Wings, transformed the I Ching from a divination text into a "philosophical masterpiece". It was this form of the I Ching that inspired the post-Warring States Taoists. It has influenced Confucians and other philosophers and scientists ever since.^[20] However, Helmut Wilhelm in his Change/Eight Lectures on the I Ching, cautions: "It can no longer be said with certainty whether any of the material—and if any, how much—comes from Confucius' own hand".^[21]

Translations[edit source | editbeta]

[show]
Part of a series on
Taoism

Fundamentals

Dao (Tao) · De
Wuji · Taiji
Yin-Yang · Wu xing
Qi · Neidan
Wu wei

Texts

I Ching
Laozi (Tao Te Ching)
Zhuangzi · Liezi
Daozang

Deities

Three Pure Ones
Guan Shengdi
Eight Immortals
Yellow Emperor · Xiwangmu
Jade Emperor · Chang'e
Other deities

People

Laozi · Zhuangzi
Zhang Daoling · Zhang Jue
Ge Hong · Chen Tuan
Wang Chongyang

Schools

Five Pecks of Rice
Celestial Masters
Shangqing · Lingbao
Quanzhen · Zhengyi
Xuanxue

Sacred sites

Grotto-heavens

---

• v
• t
• e

There are hundreds of translations of the I Ching into English alone, to say nothing of translations and commentaries into almost every language of the world.^[22] The following is only a selection.

English

• Anthony, Carol K. and Moog, Hanna. (2002). I Ching: The Oracle of the Cosmic Way. Stow, MA: Anthony Publishing Company, Inc., ISBN 1-890764-00-0.
• Balkin, Jack M. (2002). The Laws of Change: I Ching and the Philosophy of Life. New York: Schocken Books. ISBN 0-8052-4199-X.
• Barrett, Hilary. (2010). Walking your path, creating your future. London: Arcturus Publishing Limited. ISBN 978-1-84837-453-9.
• Benson, Robert G. (2003). I Ching for a New Age: The Book of Answers for Changing Times. New York: Square One Publishers.
• Blofeld, J. (1965). The Book of Changes: A New Translation of the Ancient Chinese I Ching. New York: E. P. Dutton.
• Cornelius, J. Edward and Cornelius, Marlene (1998). Yî King: A Beastly Book of Changes, Red Flame: A Thelemic Research Journal, Issue 5. Aleister Crowley's notes and comments.
• Huang, Alfred (1998). The Complete I Ching: the Definitive Translation From the Taoist Master Alfred Huang. Rochester, VT: Inner Traditions.
• Hua-Ching Ni (2nd ed. 1999). I Ching: The Book of Changes and the Unchanging Truth. Los Angeles: Seven Star Communications.
• Karcher, Stephen (2002). I Ching: The Classic Chinese Oracle of Change: The First Complete Translation with Concordance. London: Vega Books. ISBN 1-84333-003-2. Multiple alternative translations.
• Legge, James (1964). I Ching: Book of Changes, With introduction and study guide by Ch'u Chai and Winberg Chai. New York: Citadel Press. Reprint of 1899 century translation. A "highly literal" translation which reflected 19th-century Chinese interpretations and remained the "standard English language version until the mid-twentieth century." ^[23]
• Lynn, Richard J. (1994). The Classic of Changes, A New Translation of the I Ching as Interpreted by Wang Bi. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN 0-231-08294-0.
• McClatchie, Thomas (1876). A Translation of the Confucian Yi-king. Shanghai: American Presbyterian Mission Press.
• Pearson, Margaret (2011). The Original I Ching: An Authentic Translation of the Book of Changes. Rutland, VT: Tuttle Publishing. ISBN 978-0-8048-4181-8. Removes gender-based yin/yang abstractions added by later Chinese commentators that do not exist in the original.
• Ritsema, Rudolf and Karcher, Stephen (1994). I Ching: The Classic Chinese Oracle of Change: The First Complete Translation with Concordance. Shaftesbury, Dorset, Element.
• Shaughnessy, Edward L. (1996). I Ching, The Classic of Changes. Ballantine. New York: ISBN 0-345-36243-8. First English translation of the Mawangdui texts (c. 200 BCE).
• Wilhelm, Richard and Baynes, Cary (1967). The I Ching or Book of Changes, With foreword by Carl Jung. 3rd. ed., Bollingen Series XIX. Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press (1st ed. 1950). Very well respected.
• Wu Wei (revised 2005). I Ching, The Book Of Answers. Malibu, CA: Power Press. ISBN 0-943015-41-3.
• Cheng Yi (1988, 2003). I Ching: The Book of Change, Trans. by Thomas Cleary. Boston, London: Shambhala Publications. ISBN 1-59030-015-7.

Latin

• Régis, P. Jean-Baptiste (1736). Y-King: Antiquissimus Sinarum Liber quem ex Latina Interpretatione. Stuttgart, Tübingen: Cotta, 1834, 1839.

Other languages

• Bashar Abdulah's first Arabic translation [4] of the Chinese most important philosophical book "Book of Changes" or ICHING, by Dar Fadaat Publishing House, Amman Jordan, 2008. ISBN 978-9957-30-043-2

See also[edit source | editbeta]

• Ba gua
• Da Liu Ren
• Feng Shui
• Lingqijing
• Qi Men Dun Jia
• T'ai chi ch'uan
• Yin and yang

Footnotes[edit source | editbeta]

1. ^ Wilhelm, R. I Ching Introduction. English translation by Cary F. Baynes; HTML edition by Dan Baruth. Retrieved on: January 20, 2008.
2. ^ O'Brien, Paul (2007). Divination: Sacred Tools for Reading the Mind of God. Visionary Networks Press. p. 92. ISBN 0-9795425-0-2. 
3. ^ Stamps, Jeffrey (1980). Holonomy: A Human Systems Theory. Jeffrey Stamps. p. 207. ISBN 0-914105-17-5. 
4. ^ Clark, Peter Bernard (2006). Encyclopedia of new religious movements. Psychology Press. p. 290. ISBN 0-415-26707-2. "I Ching was discovered and written down by a series of legendary culture heroes, Fu Hsi, King Wen...towards the end of the second millennium BCE, with commentaries later added by Confucius (551–479 BCE). Modern sinological scholarship suggests that the earliest layers of the text may indeed date from this period and that they did subsequently receive a Confucian reinterpretation. However, there is no evidence that any of the above mentioned culture heroes or sages had anything directly to do with it." 
5. ^ Hans Steininger (1971). in Bleeker, C. J. and G. Widengren, ed., Historia Religionum, Volume 2 Religions of the Present. Brill Academic Publishers. p. 478. ISBN 90-04-02598-7. "Most probably the oldest extant book of divination in the world, dating back to 1,000 BCE, and before." 
6. ^ ^{a b} Balkin, J. M. (2002). The laws of change: I ching and the philosophy of life. Schocken Books. p. 84. ISBN 0-8052-4199-X. 
7. ^ A. Terrien de la Couperie, "China and the Chinese: Their Early History and Future Prospects," Society of Arts (Great Britain) (1879). Journal of the Society of Arts, Volume 28. The Society. p. 731. Retrieved 2011-07-13. 
8. ^ Woolf, Daniel (2011). A Global History of History. Cambridge University Press. p. 55. ISBN 0521875757. "Significant Chinese thinking about the past can be traced back to ancient canonical text such as the Yijing (or I Ching, 'Book of Changes'), which reached a definitive form about the end of the second millennium BC." 
9. ^ Shih-chuan Chen: (1972). "How to Form a Hexagram and Consult the I Ching". Journal of the American Oriental Society, 92:2 (April–June). pp. 237–249. 
10. ^ "The Oracle: Journal of Yijing Studies, Vol. 2, No. 9 (August 1999)". 1999. pp. 43–45. Retrieved 19 May 2010. 
11. ^ "Yijing Dao – Probabilities with coins and yarrow stalks". 4 January 2010. Retrieved 19 May 2010. 
12. ^ Wilhelm, R. & Baynes, C., (1967): "The I Ching or Book of Changes", With foreword by Carl Jung, Introduction, Bollingen Series XIX, Princeton University Press, (1st ed. 1950)
13. ^ Unicode Charts
14. ^ Leibniz G., Explication de l'Arithmétique Binaire, Mathematischen Schriften, ed. C. Gerhardt, Berlin 1879, vol.7, p.223; engl. transl.[1])
15. ^ Cook, Richard S. (2006). STEDT Monograph 5: Classical Chinese Combinatorics: Derivation of the I Ching Hexagram Sequence. ISBN 0-944613-44-6.
16. ^ Nylan, M. (2001). The Five Confucian 'Classics'. Yale University Press. 204, 206. ISBN 978-0-300-08185-5. The I Ching's influence is summarized by Nylan, as follows: "Outside China, the Changes is without doubt the best-known Chinese book, in addition to being the most familiar of the five classics. Beginning with Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz (1646–1716) and continuing through Carl Jung (1875–1961) and Joseph Needham (1900–1995), the work has had considerable influence on intellectuals in Europe and America, who have mined it for alternate theories of structural change in the natural world".
17. ^ Wai-ming Ng (2000). The I ching in Tokugawa thought and culture. University of Hawaii Press. pp. 6–7. ISBN 978-0-8248-2242-2. Retrieved 6 June 2010. 
18. ^ Yamamoto Tsunetomo; William Scott Wilson (trans.) (21 November 2002). Hagakure: the book of the samurai. Kodansha International. p. 144. ISBN 978-4-7700-2916-4. Retrieved 6 June 2010. 
19. ^ Snow, Eric. (June 27, 1999) "Christianity: A Cause of Modern Science?". Retrieved on: February 16, 2008
20. ^ Abraham, Ralph H. (1999) Commentaries on the I Ching. Chapter 1 Legendary History. Retrieved on: February 15, 2008
21. ^ Wilhelm, H. (1973) Change: Eight Lectures On The I Ching., p. 12. Princeton: Princeton University Press, Translated into English from the German by Cary F. Baynes.
22. ^ For discussions of the translations into English, see David Knechtges, "THE PERILS AND PLEASURES OF TRANSLATION: THE CASE OF THE CHINESE CLASSICS" [2], a scholarly discussion and history of translations into Western languages, and Chapter 5, "The Westward Travels of the Changes, in Richard J. Smith, The I Ching: A Biography (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2012), a discussion for general readers.
23. ^ Smith, The I Ching: A Biography p. 184-85.

References[edit source | editbeta]

• Marshall, S. J. (2001). The Mandate of Heaven: Hidden History in the I Ching. Columbia University Press. ISBN 0-231-12299-3
• Reifler, Samuel. (1974). "I Ching: A New Interpretation for Modern Times". Bantam New Age Books. ISBN 0-553-27873-8
• Rutt, R. (1996). Zhouyi: The Book of Changes. Curzon Press.
• Shaughnessy, Edward L. (1993). "I ching 易經 (Chou I 周易) ", pp. 216–228 in Loewe, Michael (ed.). Early Chinese Texts: A Bibliographical Guide, (Early China Special Monograph Series No. 2), Society for the Study of Early China, and the Institute of East Asian Studies, University of California, Berkeley, ISBN 1-55729-043-1.
• Smith, Richard J. (2008). Fathoming the Cosmos and Ordering the World: The Yijing (I Ching or Classic of Changes) and Its Evolution in China. University of Virginia Press. ISBN 978-0-8139-2705-3
• Smith, Richard J. The I Ching: A Biography. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2012. 278p. ISBN 9780691145099.
• Smith, Richard J., "Some Western-Language Works on the Yijing, Topically Organized: An Online Guide for Students," Education About Asia 8.2 (Fall 2003). Extensive annotated bibliography.

External links[edit source | editbeta]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: I Ching

Chinese Wikisource has original text related to this article: 周易

Wikiversity has learning materials about I Ching oracle

• ‹The template En is being considered for merging.› (English)/(French) Wilhelm, Baynes “The I Ching or Book of Changes” (Association Française des Professeurs de Chinois)
• Yi Jing at the Chinese Text Project
• I Ching: An Annotated Bibliography by Hacker et al.
• I Ching at the Open Directory Project
• I Ching: deoxy.org
• Chujian Zhouyi
• I Ching - Philosophy and Practice
• Yixue Bibliography general bibliography (multilingual) of Western works on the Yijing

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Ching

Introduction
by Richard Wilhelm

Rendered into English by Cary F. Baynes
HTML Edition by Dan Baruth

The Book of Changes -- I Ching in Chinese -- is unquestionably one of the most important books in the world's literature. Its origin goes back to mythical antiquity, and it has occupied the attention of the most eminent scholars of China down to the present day. Nearly all that is greatest and most significant in the three thousand years of Chinese cultural history has either taken its inspiration from this book, or has exerted an influence on the interpretation of its text. Therefore it may safely be said that the seasoned wisdom of thousands of years has gone into the making of the I Ching. Small wonder then that both of the two branches of Chinese philosophy, Confucianism and Taoism, have their common roots here. The book sheds new light on many a secret hidden in the often puzzling modes of thought of that mysterious sage, Lao-tse, and of his pupils, as well as on many ideas that appear in the Confucian tradition as axioms, accepted without further examination.

Indeed, not only the philosophy of China but its science and statecraft as well have never ceased to draw from the spring of wisdom in the I Ching, and it is not surprising that this alone, among all the Confucian classics, escaped the great burning of the books under Ch'in Shih Huang Ti.^[1] Even the common-places of everyday life in China are saturated with its influence. In going through the streets of a Chinese city, one will find, here and there at a street corner, a fortune teller sitting behind a neatly covered table, brush and tablet at hand, ready to draw from the ancient book of wisdom pertinent counsel and information on life's minor perplexities. Not only that, but the very signboards adorning the houses --perpendicular wooden panels done in gold on black lacquer -- are covered with inscriptions whose flowery language again and again recalls thoughts and quotations from the I Ching. Even the policy makers of so modern a state as Japan, distinguished for their astuteness, do not scorn to refer to it for counsel in difficult situations.

In the course of time, owing to the great repute for wisdom attaching to the Book of Changes, a large body of occult doctrines extraneous to it -- some of them possibly not even Chinese in origin -- have come to be connected with its teachings. The Ch'in and Han dynasties^[2] saw the beginning of a formalistic natural philosophy that sought to embrace the entire world of thought in a system of number symbols. Combining a rigorously consistent, dualistic yin-yang doctrine with the doctrine of the "five stages of change" taken from the Book of History,^[3] it forced Chinese philosophical thinking more and more into a rigid formalization. Thus increasingly hairsplitting cabalistic speculations came to envelop the Book of Changes in a cloud of mystery, and by forcing everything of the past and of the future into this system of numbers, created for the I Ching the reputation of being a book of unfathomable profundity. These speculations are also to blame for the fact that the seeds of a free Chinese natural science, which undoubtedly existed at the time of Mo Ti^[4] and his pupils, were killed, and replaced by a sterile tradition of writing and reading books that was wholly removed from experience. This is the reason why China has for so long presented to Western eyes a picture of hopeless stagnation.

Yet we must not overlook the fact that apart from this mechanistic number mysticism, a living stream of deep human wisdom was constantly flowing through the channel of this book into everyday life, giving to China's great civilization that ripeness of wisdom, distilled through the ages, which we wistfully admire in the remnants of this last truly autochthonous culture.

What is the Book of Changes actually? In order to arrive at an understanding of the book and its teachings, we must first of all boldly strip away the dense overgrowth of interpretations that have read into it all sorts of extraneous ideas. This is equally necessary whether we are dealing with the superstitions and mysteries of old Chinese sorcerers or the no less superstitious theories of modern European scholars who try to interpret all historical cultures in terms of their experience of primitive savages.^[5] We must hold here to the fundamental principle that the Book of Changes is to be explained in the light of its own content and of the era to which it belongs. With this the darkness lightens perceptibly and we realize that this book, though a very profound work, does not offer greater difficulties to our understanding than any other book that has come down through a long history from antiquity to our time.

1. THE USE OF THE BOOK OF CHANGES

The Book of Oracles

At the outset, the Book of Changes was a collection of linear signs to be used as oracles.^[6] In antiquity, oracles were everywhere in use; the oldest among them confined themselves to the answers yes and no. This type of oracular pronouncement is likewise the basis of the Book of Changes. "Yes" was indicated by a simple unbroken line (^___), and "No" by a broken line (^{_ _}). However, the need for greater differentiation seems to have been felt at an early date, and the single lines were combined in pairs:

To each of these combinations a third line was then added. In this way the eight trigrams^[7] came into being. These eight trigrams were conceived as images of all that happens in heaven and on earth. At the same time, they were held to be in a state of continual transition, one changing into another, just as transition from one phenomenon to another is continually taking place in the physical world. Here we have the fundamental concept of the Book of Changes. The eight trigrams are symbols standing for changing transitional states; they are images that are constantly undergoing change. Attention centers not on things in their state of being -- as is chiefly the case in the Occident -- but upon their movements in change. The eight trigrams therefore are not representations of things as such but of their tendencies in movement.

These eight images came to have manifold meanings. They represented certain processes in nature corresponding with their inherent character. Further, they represented a family consisting of father, mother, three sons, and three daughters, not in the mythological sense in which the Greek gods peopled Olympus, but in what might be called an abstract sense, that is, they represented not objective entities but functions.

A brief survey of these eight symbols that form the basis of the Book of Changes yields the following classification:

Symbol	Name	Attribute	Image	Family Relationship
Ch'ien	the Creative	strong	heaven	father
K'un	the Receptive	devoted, yielding	earth	mother
Ch�n	the Arousing	inciting, movement	thunder	first son
K'an	the Abysmal	dangerous	water	second son
K�n	Keeping Still	resting	mountain	third son
Sun	the Gentle	penetrating	wind, wood	first daughter
Li	the Clinging	light-giving	fire	second daughter
Tui	the Joyous	joyful	lake	third daughter

The sons represent the principle of movement in its various stages -- beginning of movement, danger in movement, rest and completion of movement. The daughters represent devotion in its various stages -- gentle penetration, clarity and adaptability, and joyous tranquility.

In order to achieve a still greater multiplicity, these eight images were combined with one another at a very early date, whereby a total of sixty-four signs was obtained. Each of these sixty-four signs consists of six lines, either positive or negative. Each line is thought of as capable of change, and whenever a line changes, there is a change also of the situation represented by the given hexagram. Let us take for example the hexagram K'un, THE RECEPTIVE, earth:

It represents the nature of the earth, strong in devotion; among the seasons it stands for late autumn, when all the forces of life are at rest. If the lowest line changes, we have the hexagram Fu, RETURN:

The latter represents thunder, the movement that stirs anew within the earth at the time of the solstice; it symbolizes the return of light.

As this example shows, all of the lines of a hexagram do not necessarily change; it depends entirely on the character of a given line. A line whose nature is positive, with an increasing dynamism, turns into its opposite, a negative line, whereas a positive line of lesser strength remains unchanged. The same principle holds for the negative lines.

More definite information about those lines which are to be considered so strongly charged with positive or negative energy that they move, is given in book II^[*] in the Great Commentary (pt. I, chap. IX), and in the special section on the use of the oracle at the end of book III^[*]. Suffice it to say here that positive lines that move are designated by the number 9, and negative lines that move by the number 6, while non-moving lines, which serve only as structural matter in the hexagram, without intrinsic meaning of their own, are represented by the number 7 (positive) or the number 8 (negative). Thus, when the text reads, "Nine at the beginning means..." this is the equivalent of saying: "When the positive line in the first place is represented by the number 9, it has the following meaning..." If, on the other hand, the line is represented by the number 7, it is disregarded in interpreting the oracle. The same principle holds for lines represented by the numbers 6 and 8^[8] respectively.

We may obtain the hexagram named in the example above -- K'un, THE RECEPTIVE -- in the following form:

8 at the top
8 in the fifth place
8 in the fourth place
8 in the third place
8 in the second place
6 at the beginning

Hence the five upper lines are not taken into account; only the 6 at the beginning has an independent meaning, and by its transformation into its opposite, the situation K'un, THE RECEPTIVE,

becomes the situation Fu, RETURN:

In this way we have a series of situations symbolically expressed by lines, and through the movement of these lines the situations can change one into another. On the other hand, such change does not necessarily occur, for when a hexagram is made up of lines represented by the numbers 7 and 8 only, there is no movement within it, and only its aspect as a whole is taken into consideration.

In this way we have a series of situations symbolically expressed by lines, and through the movement of these lines the situations can change one into another. On the other hand, such change does not necessarily occur, for when a hexagram is made up of lines represented by the numbers 7 and 8 only, there is no movement within it, and only its aspect as a whole is taken into consideration.

In addition to the law of change and to the images of the states of change as given in the sixty-four hexagrams, another factor to be considered is the course of action. Each situation demands the action proper to it. In every situation, there is a right and a wrong course of action. Obviously, the right course brings good fortune and the wrong course brings misfortune. Which, then, is the right course in any given case? This question was the decisive factor. As a result, the I Ching was lifted above the level of an ordinary book of soothsaying. If a fortune teller on reading the cards tells her client that she will receive a letter with money from America in a week, there is nothing for the woman to do but wait until the letter comes -- or does not come. In this case what is foretold is fate, quite independent of what the individual may do or not do. For this reason fortune telling lacks moral significance. When it happened for the first time in China that someone, on being told the auguries for the future, did not let the matter rest there hut asked, "What am I to do?" the book of divination had to become a book of wisdom.

It was reserved for King Wên, who lived about 1150 B.C., and his son, the Duke of Chou, to bring about this change. They endowed the hitherto mute hexagrams and lines, from which the future had to be divined as an individual matter in each case, with definite counsels for correct conduct. Thus the individual came to share in shaping fate. For his actions intervened as determining factors in world events, the more decisively so, the earlier he was able with the aid of the Book of Changes to recognize situations in their germinal phases. The germinal phase is the crux. As long as things are in their beginnings they can be controlled, but once they have grown to their full consequences they acquire a power so overwhelming that man stands impotent before them. Thus the Book of Changes became a book of divination of a very special kind. The hexagrams and lines in their movements and changes mysteriously reproduced the movements and changes of the macrocosm. By the use of yarrow stalks,^[9] one could attain a point of vantage from which it was possible to survey the condition of things. Given this perspective, the words of the oracle would indicate what should be done to meet the need of the time.

The only thing about all this that seems strange to our modern sense is the method of learning the nature of a situation through the manipulation of yarrow stalks. This procedure was regarded as mysterious, however, simply in the sense that the manipulation of the yarrow stalks makes it possible for the unconscious in man to become active. All individuals are not equally fitted to consult the oracle. It requires a clear and tranquil mind, receptive to the cosmic influences hidden in the humble divining stalks. As products of the vegetable kingdom, these were considered to be related to the sources of life. The stalks were derived from sacred plants.

The Book of Wisdom

Of far greater significance than the use of the Book of Changes as an oracle is its other use, namely, as a book of wisdom. Laotse^[10] knew this book, and some of his profoundest aphorisms were inspired by it. Indeed, his whole thought is permeated with its teachings. Confucius^[11] too knew the Book of Changes and devoted himself to reflection upon it. He probably wrote down some of his interpretative comments and imparted others to his pupils in oral teaching. The Book of Changes as edited and annotated by Confucius is the version that has come down to our time.

If we inquire as to the philosophy that pervades the book, we can confine ourselves to a few basically important concepts. The underlying idea of the whole is the idea of change. It is related in the Analects^[12] that Confucius, standing by a river, said: "Everything flows on and on like this river, without pause, day and night." This expresses the idea of change. He who has perceived the meaning of change fixes his attention no longer on transitory individual things but on the immutable, eternal law at work in all change. This law is the tao^[13] of Lao-tse, the course of things, the principle of the one in the many. That it may become manifest, a decision, a postulate, is necessary. This fundamental postulate is the "great primal beginning" of all that exists, t'ai chi -- in its original meaning, the "ridgepole." Later Chinese philosophers devoted much thought to this idea of a primal beginning. A still earlier beginning, wu chi, was represented by the symbol of a circle. Under this conception, t'ai chi was represented by the circle divided into the light and the dark, yang and yin, . ^[14]

This symbol has also played a significant part in India and Europe. However, speculations of a gnostic-dualistic character are foreign to the original thought of the I Ching; what it posits is simply the ridgepole, the line. With this line, which in itself represents oneness, duality comes into the world, for the line at the same time posits an above and a below, a right and left, front and back-in a word, the world of the opposites.

These opposites became known under the names yin and yang and created a great stir, especially in the transition period between the Ch'in and Han dynasties, in the centuries just before our era, when there was an entire school of yin-yang doctrine. At that time, the Book of Changes was much in use as a book of magic, and people read into the text all sorts of things not originally there. This doctrine of yin and yang, of the female and the male as primal principles, has naturally also attracted much attention among foreign students of Chinese thought. Following the usual bent, some of these have predicated in it a primitive phallic symbolism, with all the accompanying connotations.

To the disappointment of such discoverers it must be said that there is nothing to indicate this in the original meaning of the words yin and yang. In its primary meaning yin is "the cloudy," "the overcast," and yang means actually "banners waving in the sun,"^[15] that is, something "shone upon," or bright. By transference the two concepts were applied to the light and dark sides of a mountain or of a river. In the case of a mountain the southern is the bright side and the northern the dark side, while in the case of a river seen from above, it is the northern side that is bright (yang), because it reflects the light, and the southern side that is in shadow (yin). Thence the two expressions were carried over into the Book of Changes and applied to the two alternating primal states of being. It should be pointed out, however, that the terms yin and yang do not occur in this derived sense either in the actual text of the book or in the oldest commentaries. Their first occurrence is in the Great Commentary, which already shows Taoistic influence in some parts. In the Commentary on the Decision the terms used for the opposites are "the firm" and "the yielding," not yang and yin.

However, no matter what names are applied to these forces, it is certain that the world of being arises out of their change and interplay. Thus change is conceived of partly as the continuous transformation of the one force into the other and partly as a cycle of complexes of phenomena, in themselves connected, such as day and night, summer and winter. Change is not meaningless -- if it were, there could be no knowledge of it -- but subject to the universal law, tao.

The second theme fundamental to the Book of Changes is its theory of ideas. The eight trigrams are images not so much of objects as of states of change. This view is associated with the concept expressed in the teachings of Lao-tse, as also in those of Confucius, that every event in the visible world is the effect of an "image," that is, of an idea in the unseen world. Accordingly, everything that happens on earth is only a reproduction, as it were, of an event in a world beyond our sense perception, as regards its occurrence in time, it is later than the suprasensible event. The holy men and sages, who are in contact with those higher spheres, have access to these ideas through direct intuition and are therefore able to intervene decisively in events in the world. Thus man is linked with heaven, the suprasensible world of ideas, and with earth, the material world of visible things, to form with these a trinity of the primal powers.

This theory of ideas is applied in a twofold sense. The Book of Changes shows the images of events and also the unfolding of conditions in statu nascendi. Thus, in discerning with its help the seeds of things to come, we learn to foresee the future as well as to understand the past. In this way the images on which the hexagrams are based serve as patterns for timely action in the situations indicated. Not only is adaptation to the course of nature thus made possible, but in the Great Commentary (pt. II, chap. II), an interesting attempt is made to trace back the origin of all the practices and inventions of civilization to such ideas and archetypal images. Whether or not the hypothesis can be made to apply in all specific instances, the basic concept contains a truth.^[16]

The third element fundamental to the Book of Changes are the judgments. The judgments clothe the images in words, as it were; they indicate whether a given action will bring good fortune or misfortune, remorse or humiliation. The judgments make it possible for a man to make a decision to desist from a course of action indicated by the situation of the moment but harmful in the long run. In this way he makes himself independent of the tyranny of events. In its judgments, and in the interpretations attached to it from the time of Confucius on the Book of Changes opens to the reader the richest treasure of Chinese wisdom; at the same time it affords him a comprehensive view of the varieties of human experience, enabling him thereby to shape his life of his own sovereign will into an organic whole and so to direct it that it comes into accord with the ultimate tao lying at the root of all that exists.

2. THE HISTORY OF THE BOOK OF CHANGES

In Chinese literature four holy men are cited as the authors of the Book of Changes, namely, Fu Hsi, King Wên, the Duke of Chou, and Confucius. Fu Hsi is a legendary figure representing the era of hunting and fishing and of the invention of cooking. The fact that he is designated as the inventor of the linear signs of the Book of Changes means that they have been held to be of such antiquity that they antedate historical memory. Moreover, the eight trigrams have names that do not occur in any other connection in the Chinese language, and because of this they have even been thought to be of foreign origin. At all events, they are not archaic characters, as some have been led to believe by the half accidental, half intentional resemblances to them appearing here and there among ancient characters.^[17]

The eight trigrams are found occurring in various combinations at a very early date. Two collections belonging to antiquity are mentioned: first, the Book of Changes of the Hsia dynasty,^[18] is called Lien Shan, which is said to have begun with the hexagram Kên, KEEPING STILL, mountain; second, the Book of Changes dating from the Shang dynasty,^[19] is entitled Kuei Ts'ang, which began with the hexagram K'un, THE RECEPTIVE. The latter circumstance is mentioned in passing by Confucius himself as a historical fact. It is difficult to say whether the names of the sixty-four hexagrams were then in existence, and if so, whether they were the same as those in the present Book of Changes.

According to general tradition, which we have no reason to challenge, the present collection of sixty-four hexagrams originated with King Wên,^[20] progenitor of the Chou dynasty. He is said to have added brief judgments to the hexagrams during his imprisonment at the hands of the tyrant Chou Hsin. The text pertaining to the individual lines originated with his son, the Duke of Chou. This form of the book, entitled the Changes of Chou (Chou I), was in use as an oracle throughout the Chou period, as can be proven from a number of the ancient historical records.

This was the status of the book at the time Confucius came upon it. In his old age he gave it intensive study, and it is highly probable that the Commentary on the Decision (T'uan Chuan) is his work. The Commentary on the Images also goes back to him, though less directly. A third treatise, a very valuable and detailed commentary on the individual lines, compiled by his pupils or by their successors, in the form of questions and answers, survives only in fragments.^[21]

Among the followers of Confucius, it would appear, it was principally Pu Shang (Tzú Hsia) who spread the knowledge of the Book of Changes. With the development of philosophical speculation, as reflected in the Great Learning (Ta Hsüeh) and the Doctrine of the Mean (Chung Yung),^[22] this type of philosophy exercised an ever increasing influence upon the interpretation of the Book of Changes. A literature grew up around the book, fragments of which -- some dating from an early and some from a later time -- are to be found in the so-called Ten Wings. They differ greatly with respect to content and intrinsic value.

The Book of Changes escaped the fate of the other classics at the time of the famous burning of the books under the tyrant Ch'in Shih Huang Ti. Hence, if there is anything in the legend that the burning alone is responsible for the mutilation of the texts of the old books, the I Ching at least should be intact; but this is not the case. In reality it is the vicissitudes of the centuries, the collapse of ancient cultures, and the change in the system of writing that are to be blamed for the damage suffered by all ancient works.

The Book of Changes escaped the fate of the other classics at the time of the famous burning of the books under the tyrant Ch'in Shih Huang Ti. Hence, if there is anything in the legend that the burning alone is responsible for the mutilation of the texts of the old books, the I Ching at least should be intact; but this is not the case. In reality it is the vicissitudes of the centuries, the collapse of ancient cultures, and the change in the system of writing that are to be blamed for the damage suffered by all ancient works.

After the Book of Changes had become firmly established as a book of divination and magic in the time of Ch'in Shih Huang Ti, the entire school of magicians (fang shih) of the Ch'in and Han dynasties made it their prey. And the yin-yang doctrine, which was probably introduced through the work of Tsou Yen,^[23] and later promoted by Tung Chung Shu, Liu Hsin, and Liu Hsiang,^[24] ran riot in connection with the interpretation of the I Ching.

The task of clearing away all this rubbish was reserved for a great and wise scholar, Wang Pi,^[25] who wrote about the meaning of the Book of Changes as a book of wisdom, not as a book of divination. He soon found emulation, and the teachings of the yin-yang school of magic were displaced, in relation to the book, by a philosophy of statecraft that was gradually developing. In the Sung^[26] period, the I Ching was used as a basis for the t'ai chi t'u doctrine -- which was probably not of Chinese origin -- until the appearance of the elder Ch'êng Tzú's^[27] very good commentary. It had become customary to separate the old commentaries contained in the Ten Wings and to place them with the individual hexagrams to which they refer. Thus the book became by degrees entirely a textbook relating to statecraft and the philosophy of life. Then Chu Hsi^[28] attempted to rehabilitate it as a book of oracles; in addition to a short and precise commentary on the I Ching, he published an introduction to his investigations concerning the art of divination.

The critical-historical school of the last dynasty also took the Book of Changes in hand. However, because of their opposition to the Sung scholars and their preference for the Han commentators, who were nearer in point of time to the compilation of the Book of Changes, they were less successful here than in their treatment of the other classics. For the Han commentators were in the last analysis sorcerers, or were influenced by theories of magic. A very good edition was arranged in the K'ang Hsi^[29] period, under the title Chou I Chê Chung; it presents the text and the wings separately and includes the best commentaries of all periods. This is the edition on which the present translation is based.

R.W.

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[*] Richard Wilhelm's translation of the I Ching includes three books: Book I -- The Text, Book II -- The Material, and Book III -- The Commentaries. My computerized version includes (currently) only The Text.
[1] 215 B.C.
[2] Beginning in the last half of the third century B.C. and ending about A.D. 220.
[3] Sho Ching, the oldest of the Chinese classics. Modern scholarship has placed most of the records contained in the Shu Ching near the first millennium B.C., though formerly a much greater age was ascribed to the earliest of them.
[4] Fifth and fourth centuries B.C.
[5] We might mention here, because of its oddity, the grotesque and amateurish attempt on the part of Rev. Canon McClatchie, M.A., to apply the key of "comparative mythology" to the I Ching. His book was published in 1876 under the title, A Translation of the Confucian Yi King or the Clossic of Changes, with Notes and Appendix.
[6] From the discussion here presented, it will become self-evident that the Book of Changes was not a lexicon, as has been assumed in many quarters.
[7] Zeichen, meaning sign, is used by Wilhelm to denote the linear figures in the I Ching, those of three lines as well as those of six lines. The Chinese word for both types of signs is kua. To avoid ambiguity, the precedent established by Legge (The Sacred Books of the East, XVI: The Yi King) has been adopted througout: the term "trigram" is used for the sign consisting of three lines, and "hexagram" for the sign consisting of six lines.
[8] For this reason, the numbers 7 and 8 ,never appear in the portion of the text dealing with the meanings of the individual lines.
[9] The stalks come from the plant known to us as common yarrow, or milfoil (Achillea millefelium).
[10] Second half of fifth century B.C.
[11] 551-479 B.C.
[12] Lun Yü, IX, 16. This book comprises conversations of Confucius and his disciples.
[13] Here, as throughout the book, Wilhelm uses the German word Sinn ("meaning") in capitals (SINN) for the Chinese word tao (see p.297 and n. 1). The reasons that led Wilhelm to choose SINN to represent tao (see p. XIV of the introduction to his translation of Lao-tse: Tao Te King: Das Buch des Alten von Sinn und Leben, 3rd edn., Düsseldorf and Cologne, 1952) have no relation to the English word "meaning." Therefore in the English rendering, "tao" has been used wherever SINN occurs.
[14] Known as t'ai chi t'u, "the supreme ultimate." See R. Wilhelm, A Short History of Chinese Civilization, tr. by J. Joshua (London, 1929), p.249.
[15] Cf. the noteworthy discussions of Liang Ch'i-ch'ao in the Chinese journal The Endeavor, July 15 and 22, 1923, also the English essay by B. Schindler, "The Development of the Chinese Conceptions of Supreme Beings," Asia Major, Hirth Anniversary Volume (London: Probsthain, n.d.), pp. 298-366.
[16] Cf. the extremely important discussions of Hu Shih in The Development of the Logical Method in Ancient China (2nd edn., New York: Paragon, 1963), and the even more detailed discussion in the first volume of his history of philosophy [Chung-kuo chê-hsüeh-shih ta-kang; not available in translation].
[17] Question has centered especially upon the trigram K'an (), which resembles the character for water, shui ().
[18] According to tradition, 2205-1766 B.C.
[19] According to tradition, 1766-1150 B.C.
[20] King Wên was the head of a western state that suffered oppression from the house of Shang (Yin). He was given the title of king posthumously by his son Wu, who overthrew Chou Hsin, took possession of the Shang realm, and became the first ruler of the Chou dynasty, which in traditional chronology is dated 115o-249 B.C.
[21] Some are in the section known as the Wên Yen (Commentary on the Words of the Text), some in the Ta Chuan (Great Commentary). [Cf. p. xix.]
[22] The Great Learning presents the Confucian principles concerning the education of the "superior man," based on the view that innate within man are the qualities that when developed guide him to a personal and a social ethic. The Doctrine of the Mean shows that the "way of the superior man" leads to harmony between heaven, man, and earth. Both of these works belong to the school of thought led by Tzú-ssú, grandson of Confucius. They originally formed part of the Li Chi, the Book of Rites. Under the titles Ta Hsio and Kung Yung they can be found as bks. 39 and 28 in Legge's translation of the Book of Rites (The Sacred Books of the East, XXVII: The Li Ki, Oxford, 1885).
[23] Fourth century B.C.
[24] All three are Han scholars.
[25] A..D. 226-249.
[26] A..D. 960-1279.
[27] Ch'êng Hao, A.D. 1032-1085.
[28] A..D. 1130-1200.
[29] A..D. 1662-1722.

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