Yijing, or The Book of Changes

Yìjīng -- The Book of Changes
 #iching #Book of Changes #Yijing

Yìjīng

(or "I Ching")

Because of the Western preoccupation with Yijing, I've intentionally delayed this discussion.
Is it important to the Daoist tradition? Absolutely. 

Should you read and study it? Again, absolutely. But the Yijing needs context within the tradition, and Daoism is so much more than the rap The Book of Changes gets solely as a divination tool.

(Below, I reproduce the links to resources and introductory comments I make from the first post in this series.

    * The I Ching or Book of Changes, by trans. Richard Wilhelm (from Chinese to German) and Carey Baynes (that German to English), contains the First and Second Wings (Tuàn Zhuàn) by King Wen and the Duke of Zhou, and the Fifth and Sixth Wings (Xiàng Zhuàn) by Confucius. 

    * The Complete I Ching, trans. by Daoist Master Alfred Huang, for the essential Seventh Wing (Wényán Zhuàn) by Confucius. I might add, I prefer this translation of the Yijng these days because it's closest to the intent of the Ames and Howard version of the DaoDeJing.

    * The Living I Ching, trans. by Daoist Master Deng Ming-Dao, because it's perhaps the most readable translation for a modern audience, plus great intro material on Daoism.)

The Yijing is an undoubted primary resource for anyone serious about studying Daoism.)

From my late teenage years and for decades afterwards, my introduction to Daoism came from Richard Wilhelm's The I Ching,  and I didn't realize (because I didn't bother to read all the prefacing "fine print") how much of the Ten Wing's contextualizing explanations Wilhelm had incorporated into his translation. That source material is the primary reason Wilhelm's book remains on my essential reading list from the first posting in this blog series.

But my personal preference, as I mention above, is to rely on the much more recent translations of both Deng Ming-Dao's The Living I Ching and also Alfred Huang's The Complete I Ching, 10th Anniversary Edition. 

Ames & Hall succinctly characterize the intrinsic dynamics for the sequential arrangement of the 64 hexagrams: constituting the core of this important Daoist work:

    "In the Book of Changes, experience itself is defined simply as a succession of yin and yang phases.... This characteristic of experience is ascribed to the natural cyclical movement of qi rather than some supernatural force.
    "...This cosmic unfolding is not 'cyclical' in the sense of reversibility and replication, but is rather a continuing spiral that is always coming back upon itself and yet is ever new" (Laozi's Dao De Jing, 26,27).

Huang notes: "From a mathematical point of view, each symbol [i.e., each hexagram, which Huang refers to by the Chinese word "guà"] is the formula of a changing situation and its consequence. On this ground, as one I Ching scholar points out, one who really masters the I Ching does not necessarily consult the text [i.e., use Changes for divination]" (The Complete I Ching 15)

Nevertheless, Ming-Dao gives this advice about "consulting the oracle"--i.e., the Yijing--as a divination resource: "We contemplate others’ advice, but if we are wise, we make the final decisions ourselves" (The Living I Ching 372).

This is not supernatural hocus-pocus: The Yijing is based on ancient sages' observations of the natural cycles that factor in the wide range of potential archetypal human scenarios, situations, and consequent outcomes. But think of it rather more like consulting a wise grandfather who asks leading questions and suggests generalized advice that you have to figure out how to respond to. 

My own experience with using and studying Yijing is that this resource's real value is less as an oracle and more as a way to understand the way the Dào orchestrates the "game plan" of a Daoist view of reality as well as the rules for navigating that world in order to make life significant.

The next post in this series talks about incorporating what the Yijing offers as a way to navigate the situations in our daily life, and it's all about timing.


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