Trey Smith
A while back, Baroness Radon remarked that she rarely found mention of the I Ching/Yi Jing on this blog and wondered why. For my part, the answer is easy: I've never read it!
My first encounters with the philosophy of Taoism came through the Tao Te Ching, Alan Watts, and, later on, the Zhuangzi. I subsequently tackled the Hua Hu Ching, Wen-Tzu and The Art of War -- all of which have been shared here.
One of the reasons the I Ching wasn't high on my reading list is that several historians and interpreters consider it pre-Taoist. Consequently, I wanted to immerse myself in the classical texts of this ancient philosophy before branching out.
That said, every philosophy is built upon the foundation of what came before and so learning about the I Ching would certainly deepen my understanding. I recently purchased three books featuring translations of the I Ching: I Ching: The Shamanic Oracle of Change by Martin Palmer, Jay Ramsey and Zhao Xiaomin; The Taoist I Ching and I Ching: The Tao of Organization both by Thomas Cleary. I'm sure I will add a few more books to the pile.
So, at some point in the future, I'm sure I will write some posts about the I Ching plus, if I can find an acceptable copy of it on the internet, there's a good chance I will present the text in serialized form once we've completed the Analects of Confucius.
As to why Scott, Ta-Wan and Shawn have not referenced the I Ching, they will need to (if they so desire) answer that themselves.
Here's what Wikipedia has to say as an introduction to the I Ching:
The I Ching (Wade-Giles) or "Yì Jīng" (pinyin), also known as the Classic of Changes, Book of Changes and Zhouyi, is one of the oldest of the Chinese classic texts. 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.In addition to the three aforementioned books on this topic, I also bought another book on Chinese divination: Ling Ch'i Ching: A Classic Chinese Oracle by Ralph Sawyer. At some point, it may prove interesting to note the similarities and dissimilarities between it and the I Ching.
Traditionally, the I Ching and its hexagrams were thought to pre-date recorded history, and based on traditional Chinese accounts, its origins trace back to the 3rd to the 2nd millennium BC. Modern scholarship suggests that the earliest layer of the text may date from the end of the 2nd millennium BC, but place doubts on the mythological aspects in the traditional accounts. Some consider the I Ching' as the oldest extant book of divination, dating from 1,000 BC and before. The oldest manuscript that has been found, albeit incomplete, dates back to the Warring States Period.
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 ancient text (古文經) transmitted by Fei Zhi (费直, c. 50 BC-10 AD) of the Han Dynasty. 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 ancient text version, which survived Qin’s book-burning by being preserved amongst the peasantry, became the accepted norm among Chinese scholars.
Good luck; I may have opened a Pandora's box. There are two other volumes I personally would recomend: the classic Wilhem-Baynes edition,familiar here to anyone of a certain age, mostly for its introduction by Carl Jung; and a little volume called "The Numerology of the I Ching," by Alfred Huang, which you might find interesting, explaining how the hexagrams work. Finally, some of my friends in the qigong/TCM world recommend Hua-Ching Ni's version.
ReplyDeleteI never like to regard the I Ching as a diviination tool; that sounds like prophecy and sorcery. But as a kind of thought therapy it can be very interesting.
when I dabbled in the I Ching I found that the ideas -when this is the position, then this is likely to occur (or other such ideas that when one thing is the case then the opposite will start to move to regain balance) - had value and pointed well to a taoist balanced understanding. Apart from that, nothing that moved me to write.
ReplyDeleteIf someone says "end of the second millenium BC," does he mean around 2999 BC, or 2000 BC? I would think he would mean the latter, but am not sure.
ReplyDeleteBaroness, i'd be interested in knowing what you mean by "thought therapy," and how the I Ching is used for that.
ReplyDelete"end of the second millenium BC,"
ReplyDeleteI don't know but first millennium BC would be 999-0 wouldn't it? So end of the 2nd would be around 1000BC.
"Thought therapy..." oh, that just came to me, so I had to think bout it just now. I mean a little framework within which one can consider one's choices, potential actions, external circumstances, personal proclivities. A little like psychotherapy, a little like the way my astrologer friend uses horoscopes, not for prediction, but for counseling. If you don't have the W-B version, I would recommend it. Jung's introduction is quite interesting.
ReplyDeleteTa Wan, you're right, and exposed a pet peeve of mine, that being the saying of "Xth Century" rather than the "X-hundreds" (that is, saying "20th century" rather than "the 1900s"). I find the former confusing as hell, and always have to convert to the latter.
ReplyDeleteSo yes, I meant to ask whether the end of the 2nd millenium was 1999BC, or 1000 BC? You seem correct, since 1999BC comes before 1000BC, but it's weird going backwards and I wanted to be sure.
Sorry for this ridiculous digression
Thanks Trey for sharing about the I Ching. I want to learn about it and other books too within taoism. This blog is perfect for me, :)
ReplyDelete