I Ching
Again and again, when people ask the I Ching what it is, the oracle describes itself as a well of pure water. This well is always there, standing at the centre of the fields and available to everyone. Though generations come and go, and their way of life changes beyond all recognition, the well itself never changes, and its water of truth never runs dry.
How can you reach the water and satisfy your thirst for understanding? To do this yourself, you need to understand the well’s ancient structure and how to use it. If you prefer, you can put the expertise of Clarity to work for you. Whatever you choose, you are invited to make the I Ching’s answers a part of your life - to drink the water from the well.
The I Ching is an extraordinary book, filled with an abundance of beauty and wisdom. It is the world’s oldest oracle, the most ancient and revered book of the Chinese, and at the root of their philosophy and science. The I Ching’s earliest strata were first written down in China some 3,000 years ago, but much of it derives from immeasurably ancient oral traditions. As they compared the oracle received to what people actually experienced, the early Chinese diviners gradually wrote down the oracular judgments of the I Ching. Over the millennia, people consulting the I Ching have added observations and commentaries explaining the patterns of meaning they themselves discovered, so that the I Ching we use now arises from countless generations of observation and wisdom.
This precious water is contained within a beautiful, complex structure, which many people find off-puttingly complicated at first. But being deterred by this is rather like going thirsty because the well’s winding mechanism is a little stiff! It is true that the more you study the I Ching, the more you can gain from consulting it - and it is essential to understand a few basic facts before you start. But the time and effort involved is more than justified by the extraordinary depth and accuracy of the answers.
History
There are basically two versions of the I Ching’s origins: the mythical, and the historical. A few translations of the I Ching still present the mythical version as historical truth, which it is not. And some scholars of the I Ching’s history describe the myth as ‘fraudulent history’ - which it is most definitely not!
The myth of the I Ching’s origins has been accepted as historical truth in China for centuries. It was not until the last century that archaeological discoveries began to reveal a different history of the I Ching. These discoveries are fascinating, and immensely valuable to users of the I Ching for the new light they throw on the meanings of the earliest texts. However, they do not replace the myth, any more than, on a larger scale, scientific understanding of the Big Bang or DNA can replace the kind of understanding we gain from the world’s creation myths. And so I have included both truths about the I Ching’s history. You will notice remarkable correspondences between them.
The Mythical Truth
The story of the I Ching begins with the discovery of the trigrams by Fu Hsi, China’s first, ideal emperor and sage, who reigned from 2852-2737 BC. This truly was a discovery, not a mere invention. Fu Hsi, who observed nature with care and attention, was walking beside the Yellow River when he saw a turtle emerging from the water. Naturally, he watched it closely: as a wise man, he understood that wisdom came from carefully observing nature. Turtles in particular are significant animals in Chinese tradition, for the dome of their shell represents the dome of heaven and their flat lower surface the earth, so a turtle seems to embody the cosmos. On the back of this turtle, Fu Hsi first saw the eight trigrams - symbols that consist of a stack of three lines, either solid or broken. Through studying them along with the natural world around him and within himself, Fu Hsi came to understand how the trigrams reflect basic truths about how energy moves. In so doing, he laid the foundations both for the traditional Chinese world view and for the I Ching.
The I Ching itself was not created from its constituent trigrams for many centuries. But when the last ruler of the Shang dynasty (1766-1122BC) unjustly imprisoned his wise and honest Chou vassal, King Wen (who was given the title of King posthumously), Wen spent his time in prison reflecting on the trigrams, re-arranging them and, crucially, combining them into hexagrams. He also wrote the name for each of the sixty-four hexagrams, and a few lines on their meaning, which we now know as the Judgements.
Eventually, King Wen’s son overthrew the cruel, extravagant Shang and established the new Chou dynasty, which was to persist until 221 BC. His grandson became ruler, and the boy’s uncle, the Duke of Chou, was appointed as his regent. The Duke of Chou completed King Wen’s work by writing short texts associated with each of the six lines of every hexagram.
Finally, Confucius himself (551-479BC) studied the I Ching exhaustively and wrote extensive commentaries on it, which are known as the I Ching’s ‘Wings’. These include the Advice (or Image), the Commentaries on the judgment and on the lines, as well as the Contrasts, Sequences, Attached Evidences and Appended Judgements, in addition to the Discussion of the Trigrams and the Great Treatise. With its origins in the greatest rulers and sages of China’s past, and the illumination of Confucius’ thought binding it into a whole, the I Ching was honoured as a Classic, and was required reading for anyone wishing to enter the higher orders of Chinese society.
The Historical Truth
The earliest known system of divination in China dates from the early Shang dynasty. It involved heating animal bones in a fire and studying the cracks that formed in them, in order to discover whether the time was right to make a sacrifice. The traces even of this unimaginably ancient practice are still present in four of the oldest ideograms in the I Ching, Yuan, Heng, Li, Chen. These have an enormous range of meanings and associations - they represent the four seasons, and also the qualities of fundamentality, success, fitness and perseverance. In its earliest usage, though, this phrase seems to have meant ‘the beginning of successful communication with the spirits; to ask more would be fitting.’ At a deeper level, this practice shows the most basic principle of Chinese divination. It has at least as much to do with contact with the spiritual world and understanding the quality of the moment as it does with predicting the future.
Tortoise shells were also used, in the same way as animal bones, to produce patterns of cracks for the diviners to interpret. But the shells from past divinations could also usefully be stored for future reference - and at this point the ancient diviners began to invent writing. Images were carved onto the shells as records of what had been asked, and what the outcome had been. (This is the venerable ancestor of the ‘journal function’ in the better I Ching computer programs!) The surviving records show that the tortoise oracle was asked about affairs of state: war, proposed marriages, the birth of princes…
From about 1,000 BC, shortly after the Chou dynasty was founded, the texts of the I Ching as we now have it began to be written down. They probably came from ancient oral tradition, so it is impossible to say how old the earliest strata of the I Ching really are. It was also at this time that the yarrow stalk method of divination was created. This may well have been, at least in part, a response to the increasing scarcity of tortoises! It had the very important effect of making divination much easier, more practical, and more widely available. What had once been the prerogative of the emperor alone gradually spread throughout literate Chinese society. And of course the oracle was asked a steadily widening range of questions about more personal matters.
The roots of the I Ching we have today can be confidently dated to the 8th century BC. Firstly, some of its vocabulary is common in documents of the time but has not been in use since. Secondly, references have been identified in it to historical events of the time. In particular, the Judgment of Hexagram 35 refers to Price Kang, a Chou prince who is known to have abandoned the name ‘Kang’ shortly after the Chou conquest. Perhaps this ancient name was remembered and only actually written down later - but this at least gives us a date for the tradition of the I Ching. The basic I Ching the hexagrams, their names, Judgements and the line texts were very probably complete by 700BC. The hexagrams, as a means of referring to the texts, came rather later, in the 5th century BC. This was a crucial discovery, making it possible to see the movement of energy that the texts described. The openness at the heart of Inner Truth, for example - which later commentators saw as being like a hollowed-out wooden boat -
or the entry from below of a new, destabilising influence in Coupling, threatening its solidity:
The Tso Commentary, which dates from 672BC, refers to historical usage of the Chou I (Classic of Chou, as the early parts of the I Ching were originally known) hundreds of years beforehand - but we cannot be sure that the dates it gives are reliable. We do know that at the time when it was written, the popularity of the I Ching was growing steadily. It actually records many consultations with the I Ching, including the answers it gave, and most (though not all) of the texts it quotes are identical with those we have today.
During the Warring States period (475-221 BC) the I Ching came into its own This was a period of great cultural and political upheaval, full of change and uncertainty. The texts of the I Ching were collected into book form, and diviners carried it throughout China. When order was finally, and somewhat brutally, restored in 221BC, the new rulers (the short-lived Ch’in Dynasty) ordered a burning of books. The I Ching was one of very few volumes to be spared, because of its practical value.
During the more peaceful Han dynasty that followed, the I Ching was ‘canonised’ as a classic (‘I’) and became the object of intense scholarly work. During this period - from the 3rd century BC to the turn of the millennium - the I Ching’s ‘Wings’ were added, with detailed commentary on the interrelationships of the hexagrams’ lines and the discovery of the trigrams. Confucius is most unlikely to have written any of these, though they are in part based on his ideas. The scholars may also have made use of ancient oral traditions - certainly, the Advice (or Image) texts often seem subtly to undermine the more conventional Commentary.
This is, nominally, almost the end of the ‘history’ of the I Ching. The Ma Wang Dui manuscript, buried in 168BC, has been found to be substantially the same as the version we have today, although the hexagrams are in a different order. The current order was first suggested in the 2nd century BC, but it was only established as the standard order by Wang Bi (226-250AD).
In fact, of course, the history of the I Ching did not come to a halt once it reached its present form. The I Ching is not only a book: it is a conversation between countless generations of questioners, over thousands of years, and the spirit that speaks through the book. That conversation continues, with every question revealing new depths and patterns of meaning. The need for the I Ching has always been felt most keenly at times of radical change - and it answers a very deep need of our own times.
The myth of the I Ching’s origins shows how it is built up from the most basic truths: from yin and yang to trigrams; from trigrams to hexagrams and texts. History reveals that things occurred in almost exactly the reverse order: first the earliest texts, then the hexagrams, then yin and yang and the trigrams. But it is important to realise that these were not successive inventions, obscuring a ‘real’ original. They were discoveries of patterns and truths already present in the book, as if successive generations of questioners and scholars were progressively moving towards the I Ching’s metaphysical core. And this journey, too, continues.
The Practice
There are two traditional methods for consulting the I Ching as an oracle. They are the use of 50 yarrow sticks, or the use of three coins.
Preparation for Consulting the I Ching
The most important preparation for consulting the I Ching is framing the question you wish answered. Clearly defining your question will help the reading be relevant to your situation. It is better to be precise than vague. Typical questions can be 'What will happen if I...?' 'Should I...?' 'What lies in my immediate future?' 'What should my attitude about... be?'
There are also other preparations that can be made, such as washing your hands, lighting incense, and facing south (as did all persons of authority in ancient China).
Consulting the I Ching: Yarrow Sticks Method
Place the 50 yarrow sticks in front of you.
Take one stick and place it aside. The reason for this is lost in antiquity, but some call this stick 'The Witness'.
Divide the remaining 49 sticks into two random groups, left and right.
Take a single yarrow stick from the right hand group and place it in between your fifth and fourth fingers (little and ring) of your left hand.
From the left hand group, count off the yarrow sticks in fours until four or less yarrow sticks remain. Take these remaining yarrow sticks and place them between your fourth and third (ring and middle) fingers of your left hand.
From the remaining group, count off the yarrow sticks in fours again, until four or less remain. Take these remaining yarrow sticks and place them between your third and second fingers (middle and index) of your left hand.
Remove all the yarrow sticks from your left hand and place them out of the way. (There are three such groups to be placed and they are to be kept separate.)
The remaining yarrow sticks are now to be gathered together again and divided once more into two groups.
Repeat Steps 4 through 7 with the remaining yarrow sticks.
For a third time, gather together the remaining yarrow sticks, divide then into two groups and repeat steps 4 through 7. You should now have three groups of yarrow sticks.
Remove one yarrow stick from the first group and set it aside. Now each group will have a count of either four or eight.
Assign a value to each group as follows:
Those that have four sticks are valued at three.
Those that have eight sticks are valued at two.
Total the three values; they will equal six, seven, eight or nine.
Draw the bottom line of your hexagram as follows:
A six is an Old Yin Line (changing) and written --X--
A seven is a Young Yang Line and written -----
An eight is a Young Yin Line and written -- --
A nine is a Old Yang Line (changing) and written --O--
Repeat this entire process 5 times drawing the new line above the one previously drawn to complete your hexagram.
Look up your hexagram in an I Ching book for your reading.
If you have changing lines, redraw the hexagram turning the Old Yin lines (--X--) into its opposite, a Yang Line (-----) and turning Old Yang lines (--O--) into its opposite a Yin Line (-- --).
Look up your new hexagram in an I Ching book for your reading.
Consulting the I Ching - Coin Method
The coin method is much simpler than the yarrow stalk method, and much faster. All you need are three coins. Ideally these would be old Chinese coins with the hole in the centre, where one side is inscribed (the Yin side) and the other is blank (The Yang side). If you don't have old Chinese coins, any three coins will do, with the 'heads' considered the Yin side, and the 'tails' considered the Yang side.
Cup the coins loosely in both hand, shake them, and allow them to fall before you.
Assign values to the coins as follows:
Yin side will have a value of two.
Yang side will have a value of three.
Total the three values, they will equal six, seven, eight or nine.
Draw the bottom line of your hexagram as follows:
A six is an Old Yin Line (changing) and written --X--
A seven is a Young Yang Line and written -----
An eight is a Young Yin Line and written -- --
A nine is a Old Yang Line (changing) and written --O--
Repeat this entire process five times drawing the new line above the one previously drawn to complete your hexagram.
Look up your hexagram in an I Ching book for your reading
If you have changing lines, redraw the hexagram turning the Old Yin lines (--X--) into its opposite, a Yang Line (-----) and turning Old Yang lines (--O--) into its opposite a Yin Line (-- --).
Now you consult the table to find your oracle: look up the first hexagram, and read the Text and the Figure. Then in Lines, you read only where you have a moving line. Pay particular attention to the message of any moving line marked by a little circle; this is a ruling line in its hexagram, and its meaning may have additional significance. As a final step, look up the second hexagram and read Text and Figure. And that's your answer.
Click here for detailed information on each hexagram
Commentaries on the I Ching have been written since King Wen and his son the Duke of Chou, purported authors of the original text, themselves wrote commentaries for it. For a taste of commentaries written in different eras, consult the Wilhelm/Baynes retranslation, the oft-reprinted nineteenth-century version by James Legge, and John Blofeld's 1965 edition. Many recent translations emphasize new-ageism, feminism, etc. This version is a humanist translation.
The symbolism of a hexagram is based on the essential dualism of Chinese thinking -- the yin and the yang, weak and strong, dark and light, woman and man, earth and heaven. Thus each line of a hexagram is either solid (yang) or broken (yin), and, because a hexagram has six lines, there are only 64 possible hexagrams. Each hexagram may be thought of as two trigrams; there are only 8 possible trigrams, and each combination of two trigrams is spelled out in each Figure section, as, for example, lake atop mountain, or chasm within chasm. Since the whole universe of possibilities must be included in these 64 hexagrams, the oracle may be said to answer to any situation.
The answers one finds in the I Ching give the relations between people, within a family, or in a state. Though quaint images may be used, the center of concern in the I Ching is always ethics and morality, the behavior of human beings. For this reason, Confucius greatly favored its use as a great humanist document. No matter what ``fortune'' one may find in it, one learns something essential about the human condition, and, like the answers of the Delphic Oracle in Greece, the answers may have to wait a long time for the right questions to be asked.
The Master says: What is it that the Changes do? The Changes disclose natural things, perfect affairs of humans, and encompass all things on earth-this and nothing else the Changes accomplish. By means of the Book, the sages set a proper direction to every purpose, give evenness to every field of action, and settle all doubts.
The Master says: Writing doesn't fully express speech, and speech doesn't completely express ideas. Is it impossible to determine the ideas of the sages?
The sages invented ideograms to express their thoughts fully; they organized the hexagrams to express true and false completely. Then they added explanations and the movable lines to express their words adequately. They enlivened it all with drums and dancing, thus completely developing the spirit of the I Ching.
The Master says: In the whole of nature, what part is thinking? what part planning? Everything returns at last to the same end, though they come by different paths. There is one result for all the hopes of a hundred schemes. In nature, what is thinking? what is planning?
The Master says: The Creative and the Receptive are really the gate to the Changes. The Creative represents bright active things and the Receptive dark inactive things. As the dark and light join, various positions for the firm and yielding lines embody the hexagrams. Thus heaven and earth are made visible, and we can grasp the inner workings of the intelligence of spirit.
The Master says: Whoever knows the schema of the changes and transformations knows what is done by that spiritual power.