Recommencing lessons, 63.2.5 - 11

[Juliah]

Hello All,

Being a beginner in interpreting IC responses, I would highly appreciate any help with the reading.

Early in March I had to cease taking lessons in a foreign language due to my tutor's decision. Several weeks afterwards, in April, I asked IC if our lessons would be recommenced. The answer was 63.2.5. - 11

I take this response as positive, but perhaps, there is something important that is slipping from me...

 

[Liselle]

Hello Juliah!

This reading is confusing, but I think the timing is important to note.

Your lessons ended in early March, and you cast the reading in April. The reading might be telling you that the situation was over and done with at the start, at the time your lessons ended.

Hex 63 is called "Already Across," something that is completed and decided. Hex 11 describes a state of "Flow," a dynamic situation full of potential. Those two hexagrams don't seem to fit well together, but 11 is the relating hexagram. So it might mean that you're relating to the situation as if it was still in flow, but the primary hexagram says no, the decision has been made.

The line texts:

63.2

"A wife loses her carriage screen - don't chase it.
On the seventh day, gain."​

63.5

"The neighbour in the East slaughters oxen.
not like the Western neighbour's summer offering,
Truly accepting their blessing."​

(Those are quoted from Hilary Barrett's book. Since you are new here (unless you've been lurking for a while!), Hilary is an I Ching scholar and the owner of this website.)

63.2 does say "gain." But it also says the gain would be "on the seventh day," and advises "don't chase" what you've lost. "Seven days" doesn't necessarily mean seven days exactly, but it is one of the shorter time periods mentioned in the I Ching. (Others which I can remember offhand are three years and ten years.) It's now the end of June and apparently nothing has happened. What that might mean is that the "gain" was knowledge or facts, rather than lessons. Your tutor made a decision not to continue, so the facts (immediately or in short order - the "seven days" ) were that the lessons were over and would not recommence.

63.5 generally means that a simple offering is most appropriate, rather than anything elaborate. As Hilary explains the imagery:

"The Shang [in the East] were wealthy enough to make extravagant sacrifices of any number of oxen, while their Western neighbours, the Zhou, were limited to more modest offerings. Yet it was the Zhou who had, and valued, a true bond with the spirits."​

("Summer offerings" are sacrifices made in the summertime, before the harvest, when all you have are the meager leftovers from last year's harvest.)

What that might mean in your reading is that the situation is much simpler than you realize. Your tutor ended the lessons; therefore they're over. There's nothing more you can do or need to do.

Of course, what I don't know is what your tutor said to you in March. Did he tell you he'd resume the lessons after a break? If his decision - in his mind - was to end them entirely, it seems that he didn't do a very good job of communicating that to you .

 

[Juliah]

Dear Lisa, thank you so much!