Yilin (the forest of change)

philippa · Aug 22, 2006

Hi all,

I vaguely recall there's a brief mention of yilin here. Its text does show up on this board sporadically.

Personally, I often find the Yilin text goes against my intuition of the Yi text. I wonder if there's anyone who uses it much.

I'm interested in people's opinion of it or even some analysis of the text in relation to the Yi text.

Philippa

Trojina · Aug 23, 2006

Yes I'm interested, don't know much about it. Wondering if theres an online YiLin does anyone know ?

frank_r · Aug 23, 2006

trojan said:
Wondering if theres an online YiLin does anyone know ?

I know that harmen and LiSe are working on a translation.

http://www.anton-heyboer.org/i_ching/yilin/index.html

Trojina · Aug 23, 2006

Thanks Frank

ewald · Aug 23, 2006

I have incidently translated some lines of the Yilin too. Indeed, there do seem to be some differences between the Yilin text and what the Yijing indicates.

I think Harmen did give an explanation for that some time ago. There is a different procedure to consult the Yilin. I don't remember it in detail, but I seem to remember that it entails doing a calculation where the time of the year is included. So you supposedly can't actually look up a Yijing consulation in the Yilin without modification.

bradford · Aug 24, 2006

I'm not sure from these comments that folks know just what the
Yilin or "Forest of Changes" is or does.
When you cast a hexagram, by any method, there are 4096 possible
outcomes. That includes every hexagram with any combination of
changing lines, including no changing lines. The Yilin provides a
simple text for each and every one of these combinations, partly as
a way to relieve folks of the multiple changing line problem.
It is not intended to require its own method of arriving at a gua.
It was written during an era of great speculation, the Early Han,
and really has little to do with the Zhouyi or the Yijng text.
It really must stand alone or fall on its own merits.

Trojina · Aug 24, 2006

So going back to Philippas original question, what is peoples opinion of it ?

bradford · Aug 24, 2006

Clearly the ones to ask are LiSe and Harmen. I pondered contributing to this project at one point, and looked at half a dozen sample Chinese texts to see. I wasn't all that impressed. I'm of the opinion that both texts were written by human beings. But it looks to me like a few orders of magnitude more of man hours, effort, thought and care went into the Yijing - not to mention more people and perspectives involved and considerable support from the royal Early Zhou court. And then there are the centuries of testing and attrition where, just like in genetics, the things that don't fit are selected out of the pool. It's not the Yilin's fault, or its author's either, but the Zhouyi is a far better document, with more useful and more universally relevant images and metaphors.

jesed · Aug 24, 2006

Agree with Bradford.

From another (complementary) perspective, years ago when I started to learn Wen Wang Bagua, I asked Yijing about diferent oracles and methods

There was diferent answers, of course. The worst was about the Canon of Supreme Mystery. Don't use it.

But about "mathematical methods" of interpreting Yi Jing (Wen Wan Bagua, and Plum Blossom) and Li Chi Ching (a simplification of Yijing), the answer wasn't bad. In few words was something like: those are practical but secundary ways, compared with Yijing. You can use them for practical pourposes, but those are minor works.

I don't remember if I asked about Yilin.. but since it is another atempt to simplification of Yijing (like Li Chi Ching), I guess the answer could be similar. It would be interesting ask about it.

Best wishes

...life can be translucent

Yilin (the forest of change)

philippa

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Trojina

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frank_r

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Trojina

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ewald

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bradford

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Trojina

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bradford

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jesed

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