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confucius
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Etymology of the ideogram ge.49
The ideogram used to illustrate hexagram 49 is non-decomposable. It represented, originally, the Tanning Process. We can guess in the ideogram the ancient shape of the skin of an animal (with the head and the tail) stretched on a wooden support to be scrapped and rid of the remaining flesh. This preparation process converted this skin into leather.
Of this operation, this character has kept a double meaning: one concrete in relation to the material (Prefect level of Dun.33) and, the other, the idea of going from one state to the other (from fair to renewed) as understood at the transition level of Ding.50.
In the first case, the character Ge intervenes as a general radical in different characters concerning Leathered Goods – like the verb To Tan for which it is combined with the ideogram Suppleness – or by designating Leather Objects like Shoes or a Swing, when combined with the ideogram Transfer, as understood at the Minister level of Yi.42.
In the second case the idea is a current word, but verbally and abstractly: To Eliminate, To Repel, To Deduct, to get rid of what is no more appropriate (as is seen in the Tenth Wing). This idea is best understood in the expression to get rid of the old to make way for the new, from the Chinese syntax To Abolish (hexagram 49), the ancient, and Establish (hexagram 50), the new.
This idea is so familiar to the creators of the Yi Jing that there is a short cut expression simply assembled from the names of hexagram 50 and 49, written in that order (Ding Ge).
The particular meaning of the ideogram Ge is so overshadowed by the political term Revolution in modern China that it has become naturally associated to it. For example the reform instigated by Xiaoping to pull China out of Maoism was designated by a symbol in which the first character meant To Change (it is mentioned at the Minister level) and the second character, the name of this hexagram, Ge.
How ironic historically…actually, in the late 1800, when Marx was translated in Chinese, writers chose the two characters Ge Ming to express the meaning of his Revolution, in which Ge is the name of this ideogram and Ming the word Mandate (mentioned at the Minister level). This is how the most revolutionary concept of the german philosopher appeared in China in the form of the return to a Changing of Mandate. That same idea had been instigated by the Zhou three thousand years before to justify their acquisition of power.
Confucius
The ideogram used to illustrate hexagram 49 is non-decomposable. It represented, originally, the Tanning Process. We can guess in the ideogram the ancient shape of the skin of an animal (with the head and the tail) stretched on a wooden support to be scrapped and rid of the remaining flesh. This preparation process converted this skin into leather.
Of this operation, this character has kept a double meaning: one concrete in relation to the material (Prefect level of Dun.33) and, the other, the idea of going from one state to the other (from fair to renewed) as understood at the transition level of Ding.50.
In the first case, the character Ge intervenes as a general radical in different characters concerning Leathered Goods – like the verb To Tan for which it is combined with the ideogram Suppleness – or by designating Leather Objects like Shoes or a Swing, when combined with the ideogram Transfer, as understood at the Minister level of Yi.42.
In the second case the idea is a current word, but verbally and abstractly: To Eliminate, To Repel, To Deduct, to get rid of what is no more appropriate (as is seen in the Tenth Wing). This idea is best understood in the expression to get rid of the old to make way for the new, from the Chinese syntax To Abolish (hexagram 49), the ancient, and Establish (hexagram 50), the new.
This idea is so familiar to the creators of the Yi Jing that there is a short cut expression simply assembled from the names of hexagram 50 and 49, written in that order (Ding Ge).
The particular meaning of the ideogram Ge is so overshadowed by the political term Revolution in modern China that it has become naturally associated to it. For example the reform instigated by Xiaoping to pull China out of Maoism was designated by a symbol in which the first character meant To Change (it is mentioned at the Minister level) and the second character, the name of this hexagram, Ge.
How ironic historically…actually, in the late 1800, when Marx was translated in Chinese, writers chose the two characters Ge Ming to express the meaning of his Revolution, in which Ge is the name of this ideogram and Ming the word Mandate (mentioned at the Minister level). This is how the most revolutionary concept of the german philosopher appeared in China in the form of the return to a Changing of Mandate. That same idea had been instigated by the Zhou three thousand years before to justify their acquisition of power.
Confucius