So far, I’ve introduced the idea of ever-flowing constancy, and explored six places where the Yi advises it. There is just one more example: Don’t! 62.4 ‘No mistake.Not going past, meeting it.Going on is dangerous, must be on guard.Do not use ever-flowing constancy.’ This is clear enough: do not use… Read more »Why not use ever-flowing constancy?
A Change Circle member recently mentioned getting a whole series of readings with 15 as relating hexagram, so I thought I’d dig in and explore how it works there, as the background to a reading… Integrity, humility… The name of Hexagram 15, qian 謙, means humility – or perhaps integrity,… Read more »Hexagram 15 as relating hexagram
The Yijing is an optimistic oracle: omens of good fortune come more often than those of misfortune. But on four* occasions, it goes one step further and promises great good fortune: ‘Enriching the home.Great good fortune.’ Hexagram 37, line 4 ‘Great good fortune, no mistake.’ Hexagram 45, line 4 ‘Welcomed… Read more »Great good fortune
Here’s Wikipedia’s definition of a ‘culture hero’: A culture hero is a mythological hero specific to some group (cultural, ethnic, religious, etc.) who changes the world through invention or discovery. Chinese mythology seems to be especially full of these: people who are recognised as heroic because they invented millet farming,… Read more »Hexagrams as culture heroes
In my last post, I talked about how the Daxiang paints pictures of individual hexagrams, as a whole. In this one, I’d like to try a change of perspective, zooming in and zooming out, to see what comes into focus. Commentary on the lines The Image builds on and humanises… Read more »The genius of the Daxiang (part 2)
The Yijing mentions rain several times – in Hexagram 9, and then in 38.6, 43.3, 50.3 and 62.5. What does it represent? Wilhelm, writing about 50.3, has a succinct answer: ‘The fall of rain symbolizes here, as in other instances, release of tension.’ Wilhelm is (here, as in other instances)… Read more »Rain
As I was saying in my last post, Hexagram 61, Inner Truth has a hatchling in its name, and a crane with her young in it second line. Its paired hexagram is Hexagram 62, Small Exceeding – is the pair and complement of – and this has its own calling… Read more »More birds
