Here are the next three ‘character’ hexagrams… 32, Lasting Lasting is de‘s steadfastness. It means [encountering] miscellany and not [feeling] disgust. It provides for a single de. As you can see from the [square brackets], I haven’t quite managed to find English equivalents to the Chinese words for this one.… Read more »‘Character’ hexagrams: Lasting, Decrease, Increase
In Part II, chapter 7 of the Great Treatise (Dazhuan), nine hexagrams are singled out. The authors of the Yi, it says, knew sorrow and disasters (or, specifically, they worried about disasters), and therefore… and it goes on to list the qualities of these nine hexagrams. You can read the… Read more »The ‘character’ hexagrams
Some 15 years ago, I wrote on this blog about the non-people of Hexagram 12. ‘Blocking it, non-people.Noble one’s constancy bears no fruit.Great goes, small comes.’ Hexagram 12, the Oracle Back then, I emphasised how the idea of ‘non-people’ (fei ren, 匪人) could mean labelling people and sticking them in… Read more »The non-people of Hexagram 8
Ni, 泥 , simply means ‘mud’ – soil, putty, to daub with plaster. It’s the clay that was baked into bricks and tiles. I normally look for how a word is used in the Book of Songs, or the Book of Rites, but ni doesn’t appear anywhere in either of… Read more »Nothing quite like it
You know how the lines of some hexagrams unfold and tell a story? Hexagram 53 traces the journey of the wild geese; 1 follows the dragon’s journey across the skies; 48 describes well-repair. Well… I’m wondering whether something similar might not be happening in Hexagram 51. The name of the… Read more »The story of Shock
It’s one thing to consult the Yijing; finding the confidence to act on what it says is something else. (What if I’ve got this wrong?) Yet readings without this, without change, are theoretical at best, and at worst… maybe something more serious than a mere waste of time. We need… Read more »Trusting your reading
(The story so far: I asked what to write about, and Yi’s response – 37.1.2.5.6 to 46 – gave me the idea of writing about what makes for a friendly, domestic, quotidien, integrated relationship with the Oracle. I’ve written about lines 1 and 2; here’s line 5.) What makes for… Read more »The king’s presence
