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I Ching and Female

marybluesky

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It's not the first time I ask this myself.

While the yin lines are representatives of female in the I Ching, all the unpleasant characteristics are attributed to them. The most heard are "inferior", "weak". Hexagrams such as 23 & 44 are regarded as bad auspice because "the in/yins rule over the male". And 64 shows being out of place because the yins aren't in second place.

And I don't discuss much about the picture of women who are whether courtesans/marrying maiden/child bearing wives (MAYBE it shows all the ways possible for a woman to be in "an era" - as we don't have much information about the older areas; hence some findings about ancient Scandinavian women & matriarchal communities question the belief that views such type of female social conditioning as the "natural" course of evolution & insists that it has been like that always. Even if it was the case, so what? Should we respect slavery because it existed as some point?).

As a female, why should I keep on using & respecting a system with such a degrading view on me?

I'm not likely to stop using the I Ching all of a sudden; it has been like an addiction, or some solution for my thirst to know about future/what's invisible. But the question is in my mind, very bold.
 

Trojina

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While the yin lines are representatives of female in the I Ching, all the unpleasant characteristics are attributed to them. The most heard are "inferior", "weak". Hexagrams such as 23 & 44 are regarded as bad auspice because "the in/yins rule over the male". And 64 shows being out of place because the yins aren't in second place.

There's none of this nonsense language in Hilary's book, in LiSe's work or in Bradford's work. The problem might be you are getting it all off de Korne's website rather than looking at more modern understandings?
 

surnevs

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I think it's a misunderstanding as old as the I Ching that Yin is weak, dark, feminine etc. There is a chapter in Geoffrey Redmond and Tze-Ki Hon's 'Teaching the I Ching', Oxford University Press, 2014: Ch. 3, Women in the Yijing, which I will not tell how to understand but recommend concerning this to read.
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Add.: On pg. 72 in this PDF
 
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marybluesky

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There's none of this nonsense language in Hilary's book, in LiSe's work or in Bradford's work. The problem might be you are getting it all off de Korne's website rather than looking at more modern understandings?
I've read this in many answers on the forum, so many that I can't say exactly when and by whom. I don't visit DeKorne's website since a long time- I guess since I downloaded Hilary's Resonance Journal (the trial version) with the translations you mention.
 

moss elk

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While the yin lines are representatives of female in the I Ching, all the unpleasant characteristics are attributed to them. The most heard are "inferior", "weak". Hexagrams such as 23 & 44 are regarded as bad auspice because "the in/yins rule over the male".

There are bad attributes in the 'male' trigrams & hex's too, in extreme:
Excessive force, Rigidity, Harshness, Danger.. etc


Female is also recognized with the attributes of:

:::
Mother & Earth powers

||:
The Joyous youngest daughter

|:|
The Hot middle daughter

:||
The Gentle eldest daughter

:zen:
 

IrfanK

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Hey Mary,

I'm a big fan of Wilhelm's translation. This stuff about the yin lines being female and the female being inferior is definitely present in his commentaries, though. I find it particularly bad in his interpretations of 37 and 44. But when I use Wilhelm, I have all these mental footnotes in my head, with reservations about some of commentaries, and even some of his translations.

As a man, I find I can use Wilhelm without trouble. But if I were doing a reading for someone else, I'd "edit" it and change "superior man" to "superior person," stuff like that. If a woman asked me for a recommendation for which translation to get hold of, I'd probably advise against Wilhelm and suggest Hilary. It would get a bit tiresome to have to do that editing in your head all the time.
 

surnevs

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(Maybe out of context but for good order: yesterday evening I saw maryblueskye's posting (#1) and remembered having read about the subject so I started writing to inform about this and to be sure finding the book to see if it really was from there I've got it. Finally, when submitting the post I wondered when seeing that Trojina suddenly had made a posting - they had of course crossed each other. This is just to say that I replied to maryblueskye and not to Trojina, which could easily be seen that way. )
 

my_key

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Hi Mary
It took me quite a while to see beyond the points that are currently concerning you about the feminine as represented in the commentaries of many translators. As a male, I'm certain that the impact the wording around the role of the feminine was easier for me negotiate to reach a clearer perspective with.

Chinese culture had clear views about the woman, Many of the early commentaries were written in times where perspectives on women that were far removed from those of the modern day. The attitudes held in the text and the commentaries have been self perpetuating down the years.

To step outside of the circle, it helped me to put to one side the terms masculine and feminine and to see yin and yang as essences circulating in and around everything. (Imagine the Tai Chi symbol). Their goal, together, is to evoke a fresh harmony or balance through change. For change to happen there must be an essence that initiates or creates the potential for change and a nurturing, responsive essence that supports the manifestation of that change.

The hexagram structure of alternating yang and yin lines provides a framework of initiate and response or create and nurture. Like any well-oiled machine when a thingamabob is not in the right place the wheels can come off and it stops working as well as it could. This 'out of position-ness' that floods through the commentaries speaks more to the role of yin rather than speaking directly to the nature or qualities of yin.

For there to be balance and harmony yin and yang must act together. Both yin and yang act individually along a spectrum, as others have pointed out above, however the activity of one must support and complement the other. As Huang comments "Yin is gentle but not weak. It is submissive without necessarily giving up the initiative. Yin receives yang qualities from nurturing the yang". You might provide some insights if you spend some time with the hexagram pairs - yang followed by yin.

I see it now as a bit like a ballroom dance yang leads and yin follows, for that is their intended roles. If the lead is too strong or fierce it will ruin the dance: as it will if it is too weak. The beauty of the dance can be seen best through how seamlessly or effortlessly yin can manoeuvre in response to the lead. If yin steps off in another direction or is looking to lead her own dance then making the dance a thing of beauty becomes increasingly difficult.

So each has an equal role to play. One is not superior to the other it's just that when both yang and yin fulfil their roles the outcomes are superior.
 

Trojina

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Someone told me, but I can't recall who, I may have heard it from Brad, that one cannot link yin and yang too closely with male and female in human form. It really isn't the same thing.

Re your question Mary

While the yin lines are representatives of female in the I Ching, all the unpleasant characteristics are attributed to them. The most heard are "inferior", "weak". Hexagrams such as 23 & 44 are regarded as bad auspice because "the in/yins rule over the male". And 64 shows being out of place because the yins aren't in second place.

I don't encounter this kind of commentary much or if I do I skip it, it belongs well in the category of 'dry preachy old men' in my mind and I recommend you put it there too if it's an irritant. I should say I'm not rejecting all of the stuff any author wrote, I love Wilhelm's translation for example (though I don't include him in the 'dry/preachy' come to think of it) and his commentary can be spot on too at times, it's of it's time, it's a way of seeing it, but I think what you refer to in the above paragraph needs to be taken wholly symbolically with regard to the primal powers of yin and yang rather than attribute them to actual women and men's role in the world.

I think what's happened is, as with every other philosophy/religion etc is misogyny has crept in and been written up to indicate the 'natural order' - is females should follow males. We know that isn't true. We know there is no good reason as human females to follow men. They are after all no more insightful, clever or worthy of following than women. And all systems that suppressed female creativity and endeavour looked for justification of that misogyny in their bibles/Yi books/ philosophical approaches. And of course because men were the ones writing it was their voice that was heard. I think we can now jettison all that nonsense that came as an add on, that never was there really in the I Ching at all.

So yin does not exactly = woman nor does man exactly =yang. All humans are both in varying degrees. In Yi yin and yang are those polar opposites/forces/energies in pure form, we seem them interact together to form the hexagrams. They really are not representing how women or men 'should' be.

So to repeat I think you have to take such commentary as in the above commentary wholly symbolically, recognise it as of it's time, and be clear to distinguish that yin and yang do not equate to human man or human woman. I mean clearly a woman may have more yin tendencies but that doesn't mean she herself is yin anymore than any male would be pure yang. We all include both within us to varying degrees at varying times in varying situations. Indeed one reason we consult is to measure how much yin or yang we need to work with in relation to our question.
 

marybluesky

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It's more than clear to me that women aren't Yin & men aren't Yan in real life, neither I see the Yin as the female and the Yang as the male. But the I Ching does (the 2nd hexagram which is considered the female principle is all Yin).

I'm less disappointed by published translations and commentaries, even the older ones, as the misogyny is rarely visible in them. I would have stopped using the I Ching the first days I knew about it otherwise.

I talk mainly about the attributed characteristics of Yin lines - which are the representatives of female in the I Ching - and how their position determine the meaning & auspice of a cast. That's what I have read in many interpretation.
I think what's happened is, as with every other philosophy/religion etc is misogyny has crept in and been written up to indicate the 'natural order' - is females should follow males. We know that isn't true. We know there is no good reason as human females to follow men. They are after all no more insightful, clever or worthy of following than women.
That's because females have been encouraged to be always immobile, receptive and reactive instead of active that, in this forum, we see so many women who can't release themselves from pathetic relationships or find a way to end their N year-old obsession over an unworthy male.
 
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Trojina

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It's more than clear to me that women aren't Yin & men aren't Yan in real life, neither I see the Yin as the female and the Yang as the male. But the I Ching does (the 2nd hexagram which is considered the female principle is all Yin).
It's not clear to you because you used the word 'principle' but have missed the whole point of the word. A woman is not 'the female principle' a male is not the 'the male principle'. A 'principle' is not a human being, it's in Yi half of the primal powers in the universe. So no the I Ching does not equate hexagram to a woman.

That's because females have been encouraged to be always immobile, receptive and reactive instead of active that, in this forum, we see so many women who can't release themselves from pathetic relationships or find a way to end their N year-old obsession on an unworthy male.
That could be somewhat of an over simplification. Women aren't locked in these kinds of relationships only because they have been taught to be immobile. There can be women who are highly successful in their work, who are anything but immobile, who still can find themselves obsessed with someone who doesn't return their passion at all. There's many factors at play in this, some I think are rooted in biology, some are more psychological.

One thing is for sure, being at Clarity for 20 years has changed my view of women as a group although for sure Clarity isn't a representation of all women. Women in SR mainly want to know what 'he' thinks or what 'he' will do next. Men generally just don't ask that kind of question. I notice men when they ask about romance in SR are far more along the lines of 'how can I make her like me' or 'how can I do xyz with her'. It's almost like they see her as this thing to change or to mould where she seeks to be whatever he would mould her to In that regard they fall quite well into the yin/yang categories I guess. That's a great over generalisation I know but it's merely an observation of Clarity's SR 2001-2022.



I have written before I think in the UC threads of how polarised the male/female divide is even with regard to interest in Yi. Speaking very broadly women just want to use Yi. They want to use it in their life. They are not that interested in reading many academic tomes about ancient china or the origins of Yi and so forth (except Hilary and LiSe and many others but I am speaking of the population of women on this site over the years). So SR is mainly a female space I'd say. Compare that to ED which is far more removed, far more analytical, far more threads begun by men (never counted so don't quote me on that) far more about Yi, about what it is, about the history, translation issues and so on. And some of them appear never to actually use it as an Oracle as their interest is an academic one. Both 'sides' really need each other. If people rely too much on their experience with readings they can get lost in their own associations, if people only read the books and never use Yi to consult they lose touch with the life of the book. We discussed this, interestingly in the 11/12 uc threads I think because some people were saying 'why have we got experiences thread here in ED' , some even said 'why isn't this in SR?' and the sense was females with their emphasis on reading experiences in their lives should stay in SR rather than enter the hallowed area of ED with it's more academic slant.

I'm a bit uneasy that I have observed this split in the forums as 'women with Yi' and 'men with Yi' because of course it sounds awfully sexist and of course women are every bit as academic as men are but it really is only my observation. It seems to me almost like men are more inclined to view Yi from a distance as an interesting artefact and women just want to talk to it about their problems. However I could have under represented women posting threads in ED, after all you have. And of course men do do plenty of readings but what I'm trying to convey is very broad trends I have noticed in gender and Yi interest.


Rambled away from the topic there
 
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marybluesky

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It's not clear to you because you used the word 'principle' but have missed the whole point of the word. A woman is not 'the female principle' a male is not the 'the male principle'. A 'principle' is not a human being, it's in Yi half of the primal powers in the universe. So no the I Ching does not equate hexagram to a woman.
I didn't say women are female principle:unsure:

There can be women who are highly successful in their work, who are anything but immobile,
I talk about passivity towards men and in relationships, not in other areas of life.

Women in SR mainly want to know what 'he' thinks or what 'he' will do next.
A perfect example for female passivity and waiting for an action to react instead of deciding what to do themselves: what does he think? what will he do? I don't think that's inherent or biological.

Men generally just don't ask that kind of question. I notice men when they ask about romance in SR are far more along the lines of 'how can I make her like me' or 'how can I do xyz with her'.
And a perfect example for male activity and making things done.

It's almost like they see her as this thing to change or to mould where she seeks to be whatever he would mould her to In that regard they fall quite well into the yin/yang categories I guess.
It's toxic. It most change. We are already seeing its destructive effects. That's where the objectification of females and the pattern of controlling man- submissive woman stems from, which is the root of abusive relationships.

P.S: If you don't agree with me on what's inherent/biological or not, that's OK. I just expressed how I've perceived the world as long as I've known myself.
 

marybluesky

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As a side note, there have never been anything a male could to to attract me/encourage me to enter a relationship with hem if I hadn't felt the attraction right from the start. Biologically, I'm a perfect female in the sense that my hormones and other biological factors work well.

Then there are demi-sexual people who need time to develop attraction for others and are persuaded with behaviors such as sweet talking. I've observed that both in males & females.
 

Trojina

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I didn't say women are female principle:unsure:
It's more than clear to me that women aren't Yin & men aren't Yan in real life, neither I see the Yin as the female and the Yang as the male. But the I Ching does (the 2nd hexagram which is considered the female principle is all Yin).
You said here it is clear to you women aren't yin and men aren't yang but then you say in the second sentence the I Ching does see it that way. That is I read it as you know women aren't pure yin but the I Ching thinks they are. I'm disagreeing with that, with your second sentence.

It's toxic. It most change. We are already seeing its destructive effects. That's where the objectification of females and the pattern of controlling man- submissive woman stems from, which is the root of abusive relationships.
'Already' how do you mean already it's been going on for millenia. You aren't telling me anything new here, I was doing modules in feminist studies at uni 30 years ago, it's not new stuff, it doesn't need explaining to me, I've lived through it and it's ramifications myself. But it really isn't as simple as that, there's a lot more strands and perspectives to think through.


P.S: If you don't agree with me on what's inherent/biological or not, that's OK. I just expressed how I've perceived the world as long as I've known myself.
Neither of us know what is biological or what isn't. When I referred to it here

That could be somewhat of an over simplification. Women aren't locked in these kinds of relationships only because they have been taught to be immobile. There can be women who are highly successful in their work, who are anything but immobile, who still can find themselves obsessed with someone who doesn't return their passion at all. There's many factors at play in this, some I think are rooted in biology, some are more psychological.
I meant women may biologically have the urge to seek continuity in relationships more, are more loyal because they have children and they need someone around. You can't just wipe out the biological necessities in evolution because they are no longer desirable traits. Humans don't control that, we are still biologically reacting to unpleasant emails like there was a lion in front of us, we sweat, we need the loo...all that. We are still animals in many ways and we have their reactions. It's therefore not hard to realise women may be primed to seek out security more for the sake of their offspring's survival. In modern day that can translate that a women can't let go of an ex, she's primed perhaps to be more loyal so why would she be expected just to 'move on'.
 

Trojina

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Sorry. :paperbag:

That's where the objectification of females and the pattern of controlling man- submissive woman stems from, which is the root of abusive relationships.
Actually I'm not sure about this statement so much anymore, I mean about objectification because women seem to be doing a bloody good job of objectifying themselves all over the internet and all over media platforms. Look at tiktok, countless women and girls thrusting their tits and everything else at the camera and no one is pushing them to do it. Some may be victims for sure but many really really aren't. They want attention and admiration and there's nothing inherently wrong with that, but I mean I just can't swallow that each and every one of them gathering 'likes' and comments and all that are actually victims of objectification.

Even some female singers who can actually sing, who have talent, seem to feel the need to shove their everything in front of the camera. Are they really victims of objectification? Sure they may be expected to do it, there may be pressure on them but there are plenty of other female artists who say no to that. I think at times female artists can really betray themselves through self objectification or maybe not, never seemed to do Madonna any harm, she was taking self objectification and running with it for all it was worth.
 

surnevs

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On: #1,
It also has to do with the way You translate the received text.
% from the book mentioned on #3 in this thread is an excellent example of how translations can influence the view on women. (from pg. 82)
 

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Liselle

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As a female, why should I keep on using & respecting a system with such a degrading view on me?
Short answer: because it works and answers us in ways nothing else can, and if we appreciate that we have to try to ignore the rest.

Better answer: Yi both is and isn't the words-on-paper we use to consult it, in my opinion.

Yi is known to describe itself with 48. If I have time to find links, I'll post them - not a promise though 1645468746702.png ...

(Okay, here's one that was easy to find, from here: https://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/reading/hexagrams/48-the-well/ )
hilary said:
It can also represent a connection to underlying truth – hence Yi’s not infrequent use of this hexagram to represent itself.

Wells are not the water, they're contraptions people make to access the water, and they can fail in many ways. People have nothing to do with the water itself.

The books, translations, commentaries, and the language used in them are all wells. They're not the water, not the Source that's speaking. The Source that's speaking - my opinion - is infinitely ideal, and if it could speak to us without the words-on-paper it wouldn't say "women are undermining influences" (44) or "men are creative dragons" (1) or anything like that. (Except of course if it needs to tell a particular man or woman those things at the moment, and of course it can just as well say each of them to either sex.)

The Source that's speaking did not literally tell people to invent things called yin and yang. Those are human constructions, wells, attempts to describe and categorize. We can't not describe and categorize, but we can recognize it for what it is, an invention.

So blame all the stereotypes on the people who put the words on paper, and ignore it. It's not the real message.

I also agree with the points Trojina and Moss Elk made (am also paraphrasing badly and conflating it all into one sentence) - that very broadly speaking women are more likely to be nurturing etc. and men aggressive etc.

Stereotypes exist for reasons, the problem is misusing them to denigrate people. We also say things like, "Well of course he/she acts like that, he/she's a Leo" which is silly and patronizing if taken too far. But we simultaneously know "Leo" is a thing that's different from the other signs, and Leos really will act like Leos in various ways.

Indeed one reason we consult is to measure how much yin or yang we need to work with in relation to our question.
Yes.
 

charly

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I think it's a misunderstanding as old as the I Ching that Yin is weak, dark, feminine etc. There is a chapter in Geoffrey Redmond and Tze-Ki Hon's 'Teaching the I Ching', Oxford University Press, 2014: Ch. 3, Women in the Yijing, which I will not tell how to understand but recommend concerning this to read.
--------------------
Add.: On pg. 72 in this PDF
Hi Mary:

I think Severus' advice to read the Geoffrey Redmond and Tze-Ki Hon's «Teaching the I Ching», chapter 3 «Women in the Yijing» is very good.

The book is available for partial preview on Google Books, here.

I believe it helps to understand that the full text of the «Changes» is a multilayered historical stratification whose core, the «Zhouyi», must be understood in light of the ideological atmosphere of the time surrounding the defeat of the last Shang ruler at the hands of Wu Wang, one of the sons of Wen Wang who had supposedly received the Mandate of the Heavens to rule.

In those times the concept itself of YIN-YANG forces did not yet exist and most likely YIN meant the SHADY side of a mountain and YANG the SUNNY side. Nor was the role of women so devalued it was as the political organization evolved towards the Empire and philosophy towards the post-Confucian stages.

Early Western Zhou ideology had a certain EGALITARIAN flavor with a stated preference for a pedagogy of TOLERANCE, ENJOYMENT, and LOVE as opposed to the pedagogy of CRUELTY, SUFFERING, and HATRED, whose preference they attributed to the Shang.

In this ideological context, WOMEN should play a more valued role, as suggested by the analysis of many Western Zhou bronze inscriptions.

I advise to download from the personal page of Prof. Maria Khayutina:
khayutina.jpg
«Marital Alliances and Affinal Relatives (sheng 甥 and hungou 婚購) in the Society and Politics of Zhou China in the Light of Bronze Inscriptions», Early China 37 (2014): 1-61.
Here.

... On this point, it should be noted that some inscriptions explicitly express a wish to have both male and female descendants. Such statements make one reconsider whether the ubiquitous address to zi zi sun sun 子子孫孫 in bronze inscriptions is correctly understood as referring exclusively to male “sons and grandsons,” but not to children of both sexes.
Evidently, without having enough daughters, a lineage had less potential for constructing social and political networks. Therefore, valuing only sons and neglecting daughters would signify only political blindness. Wishes of abundant progeny, especially when placed on dowry presents commissioned by a bride’s father or brother, very likely concerned the offspring of both sexes ...
[page 33]
_____________________
子 zi3 son / child / seed / egg / small thing / 1st earthly branch: 11 p.m.-1 a.m., midnight, 11th solar month (7th December to 5th January), year of the Rat / Viscount, fourth of five orders of nobility ...
孫 sun1 grandson / descendant

Advice: read actively the statement and lines, maybe also the later Image. Be cautious readinge comentarial tradition, there was an increasing process of yang.

All the best,

Charly
 
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IrfanK

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In those times the concept itself of YIN-YANG forces did not yet exist and most likely YIN means the shady side of a mountain and YANG the sunny side. Nor was the role of women so devalued it was as the political organization evolved towards the Empire and philosophy towards the post-Confucian stages.

Early Western Zhou ideology had a certain EGALITARIAN flavor with a stated preference for a pedagogy of TOLERANCE, ENJOYMENT, and LOVE as opposed to the pedagogy of CRUELTY, SUFFERING, and HATRED, whose preference they attributed to the Shang.
Ya. If the Song dynasty people had a misogynistic world view, that's what they would find in the Yi. If you have a different view, you'll find something different. It's a mirror.
 

charly

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Ya. If the Song dynasty people had a misogynistic world view, that's what they would find in the Yi. If you have a different view, you'll find something different. It's a mirror.
Hi Irfan:

Of course tha's a mirror but I was speaking about what is written in the Zhouyi received txt and some keys scattered in the text by the Zhou scribes. The Zhouyi doesn't present a misogynistic world view although maybe in the real life they can have it. Maybe they don't like cattle slaughtering but they liked to eat meat. Maybe they didn't like people suffering but they make war. Implicit in the idea of the Mandate of Heavens is the idea that some rulers may not deserve to have it, that ruling dynasties will not last forever.

Of course that even the Zhou had some misogynistic prejudices. If not why they said that the favorite of the last Shang ruler was but an evil fox spirit? But that's another story.

All the best,

Charly
 

IrfanK

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Of course that even the Zhou had some misogynistic prejudices. If not why they said that the favorite of the last Shang ruler was but an evil fox spirit? But that's another story.
Daji certainly found her place in history. If you go to YouTube and do a search, you'll see hundreds of clips of a beautiful but evil looking ("foxy"?) woman, laughing and cackling at other people's misery as she transforms her shape. She certainly lives on in the Chinese imagination!

I think it was Redmond who said she's got worse and worse over the centuries. The earliest accounts said she was a bad woman, but didn't go too much into specifics. As time passed, more and more specific (and often horrible) details were added to her crimes, and she became positively genocidal.
 

marybluesky

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Stereotypes exist for reasons, the problem is misusing them to denigrate people.
Stereotypes exist for a reason but the reasons don't need to be permanent/inherent.

For instance we're talking about male/female characteristics. I live a developing country with very fast, breath-taking norm changes. 20 years ago seems like a century ago & I feel like having lived in several bodies in different time. Really I do. I'm not saying that the stereotypes have totally disappeared nor I confirm all the attempts against them, which are sometimes outrageous.

The things I'm going to mention happened in the west about half a century ago or maybe more (I know that female work force & suffrage are older phenomenon, I'm talking about the role of women in families- the so-called 50s wife material something). So there is nothing new, but as my observation is the source of my reasoning, I talk about it.

I see how most women from my generation (in bigger cities anyway) don't want/hesitate about having children, are far less nurturing than previous generations, aren't willing to be molded by men, or if they do, they resent it later and break up. Many women from the previous decades who had traditional marriages with classical male-female role regret it, many file for divorce. They feel like they have never lived as they wanted. Many girls (including myself) refuse to marry as they don't want to have a life like that of their mothers or older generations of women in their families. Many girls younger than 30 are focused on money and career success (and why not? After all money brings power).

So what's the point? That if being overly nurturing and molded by others was an inherent female thing that made the majority of women happy, they didn't jump on occasions to change, nor older generations regret not having lived like the younger ones. You can say that's the result of external changes but isn't this all the evolution is about?

However, hey, the Yins aren't even regarded as gentle and nurturing, rather idiot and destructive :)
 

marybluesky

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In those times the concept itself of YIN-YANG forces did not yet exist and most likely YIN meant the SHADY side of a mountain and YANG the SUNNY side.
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P.S: I find attributing "gentleness" to one gender and "aggressiveness" to the other utterly dangerous, as it justifies the cruelties of the latter, while regards any forceful reaction to the cruelty from the former to be out of character; so practically, the gentle would have to remain always the aggressive's victim.
 

hilary

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This isn't quite an answer to your original question, Mary (I think that's been done), but it's worth bearing in mind that, whatever social attitudes may be a) in the book or b) in the accreted tradition, the actual use of the oracle is a different thing. There, it has its own voice - and men consulting the Yi have always had to face the possibility that they might be described as the earth, or the second wife. I reckon an oracle is always, intrinsically disruptive, because no-one can control what it says.
 

surnevs

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Concerning Yin-Yang,
I'm not sure what it's named, The supreme ultimate?

tao-e-taoismo.jpg
Anyway, it's important to distinguish between the stationary and dynamic state here. That Yin should be feminine, weak, dark etc. fit's the state at the moment but is wrong seen in the light of evolution. Just as wrong as if one could imagine two people sitting at a table with a plate between, blue on one side and yellow on the other side, being asked for the colour of the plate.
Likewise, I think with the vocabulary at hand in bronze age China: it was more or less associated with the fact that back then it was the male who was hunting, defending and carrying heavy burdens thereby maybe being praised for more important in the struggle for survival (? today female can do all of that as well, thank's to "industrial wonders")
What I'm heading at here is that the words and expressions found in the received text should be taken metaphorically rather than literal (? being aware here that the text often in readings actually shall be taken literal - but I must confess here I'm in another discussion.) So when women in the I Ching are put in a light that won't be accepted today one must consider that the meaning underneath should be transformed into an image known today like with the King being an authority: So is today the media's, at least in democratic ruled areas.
All of this writing is sole as I see it; I can't link to any sources here (and btw with the help of translating tools) and I can be wrong seen in the light of other resources I know.
_______________________________________________

Added: I found an old example concerning the use of metaphors:


From my I Ching Log, 19' of June 2012

In a question concerning my economic situation, I received Hex. 37.2

Judgement: The Family. The perseverance of the woman furthers.

6 on the second place: She should not follow her whims. She must attend within to the food. Perseverance brings good fortune. [acc. Wilhelm/Baynes, Book I]

I'm on my own in my flat and no woman is present concerning my economy.

So, in brief, I reached the Reading to be:

" The Home. Economic stability furthers.

The economy shall not be placed under accidental whims. The economy must be solely for housekeeping. Perseverance brings good fortune."

And: " The critical point here is whether one can equal the woman with the economy. Remembering that the place of the women is within and that of the man is without, respectively the lower and upper trigram - and looking back to the time when men went for hunting and woman stayed back looking for children, cooking etc. it should be possible to see the similarities: the hunt is outside the home and the prey is brought home, the hunt equals his job and the prey equals the pay or the economy which is administered from within and out. The job is administered from without and in. The economy is brought in just like the woman in the lower trigram is in. Roughly seen this can equal the economy with the woman."




 
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charly

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P.S: I find attributing "gentleness" to one gender and "aggressiveness" to the other utterly dangerous, as it justifies the cruelties of the latter, while regards any forceful reaction to the cruelty from the former to be out of character; so practically, the gentle would have to remain always the aggressive's victim.
Hi Mary:

I´ve pointed to the fact tha misogynism didn't appear in en Zhouyi, say the statement and the lines, but in the much later commentarial tradition.

Of course that translations made by followers of the comentarial tradition like Wilhelm or Legge have tendency to modify the literal meaning of the received text looking for bettering the original through interpolations, interpretations, euphemisms an comentaries.

They bring a lot of spurious content that is difficult to filter if one believes that the translation only expresses in another language what is written in the Chinese original.

Maria Kayutina based in the analisis of numerous Zhou Bronze Scriptures says that mayBE the formulaic «SONS AND GRANDSONS» can be rightly translated otherwise. I wonder if «MANY CHILDREN AND CONTINUOUS POSTERITY».

(TO BE CONTINUED)

All the best,

Charly
 
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IrfanK

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I looked up Wilhelm's commentaries on 44 to try to remember why I didn't like them:

This hexagram indicates a situation in which the principle of darkness, after having been eliminated, furtively and unexpectedly obtrudes again from within and below. Of its own accord the female principle comes to meet the male. It is an unfavorable and dangerous situation, and we must understand and promptly prevent the possible consequences ....

The rise of the inferior element is pictured here in the image of a bold girl who lightly surrenders herself and thus seizes power. This would not be possible if the strong and light-giving element had not in turn come halfway. The inferior thing seems so harmless and inviting that a man delights in it; it looks so small and weak that he imagines he may dally with it and come to no harm.
So, all of a sudden, the powerful woman becomes the "inferior thing that seems so harmless and inviting," a symbolic representation of the inferior man.

Yuck.

A fine example of the Song dynasty neo-confucian misogynist attitudes. But nothing much to do with what the zhouyi says.

PS As you can see from my signature line, I still use Wilhelm as my primary resource. You just gotta make a few mental reservations when you use him.
 

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