If you had to create another chapter of the Yijing what would it be?

[Zimbali]

If you had to create another chapter of the Yijing what would it be?

Do you think all of life can be categorised in the 64 chapters, or do you think parts are missing of what you experience in entirety.

Maybe Clarity 65, or Intervention 65.

Is pigeon holing everything within 64 in itself an over simplification?

 

[pocossin]

Do you think all of life can be categorised in the 64 chapters

Yes. The hexagrams are the sixty-four phases of the human life cycle. I am now at 58.2.

 

[bradford]

I would add 14 more, for a total of 78, like the Tarot, and explore the Ba Gua or Eight Trigrams in their pure form, the Si Xiang or Four Emblems, introduced to the Yi in the Song, and Yin and Yang, first introduced to the Yi in the Han Dynasty's Ten Wings.

 

[sooo]

According to 63, followed by 64, a continuance of the complete cycle, I would say the system is complete. One can think of ten thousand redundancies.

That is not to say another system wouldn't require more or less; in many cases, a great many more. We do have a tendency to over complicate.

Watching an art instructor the other day. Asked, when do you know when to stop painting a subject? His answer was, when anything I add begins to take away.

 

[Trojina]

Is pigeon holing everything within 64 in itself an over simplification?

It's not that simple, if it were we wouldn't keep discussing it.

Anyway I feel it complete unto itself but if I had to add another hexagram I'd make hexagram 65 "Use your Common Sense". There are many answers that boil down to that but it's often not clear so if there were a hexagram that said straight "you can figure this out all by yourself so go and figure it out for yourself" that might be handy. I might call Hexagram 65 'No Oracular Assistance Necessary'.

Hmmm changing lines though ? They could be fun

 

[moss elk]

65.1 Before figuring it out for your self, remove head from posterior.

 

[Trojina]

65.2 You know what s/he said ? That's what s/he meant.


But there can be no hexagram 65 because all the combinations of line positions are taken.

Shame though


65.3 ? Any suggestions ?

 

[boyler]

... numerical system of the Changes is such that there is nothing that could be added, and there is nothing that could be taken away ... Changes are complete, as it is said in the Changes itself ...

 

[sooo]

A quarterly report card?

 

[lindsay]

If I could add one more hexagram, it would be a wild card standing for the Mystery. Call it the Black Swan. Not every question has an answer, not every question deserves an answer. Perhaps the Judgment would read, "Beats me! Darned if I know. You're on your own. Good luck with that."

 

[moss elk]

If I could add one more hexagram, it would be a wild card standing for the Mystery. Call it the Black Swan. Not every question has an answer, not every question deserves an answer. Perhaps the Judgment would read, "Beats me! Darned if I know. You're on your own. Good luck with that."

Sounds like a good candidate for line 5 to me.

 

[svenrus]

If you had to create another chapter of the Yijing what would it be?

Do you think all of life can be categorised in the 64 chapters, or do you think parts are missing of what you experience in entirety.

Maybe Clarity 65, or Intervention 65.

Is pigeon holing everything within 64 in itself an over simplification?

Adding space to the universe ?

I guess that an ancient system like this had been tried to been expanded several times and probably without luck. And those who had tried wasn't stupid either...

In 'The great Treatice', Book II, chapter XI (On the yarrow stalks and the hexagrams and lines), § 2, Wilhelm/Baynes "I Ching or book of changes", it's indicated that the numbers seven and eight makes the basis for partly using the number 49 when summing up the stalks of yarrow and 64 when determining the field of action (7 x 7 and 8 x 8).
The number three is the basis for the whole system hence the eight trigrams and, I suppose, can't be expanded further if the logic should be holded/kept with.
It would have been nice if the number twelve was the base as one then could compare the system with the cyclus of the year.... wouldn't it ?
----

With that in mind I would say the chapter to be added should be me/myself/One self/the Individual....

 

[sooo]

Adding space to the universe ?

Though not an astrophysicist, it seems to me that while the universe is still expanding, the space for further expansion is infinite. I always imagine the Dao being more female, and the ten thousand things being the male particles, somewhat like spermatozoa finding their way to the womb. Perhaps that one that is Svenrus is the one self that succeeded? At least in your universe.

 

[svenrus]

I agree in that; but the circle is still a circle no matter how much it's expanded. Either I can choose to believe in that the I is perfect - of course with it's translationmisseries taken into account - or not. This is completely up to me. Whether it then in fact is perfect, thats not up to me. So my knowledge has limitations and will allways have limitations; I prefer to believe in that it's true what's handed down through millenias past unnumbered amound of people; but not that the translations necessarily is correct.

 

[blue_angel]

It all seems to be here in these 64 hexagrams, in one form or another. 65 for me then would be the after life. What's after our experience here on earth. And 66 what was before this life. And 67 What's after the after life. Giggle.

 

[sooo]

I agree in that; but the circle is still a circle no matter how much it's expanded. Either I can choose to believe in that the I is perfect - of course with it's translationmisseries taken into account - or not. This is completely up to me. Whether it then in fact is perfect, thats not up to me. So my knowledge has limitations and will allways have limitations; I prefer to believe in that it's true what's handed down through millenias past unnumbered amound of people; but not that the translations necessarily is correct.

I've no difficulty with that.

It is also possible that heaven and earth, as it is perceived and experienced here on earth, may have a different constitution of laws elsewhere, such as within a different dimension. Even within the same heaven and earth this is increasingly becoming the case. Would the same Yijing function the same way with the same cause and effect principle within the itty bitty quantum universe? Or, perhaps that is the field in which the I is always operating. Perhaps that is where Lindsay's Black Swan exists - down the rabbit hole.

(crossed posts with blue_angel)

 

[lindsay]

This is a very interesting discussion, this business of 64+ hexagrams. But there is another aspect to it that bothers me. As Svenrus and others suggest, the system of 64 hexagrams is perfect. Given 2 kinds of lines and 6 positions, there can only be 64 hexagams. So the Yi is essentially a closed system. Everything you can possibly ask about must fall into 64 categories. If you imagine all of reality as a pie, then each reading serves you one or two pieces. But what exactly is included in each piece?

Well, that's another problem. The problem that bothers me most is the Yi's perfection. Do closed systems alleged to include everything really exist? Take for example the English alphabet. Is it really possible to spell out every sound a human being, even an English person, can utter with the existing 26 letters? Or are there sounds we make outside the alphabet's range? Another example is divine revelation in theology. Is it true that God's revelation is complete and final, that nothing can be added or subtracted to what God revealed two thousand years ago?

In a way, fixing on 64 hexagrams is like saying, "There are only two kinds of people in the world: short people and tall people." This may be true, but does it really offer an adequate way to categorize humanity? How useful is it?

Someone is bound to say, "What rubbish! The Yi doesn't just rely on 64 variables. Each hexagram has 6 lines of two types, solid and broken, and each line can be old or young, thus creating the possibility of changing into other hexagrams with their own significant lines. And then there are the component trigrams and other derivable structures. In all, thousands of possible permutations exist."

Yes, I say, but you are still inside the box, inside the perfect system. Everything has been pre-defined, nothing new can be added or taken away. Perhaps the pie can be cut into ten thousand pieces instead of sixty four, but each one has a number (like, the Bible says, the hairs on your head).

So what kind of universe do you live in? A closed system that limits what is possible, or an open one, where new things appear every so often? Can the Yi predict a miracle?

 

[sooo]

Take for example the English alphabet. Is it really possible to spell out every sound a human being, even an English person, can utter with the existing 26 letters? Or are there sounds we make outside the alphabet's range?

Dattsa one abigga pie! But let me take just one bite from this alphabet example because I think it capsulizes your point beautifully and simply.

The answer is, no. Listen to any of many indigenous tongues, and there are sounds that no alphabet can pronounce. Each language is its own closed system. Even more, the word "cough" sounds nothing like an actual cough. How can you spell the sound of blowing your nose, or giving someone "the raspberry"? The closed system is limited to that system.

A friend created a fairy oracle, and there are only so many cards in her deck, the same as with Tarot. Each system is a system unto itself. What's interesting is that, though there are no direct correlations from one to another, the same ideas can be and are expressed somewhere within any given system. Some will call "Rubbish" on that idea too; the Bible, for instance doesn't belong in the same catagory, to which I say, "Rubbish", but those who consider the Bible a book of metaphor would likely have no problem agreeing with me. Here enters the problem of prejudice: my oracle is better than your oracle . An uninformed view, as I see it, regardless which system follower says it. The point is, it is its own closed system. A computer system functions on 1's and 0's (pardon improper spelling). It is perhaps the most versatile and generous of all man-made systems in the history of mankind, and likely beyond, out there, somewhere. It is also the most open system in terms of what can be created by stringing together like pearls nothing more than 1's and 0's. Perhaps the only other string as vast and complex is DNA - I'm not even going to touch the possibilities within "String Theory".

The missing component of the I Ching pie, the Black Swan as it were, is the subjective effect and interpretation. Like a pallet of 64 colors, it is the painter which breaks through the system, and through any system. That's why, like a snow flake, each person, each living thing, has it's own individual DNA. We are more than robots, more than a computer, more than a closed system.

 

[ginnie]

If I could add one more hexagram, it would be a wild card standing for the Mystery. Call it the Black Swan. Not every question has an answer, not every question deserves an answer. Perhaps the Judgment would read, ". . . You're on your own. Good luck with that."

I think 20.4 just about says that. Yi reserves its answer and says "Go there and find out for yourself."

I just asked the I Ching what state it is in, as I've been very impressed lately with how it responds to our thoughts, and how much I've come to rely upon it. Yi said: 63 unchanging -- which I understand to mean: settled and complete, ever keeping the pot on the boil. Seems that the I Ching has no urge to grow larger . . . I thought this was interesting, given the question of 64+ hexagrams . . .

 

[anemos]

was thinking DNA too, reading Lidsay's post. For constructed by only four elements , the variety is vast. If i recall correct we have about 25000-30000 genes to start making combinations stem from those 4

Also, lets look at our body. most of its functions is an on-off kind of relay. however this simple process supports a huge amount of different functions. Like Yi, its a system with such rules . its not the 64 * 6 lines or the possible combinations we can get but the context - the patterns iow.

I recall when i saw for the first time the "game of Life" animation. A simple rule but the pattern appeared was uncountable- ( will try to find a link) but the feeling was in simple matrix something was alive and growing.

I personally like the pre-heaven notion and the duality - its more "clean and clear" yet more "open even in a closed system.

Reading those last posts a question popped out. What situation everyone of us haven't found in Yi. Is it the number of lines or hexagrams or the pattern that can answer for a lost key or a personal mater or art or anything else. ?

 

[anemos]

In a way, fixing on 64 hexagrams is like saying, "There are only two kinds of people in the world: short people and tall people." This may be true, but does it really offer an adequate way to categorize humanity? How useful is it?

That's an interesting question !!! Categories seems to be practical because maybe we are wired to think like that and built up knowledge. Useful is not always,imo, because categorizing has its limitations and sometimes we need to make decisions on what to take into account and what to ignore. But , if its a system for human's capacities shouldn't be designed in such ways so humans could understand it ?

What if Yi is perfect and predicts things we can't understand ? for instance, many here have asked if there is life after death, why we dream and such. Yi gives answer but are we sure we understand them ?

So what kind of universe do you live in? A closed system that limits what is possible, or an open one, where new things appear every so often? Can the Yi predict a miracle?

Why not ? In genetics I think is what we call mutations - the unexpected or accidents which are not always harmful.

 

[blue_angel]

"Dattsa one abigga pie!" I can hear my grandmother now! Thank you for that Bruce! And I will raise my hand in agreeing the Bible is a book of metaphor. Ah, but my oracle IS better than your oracle of course


My first thought was that it is not closed, nor will it ever be. It is revolving like the earth on its axis and forever evolving with human kind. The book of changes, changes. This is why it has become open to interpretation, different perspective, languages, and different translations altogether. It evolves with us through our time. As our society and cultures evolves so does its translations. So long as one is in touch with ones own true nature and spirit, the new translation will come through. Just have to be open to it. Like this... http://download.manycam.com/effects/get?f=l&i=1892&v=1.00 Not a closed circle, but a circle that continues to expand with time as needed.


However, after reading Bruce's post, I am open to it being a closed system. As it made sense. Will have to allow that to sit with me a while, and settle, to see how it rises back up of course.


Anemos, I am not sure I understand your question, as my mind is blown right now. But what I see is different signs popping up in each reading, at least for me. It seems to work by answering through different ways. I know this may sound weird. But as I mentioned in my post on shared readings, sometimes it will answer with images, pertaining to astrological signs or elements. Sometimes not. Sometimes its showing me how a situation wil evolve through the weather.


Its a matter for me of feeling very tuned in. Very free...? In a some what meditative state and open to all signs and possibilities. Then as I am looking through the answers, things, words, or images start to pop out. It starts coming together like a story told. And what doesn't belong, my mind, or eyes just don't take much notice. And if I don't understand it completely the first time, the answer comes again in clearer, and different ways. So long as I stay open. Sometimes through different people. And its something I can feel, as sure as I breathe. Then the real miracle is when it happens in front of me or when someone else tells the story of what already happened. Like proof of a giant puzzle or pie, piecing together.


I think the same reading can be a different answer for a different person under different circumstances. That to me means, there are not only 64 hexagrams and 6 lines, not if the translation can be open to change. Like in art, blue and green make turquoise, right? But it can make other colors as well, depending on how much more blue or more green is added.

 

[anemos]

What situation everyone of us haven't found in Yi. Is it the number of lines or hexagrams or the pattern that can answer for a lost key or a personal mater or art or anything else. ?

Anemos, I am not sure I understand your question, as my mind is blown right now. But what I see is different signs popping up in each reading, at least for me. It seems to work by answering through different ways. I know this may sound weird. But as I mentioned in my post on shared readings, sometimes it will answer with images, pertaining to astrological signs or elements. Sometimes not. Sometimes its showing me how a situation wil evolve through the weather.

You mean the quoted question blue angel ?

My question had to do with Lindsay's underlining question, if have understood him well. I'm not sure if Yi is an open or closed system. To me makes more senses as a chaotic system- very dynamic. It has rules but doesn't exclude randomness.

The feeling when I get a reading is that there is always a gap the querent has to fill. The querant is part of the system at least this is my believe so far and this is why I can't totally agree with the idea of closed system.

On the other hand, if Yi can't describe situations that other systems can , then its a closed system and limited or focused on specific features /patterns. So this is why I asked that question to all of you that have experience with other systems of this kind so we can share any difference you have observed. i.e tarot covers a X area that Yi can't due to its rules .

64, 6 , 3 etc , in my eyes its just classifications for practical reasons. if we had the time and knowledge to play and instead of a 3 line unit brake down it in 2-line unites then another classification would born. But in essence would be a different "system" ( can't find a better word atm) ? Or , in other words , what if we say that there are just two situations ? ( on /off) . Does it make it a finite system ?

Its very common to me when get a line finding - at least- two opposite ideas and narratives , not only in the lines that the conditions are explicit. We have to arrange and rearrange the different features so that it will make a narrative that makes senses to use. But does this narrative is the "correct" one ? I'll never be sure.

there is not such a thing as a red apple out there, the red apple is in our mind.

 

[blue_angel]

What if there are no rules? There are are only rules if that is what rings true for us? But then if we believe there are rules when in fact there are not. Doesn't that make us closed and not the Yi? And what if there are not only two ways to interpret any one line or reading? What if there are many?

When we are using any system who is it we're communicating with? If we are communicating with guardian angels, ancestors, God, whoever is out there to help and guide, how can there be any rules? As the system would no longer be closed but open and designed specifically for the person using it in that moment of time.

Or perhaps the person that believes the the power lies within their own intuition, still there can be no
rules because it would then change according to that particular individual. Rules may be good for
the beginner, the person getting started but once that person takes off into their own spiritual
existence, the rules begin to dissolve. What stays behind is what that person is meant to experience
in this life time. And it would be different for each person because each person is on their own path,
living their own experience.

For me Yi is the most open system out of all other systems available to us, if we are considering tarot ect. We do not have only the lines available but an image, a judgment, a commentary. I am not sure I can explain in depth where I am coming from so that it will be understood.

When I want a closed answer, or simply a source of inspiration, I go to Tarot. But I know when I go to Tarot, the message I need in order to grow is most likely not going to come through. Sometimes growing though can be painful and we need a break, some rest, and maybe some water, nurturing. Whoever it is we are communicating with in our great universe and beyond knows this already. At least this is what I see.

 

[Lilly-La]

Hex. 65 would be 'Poker'

The king enters the temple and steps onto the tigers tail. He brings the message: play.
It is well to strive upward,
It is not well to remain below.
No blame. Great fortune.

65.1: seeing red and seeing black is fortunate.
Sweet limitation brings good fortune.
No blame

65.2 it furthers one to cross the great water.
Seductive joyousness when counting your toes.
Step forward without regrett.

65.3 The superior man never joins with his neighbor.
Heavy rain keeps the lake filled. Little rain dries out the well.
Perseverance is favorable.

65.4 If the Great man busies himself with trivial things,
He draws down misfortune upon himself.
Seeing red and seeing black is unfortunate.

65.5 Only those numbers
On whom a man fixes his conscious thoughts
Will follow. Play the Lords numbers.
Tears in floods, sighing and lamenting.
Good fortune.

65.6 Not going out of the gate and the courtyard
Brings misfortune.

 

[sooo]

rules

I'm admittedly out of my depth, but what the heck, we're just dancing in the abyss here anyway.

I don't particularly like thinking of Yi's closed system as rules, but more as structure and classifications, compartmentalization, as in 60. "In relation to the moral sphere it means the fixed limits that the superior man sets upon his actions-the limits of loyalty and disinterestedness. - In human life too the individual achieves significance through discrimination and the setting of limits. Therefore what concerns us here is the problem of clearly defining these discriminations, which are, so to speak, the backbone of morality. Unlimited possibilities are not suited to man; if they existed, his life would only dissolve in the boundless. To become strong, a man's life needs the limitations ordained by duty and voluntarily accepted. The individual attains significance as a free spirit only by surrounding himself with these limitations and by determining for himself what his duty is." - Wilhelm. I also think of "moral" in a very broad sense, as in which is the most fruitful path in the long run.

These classifications fall into two sub-catagories: universal and man-made. It seems the IC offers to join these two, therefore what applies to nature, in the broadest sense of nature, also applies to man. In this sense, there is no supernatural, there is only nature we understand and nature we do not yet understand.

If the IC was an entirely open system, there would be no way to discern a useful answer from a useless answer, other than what we choose to make from a random bunch of symbols. But the symbols would have no organized meaning, therefore we can interpret it to mean whatever we wish it to, which would defeat any logical reason for asking the IC a question. We might as well just have a good talk with ourselves without input from the IC. We might as well just scribble six, seven or ten whatever arbitrary lines and do away with coins or any means by which to establish order within the lines. I suppose there could be usefulness in this approach, but it wouldn't be using the IC system, it would be using our wishes, or our reason at best. Wishes and reason have their place but the whole point of the IC is to provide a system by which we can organize our thoughts to fit with a universal order of reason, not to simply indulge our imagination alone. We don't need an IC to do that. If we're not ready to receive and ponder the reasoning of this order, we're really just wasting our time and whatever intelligence the IC offers to us. This seems highly disrespectful, and a teacher (according to the IC) will just ignore our further inquires, which will lead to confusion, chaos and disillusion. This, as Spock would say, is illogical.

 

[Lilly-La]

Duality

Hi sooo,

there would be no way to discern a useful answer from a useless answer, other than what we choose to make from a random bunch of symbols.

there is no useful answer as you expect it - and yes, you can draw some lines and look up the Yi. The Yi presents the world/reality as we! create/think it is: in duality.
There are 4 basic ingredients in dual thinking/creation: Creative Energy (Hex.1), Space (Hex2), Time (Hex 63 + 64) Past + Future.

Our brain continously splitts the world into duality (by thinking): good/bad, high/low, seperated/joined etc... Lake/Wind, Mountain/Thunder etc... you know the graphic symbol of Taiji which exactly represents this. The 60 images the Yi present are images of duality.

In fact the Yi only points out that there is a bud and later a blossom (change) - but without a bud there would be no blossom and(!) no blossom without a bud. If you merge the dualities back together you come to understand Dao. Dao is the same as eternity, presence, noumenal, beeingness ...

Our world, as we perceive it, is a concept and words are concepts of a concept... so the Yi is just a concept of a concept. And moral is just a concept too.

What you seek is not there.

 

[sooo]

If one hopes to exist in a world without duality, they won't find it here. The entire premiss of the IC is based on duality, the entire system is based on a series of relationships between separate entities and energies. If one wants to contemplate non-duality in meditation, that's fine, and walking into a speeding train will cause one to become one with the train.

 

[sooo]

Our world, as we perceive it, is a concept and words are concepts of a concept... so the Yi is just a concept of a concept. And moral is just a concept too.

And what you've written of concepts is a concept too. I agree. I emphasized moral and nature in their broadest sense to try and avoid this conceptual debate. Of course our concepts are constructs, the IC is a construct, religions are a constructs, and thoughts we have about them are a construct. So the next time you draw on the insight from the IC, just forget it, put it away, because it's all a construct. That's always an option.

And, how do you know what I seek, or even if I seek, or whether it's here or there?

 

[Lilly-La]

Read the Yi Backwards

Hi sooo,

If one hopes to exist in a world without duality, they won't find it here.

in my eyes you are right and wrong at the same time. No duality, no Dao. No Dao, no duality. Somewhere in the IC or Appenix you find an interisting sentence: "if you want to know the tree go back to the seed".
Discard time (now is the only time there is), discard desires, discard judging, discard ego... means: see the big/huge human.

In Hex.1 the big/huge human is at least mentioned twice if i remember correctly. There is where everything starts. Again: No duality, no Dao. No Dao, no duality. I really hope you do understand me.