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heylise

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I finally could use the Yi for divination when I found myself what the lines really meant. Wilhelm is good, other translations often as well, and not speaking here about bad ones. Even with good ones it is not easy. But with really studying the text, finding the wide range of meanings, the 'base' of them, only then I could really make sense of it.

Even the best translation is always just part of the image. But for divination it is not very helpful when you have to put ten books around you and read in all of them. By the time you read the last one, you forgot the first. And your head is too full of things for being able to figure out anything.

So I think discussing meanings, dissecting characters and sentences, reading and learning, all of that helps to understand the text. And then, with that understanding, divination gets a lot more rewarding.

Just IMHO of course, which is after all the title of this thread.
 

bradford

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I finally could use the Yi for divination when I found myself what the lines really meant. Wilhelm is good, other translations often as well, and not speaking here about bad ones. Even with good ones it is not easy. But with really studying the text, finding the wide range of meanings, the 'base' of them, only then I could really make sense of it.

I found that too, only I would phrase it "when I began to discover why those words and images were used". That's when understanding begins. Look at line 40.1 for instance. This is the only case where a common expression, wu jiu, is used all by itself as the complete text of a line. To ask why of this is to go beyond taking this as some sort of literal gospel or prediction and see it asking you to examine the core meanings of "no blame", what it means to start disentangling ourselves by letting go and forgiving, which of course feeds back into our understanding of Hexagram 40 as a whole. Such an understanding is not just an intellectual exercise - it's trying to get inside the mind of the authors and occupy that point of view. It is this process that actually allows us to get free of literalness because we are understanding and identifying with the creative process of the writer. But it comes from being mentally rigorous and not just believing everything we hear and read. If I was only an academic or intellectual, my commentary would consist of nothing more that trying to explain what had been said, like in the boring hour of hooey that follows a president's speech. It's important to go beyond the words to the meaning. Then we can extrapolate to answer our questions better. Wang Bi, of course, had his thing about letting go of the words once their meaning was grasped. Unfortunately, he also had a tendency to let go before his understanding was ripe. And that's the big danger of accepting that philosophy. It could take fifty years of pondering before we really grok some of those lines.To be fair to Wang Bi, however, he died at age 24, when we all still know everything.
 

charly

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I'm very puzzled by several things in this thread:
... A little surprised by some of the statements that implicitly devalue others' efforts to approach and understand the Yi, thus taking the position of believing their own approach is the correct one and even thinking "divination" is all that is worthy of discussion about the classic. ...
Hi, Luis:

You know that I prefer discussion but maybe is nothing bad to get an encyclopedic culture.

Fortunately I get it being very young in such an authoritative source like «Cases & Things» (1) and «Divulge it» (2) from a countryman of yours, FOLA:


Fola+8.jpg

From: El oficio del plumín
at: http://eloficiodelplumin.blogspot.com/2008_07_01_archive.html

Translation:

LOWER THE RADIO!
Lower the volume, please.

CLICK ♫
sound made by the potenciometer

THANKS!
message of gratitude


Abrazo,


Charly
___________________________________
(1) Casos y Cosas, Vosotras Magazine, if I remember well.
(2) Divúlguelo, La Razón.
(3) ... pen name, of course, maybe Follari, Follarii...
 

bamboo

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I thnk Bob started this whole thread after he read another thread in which Frank and Brad were heatedly arguing about a definition from OED...he seemed to saying that haggling over minute differences in meanings can take away from "using the Yi"...I think.

but the whole discussion seemed to polarize two views that ought not to be polarized.The more it polarized, the more Bob felt he needed to dig his heels in deeper. ( He just wanted Brad to smile at him and pat his head, but that's not Brad's style:eek:)

Brad, Of course I understand your desire to steer newcomers to YiJing to the most accurate interpretation. If the Yi is going to be a meaningful and longterm tool, there absolutely has to be some serious study usually over a long time. And it is probably most helpful to start out with the best of interpretations, as you imply, so as not to imprint false or misleading ideas in the subconcious or conscious mind.

It seems to me that serious students of the Yijing, if they are going to continue the relationship, will by nature read more and more and study and learn. If they do not do this, I guess the YiJing just gets thrown up on some dusty shelf, filed away as a curious item to use at parties. Without understanding what it actually has to say, without a rich soup of authentic meanings and symbols, divination becomes a silly parlor game.

and some people get so engrossed in the characters and the meanings and the relationships, that divination becomes a dim secondary interest. The exploring and learning becomes its own kind of divination.

It may be like playing the piano. discipline before playfulness
 

larsbo_c

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The more precise translation the more precise answer!

If we make 64 verses with anything we want to write in seven lines each, it won't help no one very much, no matter if we go in to our sub consciousness. We can go in there any time with the help of a great number of different other good methods.
No, this particular book gives us answers we know is correct for us. I think that if we stick to something fairly close to what the author wrote down 2800 years ago in Zhou Yi disregarding later comments, we will have a much more precise answer. But I am not denying that we can have answers which help us to choose a hairdresser or finding a better job with a translation that is not so well done.
I started out with Da Liu and later added John Blofeld, they supplement each other very well I think, using them worked wonders for me, like your favorites did for you.
I found out more over the years, now I translate myself, with a firm academic basis, works better and better day by day.
Now, Stephen Karcher is a problem to me because he is very popular I see. His book is very far from being a loyal translation, just psychological New Age mumbo jumbo. It is painful for me to even just open the book.
So why do many people find it useful? Because the guy gives them what they want; a way into their sub consciousness. I read he has a PhD. But he is not a PhD of Classical Chinese, only Ph.D. from University of Connecticut in Comparative Literature/Archetypal Psychology. That’s why he can create lines and sentences that works with peoples sub consciousness. If he had a Ph.D. from Cambridge in Classical Chinese it might have been worth considering his "translation".
If sub consciousness is good or bad depends what person we are talking about since it is limited to this person. When we divine we ask God or Heaven, that was the intention by people 2800 years ago, we can't change that only maybe call it a different name if we like. But don’t confuse it with our own sub consciousness.
It was the core divinatory text that attracted both early and later commentators and admirers. If we think we can create something more useful by changing it or adding something we personally find useful, we are thinking too highly of our selves. Nor can we say it is the Wings that are the most important part of the clsassic, they are still just comments of admirers of the core text.

The more precise translation we use the more precise answers we get!
 
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rosada

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For some years I worked as a math tutor for all grade levels but mainly junior high students. I was able to observe first hand the joy of first graders discovering they could count but I also saw the other end of the spectrum, the disappointment and frustration the older students experienced when they could not do the equations and I saw the complete contempt so many of these folks ultimately had not only for the subject but also for the few who had managed to master it. What had gone wrong? Why had so many who had started out with such enthusiasm ended up thinking Algebra was a worthless pastime for the Nerdy Elite? It was not hard to figure out. At some point the students who hated math had been forced to proceed faster than their understanding could carry them. They had been required to move ahead to harder material before they had learned the level they were working on. Kids who didn't completely understand adding would be given a B and promoted to subtraction where the misunderstandings would be compounded, at which point they would be given a C and be promoted yet again until ultimately they would be in a class where math made no sense, where they were a complete failure and certainly math wasn't any fun.
It was my job to take them back to where they still had a solid understanding (shades of hex. 24 :rolleyes:) and then proceed one teensy step at a time from there. I always got such a kick out of seeing a child fall in love with math all over again, which happened frequently when they were no longer being required to pretend to understand more than they knew.
I think we have a similar situation with the I Ching. I really don't believe those who claim they are comfortable and complete with their own interpretations wouldn't opt for the ancient's understandings if they could get them. Unfortunately even if one has the books, the time and the patience there is still a lack of teachers to help fill in the gaps. Perhaps what is needed here is a set of lesson plans that would take a seeker from novice to master. I have been intending to take Hilary's course and I think now that I'm writing this out that next time it is offered I shall. Perhaps eventually she will create courses that could take us all the way to the top quality of understanding. If learning and mastering the I Ching were as orderly as mastering math - and there is no reason why it shouldn't be - there would probably be a great many more people interested in studying it. Hilary could issue diplomas and teaching credentials! We could be the founding faculty of The I Ching On Line Clarity College! Ah well, anyway, being a novice at this, I just want to say I love when the I Ching speaks to me, but I wish I spoke the language more fluently. Someday...
Rosada
 
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bradford

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Hi Rosada-
Just to pick a nit - way way down the educational line you may discover the silliness of using the term Master with regard to the Yijing, but you might consider dropping the term now. There just aren't enough centuries in a lifetime to get there, and anybody who makes that claim is just plain deluded.
But as to Hilary's courses, I find the name Clarity quite appropriate.
B
 
M

meng

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Is it possible to understand the Yijing and still not know those elements and phenomenon within ones self? If just knowing facts and structures were enough to earn a degree in Yiing, it would be missing the point. You should then get a degree in facts and structures, not in Yijing.

What separates an effective translator from an effective Yijing teacher or practitioner, or even student? They're clearly not the same thing.

As for the "master" or "mastering" thing, yeah, it's a bit silly, but that's true of everything, not just the Yijing. But it is relative, you know. Master can simply be a respectful word for teacher. I was assisting a young Chinese woman with her family and business affairs and decisions, years ago. She soon was calling me master, and thought it strange that she was learning from an American, Chinese wisdom. Master is no big deal, and every master should have one.
 

larsbo_c

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Hi Rosada. Nice comment!
However, you have an advantage because math is an exact science and everybody agrees on what the basic idea of math is.
There is generally no consensus on the subject of what I Ching is about. Proof of this is in the next post about the number of translations, and the bibliographies posted there. The many translations are so different that sometimes they could be completely different books with 64 verses.
Without a translation that is close to the authors original meaning it gets difficult to teach or learn. Without academic skills in this particular subject, how can you choose a book or teacher? It then gets down to how well you like or trust the teacher, not the text. Or you just have to trust what you yourself feel the book is about based on 30 completely different translations, not exactly an objective approach.
With regard to most translations this could be compared to the task of reviewing a book you have heard of from a dyslexic.
 
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Sparhawk

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If he had a Ph.D. from Cambridge in Classical Chinese it might have been worth considering his "translation".

Well, I suppose I should throw out the window a couple of my favorite translations, done by people that have spent more years than what's needed to obtain a PhD, studying Chinese...

Is that going to be your measuring stick to qualify translations? A PhD in Classical Chinese? You'll find yourself in a very lonely place... Did perhaps Rev. James Legge and Richard Wilhelm had PhD's (***)(in anything, let alone "Chinese")? You realize that "sinology" didn't start as a university degree, don't you? And since you mention Cambridge, what about Joseph Needham? The man's education and "PhD" was in "embryology"... What about Karlgreen, who had a degree in Russian and took Chinese later on as a personal interest...

Also, you keep mentioning "translations," as a focus, as if the only thing that's important to the scholarship of the Yijing were the core text of the Zhouyi, in a vacuum of historical context. There's much to read... :D As a matter of fact, the other day, while discussing 貞, you mentioned following Shaughnessy's model of taking the "Zhouyi core" for your reading and translation. I wonder, have you read his numerous works and translations of Chinese scholarship in places like Early China, JAOS, etc., discussing Shang and Early Zhou scripts? You brought Shaughnessy up in discussion but I think that if you pay some attention at what he has to say about certain old characters, in the historical context of the Zhouyi, you'd be appalled. Of course, you are free to feel qualified to dismiss his scholarship and take only what's "useful."

As I and others have mentioned before, Classical Chinese alone, as a subject of study and expertise, will take you nowhere regarding the Yijing. The Yijing is its own "species" as a literary work and its proper translation must be supported by several different scholarly disciplines.

BTW, if you want to read some serious reviews of Yijing books and translations, go here

(***) Correcting myself here, Rev. Jame Legge did have a doctorate, "Doctor in Laws" from the universities of Aberdeen and of Edinburgh... :D
 
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charly

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... a phsyciatrist... asked if he should marry her and then explained in detail how he had ended the relationship because he got 31 no lines. ... I told him 31 is usually understood to be an encouragement about marriage and he suddenly became very pale. Fortunately he had a very nice wife :)
Lars:

I apologize for not answering timely. I was very sad and miss the thread start. Now, scrolling back I found your post.

Maybe something from his unconscious carried him to not marry the girl, or maybe a not so bad understandign of H.31 that in the chinese text says:

xian2: all / in all cases / (influence , wooing for W/B)
heng1: sacrifice / feast / celebration / prosperous /

li4: advantage / benefit / profit /
貞zhen1: divination / omen / perseverance / chaste /

qu3: to fetch / to take / to get /
nu3: female / woman / young woman /
ji2: fortunate / lucky /

Appart that the character xian2 depicts an ax cutting off a head, maybe an advice for not losing your head in the celebration, the pertinent sequence only says:


FETCHING FEMALES LUCKY
catching women is lucky

Nothing about to marry them!

Of course, prudish interpreters took the similar qu3, to take a wife, to marry a woman for replacing the original character qu3, to fetch, that depict the action of taking a ear.

... ear + hand / action indicator → compress one's fingers about the ear of an enemy in taking him prisoner, symbolic of military exploits → take; grasp; take away; seize; rob; remove; eliminate → obtain; get (a prize / grade / salary etc.) ...

From: KanjiNetworks
An Etymological Dictionary of Chinese Character Interpretations
By Lawrence J. Howell and Hikaru Morimoto
at: http://www.kanjinetworks.com/

Psychiatrist know what the EAR means. Maybe at least the advice was not to marry, but something else.

Ending: no matters how nice the actual wife can be, the first bride always remains in the heart of a guy. Maybe the same passes with the 2nd., the 3rd. ... More the women, more the aptitude for understanding enigms. But this is another story.


Yours,

Charly
 
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Sparhawk

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Charly, me hiciste acordar de unas revistas viejas de Uruguay. River Plate humor is in a class by itself... :D
 

Sparhawk

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Charly, sometimes I think the Yijing was invented by Jaimito and his command of narrative "brevity":

La maestra le dice a sus alumnos que tienen 2 horas para hacer una
redacción y que el primero que la termine se puede ir a su casa.
La redacción deberá abordar 4 temas:

1. Sexo
2. Monarquía
3. Religión
4. Misterio

Jaimito fue el primero en entregar (1 minuto).

Su redacción decía:

¡SE COGIERON A LA REINA! ¡DIOS MIO! ¿QUIEN FUE?

For everyone else, "Jaimito" is the archetypal uber-mischievous kid in elementary school. Rough translation, though it sounds better in Spanish:

The teacher tells the class they have 2 hours to write a composition and that the first one to finish can leave the class for home. The composition must include the following four themes:

1. Sex
2. Monarchy
3. Religion
3 Mystery

Jaimito was the first one to finish, in under a minute.

His composition read:

THEY F***D THE QUEEN! MY GOD! ¿WHO'VE DONE IT?
Yup, Jaimito was a Zhou prince... :rofl:
 

charly

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... and some people get so engrossed in the characters and the meanings and the relationships, that divination becomes a dim secondary interest. The exploring and learning becomes its own kind of divination...
Dear Bamboo:

Trust me, diviners or readers are, in the case of YI, almost the same. Who goes to read a book like the YI if not interested in divination? There are many more interesting books of poetry or narrative for reading and studying.

I believe that you are looking form your own point of view, like a YiJing user and little have made for seeing from the other point of view. For some people wondering about words, meanings and new airs is a passion, not an intellectual excercise. So said Brad?

Aren´t you willing of taking a bit of this sort of toxic beverage? Why don´t you try to see the same landscape from another point of view? Does scare you to read the chinese text, even a short sequence, with your own eyes, no matters what you was said?

It´s a good trip and little dangerous. You can get help in any point of the way. It´s cheap, nothing onerous. But beware, can happen (1) exiting indemned or (2) falling in love with a YI that you still little know and not exiting at all.

Why don´t you try?


Yours,


Charly
 

bamboo

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Dear Bamboo:

Trust me, diviners or readers are, in the case of YI, almost the same. Who goes to read a book like the YI if not interested in divination? There are many more interesting books of poetry or narrative for reading and studying.

I believe that you are looking form your own point of view, like a YiJing user and little have made for seeing from the other point of view. For some people wondering about words, meanings and new airs is a passion, not an intellectual excercise. So said Brad?

Aren´t you willing of taking a bit of this sort of toxic beverage? Why don´t you try to see the same landscape from another point of view? Does scare you to read the chinese text, even a short sequence, with your own eyes, no matters what you was said?

It´s a good trip and little dangerous. You can get help in any point of the way. It´s cheap, nothing onerous. But beware, can happen (1) exiting indemned or (2) falling in love with a YI that you still little know and not exiting at all.

Why don´t you try?


Yours,


Charly

I am not sure, but I think you misunderstood me Charly. I was just musing about that, not saying it was especially true of anyone here. It can seem to me that it would be a possibility that someone might become so interested in the Yijing as a text that divination would be a secondary interest...and that is not something I am critical of in any way. I think the Yijing is a fascinating text for study and one worthy of passion. I have my own little book of Chinese figures, actually very old, and found in my father's things after he died. It is something I love to pore over. I consider myself not very knowledgeable and studied when it comes to Chinese figures, but it is not something I disdain, in any way, I love to read the threads where the figures are discussed. If I had another fifty years to live, I might even consider making it a serious study, like my dad did. For now, I benefit tremendously from the studies of others like Brad and hilary and Harmen and I am so grateful for the wider understanding I have gotten.

Bob's thread started with his idea that Yijing divination, in and of itself, could be playful and leave the imagination open to images and connections that sometimes might stray from the original meanings of the chinese figures. I am not in disagreement with that.

all the best:bows:
 

charly

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... you misunderstood me Charly... I have my own little book of Chinese figures, actually very old, and found in my father's things after he died. It is something I love to pore over... If I had another fifty years to live, I might even consider making it a serious study, like my dad did...
Hi, Bamboo:

I apologize.

What is the book? Might you post some picture? Maybe you have some more about Dad to share?

An advice: don´t make nothing serious. Better to do NOW something funny than waiting so much for doing serius study.

Are you Jungian? Why so much interested in Bob´s posts?

I believe that Jung was a nice guy more interested in women and money than in scientific research, be said in his favor.

He had a double personality: outer formal, inner passional.

So passed with much people.


Yours,


Charly
 

larsbo_c

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As I and others have mentioned before, Classical Chinese alone, as a subject of study and expertise, will take you nowhere regarding the Yijing.
Thanks for the lecture from you all. But of course it will take me somewhere! don't be silly! Being able to read classical Chinese is an indispensable prerequisite for translating! There were not really much Sinology at the time of Karlgren and all the others you mention, they were the ones who created the whole basis of the Sinology. So point not taken!
And it seems to me you keep defending that translations can be extremely different and still all make sense. So basically you like what translators have put into the text, not the original text itself. In that sense you actually don't show much respect for the original text do you?
Of course I don't mean that being able to read the original text is the only measure, I myself spent nearly twenty years studying this book every single day viewing it from different angles. But without being able to read it I'd surely be stuck; with 113 different translations to choose from.
The Yijing is its own "species" as a literary work and its proper translation must be supported by several different scholarly disciplines.
So you believe that even if we could translate it almost perfectly it’s so difficult to understand that you need a PhD in psychology etc. to understand it? I agree it's difficult, but that is because it’s so ancient. We didn't really have the means to translate texts like this before, because it is very time consuming to make databases of all the old characters from the most ancient text on oracle bones etc. Also oracle bone texts and bronze vessel texts were usually very simple, not really representing the everyday language. What about all the many other more ordinary texts that were lost: poems, messages, war strategies, deeds, farming manuals etc? if we had those it would be much easier to know the language, but they were written on bamboo, leather and silk and were of course lost. The bone and bronze texts are really not very good for learning the ancient language, but it's all we got and the people working with it have come far already. If Legge and Karlgren were alive today they would have had a much better chance. In my opinion you don’t have to be a psychic to understand this text, it was written in plain daily-life ancient Chinese.

The Mawangdui text is still surprisingly regarded by some people as a valid edition that can be used to pick characters from whenever there is something they don't understand. Then they just twist and bend it a bit and voila! we got a translation. Useless of course. Karlgren proved that he could reconstruct the sounds of ancient Chinese, so fortunately we know the sounds. The Mawangdui text sounds just like the other versions, and I don't know many people today that are silly enough to still think it was not made by a copyist who listened to the text from someone who knew it by heart! And yet we still see people take characters from it to make fit how they like. We also still see cutting and twisting definitions from dictionaries not at all relevant for this period. We even see ”translators” who don’t even bother to check a wider range of text examples than found in the dictionaries. Should be basic stuff really.
Is this what you see as a broad academic and insightful approach?
 

bradford

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I believe that the word "alone" was meant to be the most important word in Luis' sentence, and that seems to have been skipped over. The academic study of Classical Chinese alone does not confer any philosophical perspective. or any sense of how grammatical context shapes a word's meaning.
Maybe this would be an appropriate analogy to what Luis said: Mathematics alone, as a subject of study and expertise, will take you nowhere in the study of science". Mathematics completely lacks the real-world observation that science requires, and yet science also goes nowhere without mathematics.
 
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Sparhawk

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I believe that the word "alone" was meant to be the most important word in Luis' sentence, and that seems to have been skipped over. The academic study of Classical Chinese alone does not confer any philosophical perspective. or any sense of how grammatical context shapes a word's meaning.
Maybe this would be an appropriate analogy to what Luis said: Mathematics alone, as a subject of study and expertise, will take you nowhere in the study of science". Mathematics completely lacks the real-world observation that science requires, and yet science also goes nowhere without mathematics.

Thanks! At least someone was paying attention to the emphasis giving underlines I use in my posts, when warranted... :D
 

bradford

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I guess where the math analogy breaks down is that Classical Chinese studies, particularly etymology, phonetics and context criticism are nowhere near the exact sciences that they pretend to be - their premises and methodologies are riddled with specious reasoning and logical fallacies. This does not invalidate all of their findings, but it does suggest that they be used with a greater degree of humility than anybody has seen so far in academic circles.
 

Sparhawk

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Thanks for the lecture from you all. But of course it will take me somewhere! don't be silly! Being able to read classical Chinese is an indispensable prerequisite for translating!

Please, I'm well aware of being a Latino using English as a second language and that you are a Dane in the same position and that we are forced to share English as lingua franca, but try to pay attention at the way I phrase my posts and where I place the emphasis to the points I'm trying to make. I'm painstakingly careful to convey the proper message. I believe I used, not only the word "alone," but I also underlined it so it wouldn't be missed. Alas, it appears you did miss it...

Now, you talk about us 'lecturing you' and I can't but smile at the irony of it. I'm not the one flashing academic credentials and saying the Holy Grail of a proper Yijing translation rests in the hall of academically learned Classical Chinese.

There were not really much Sinology at the time of Karlgren and all the others you mention, they were the ones who created the whole basis of the Sinology. So point not taken!
Ah, but you seem to have missed my point, so, how can you take it? What I clearly implied is that "academic credentials (i.e. a pretty diploma on your wall)" (yup, that's going to be difficult to miss...) in Classical Chinese is not a requisite for a person with the drive to, not only learn Classical Chinese outside of an established institution, but also apply said learning, as one more tool, in the translation of the classics. That's why I used the examples of Legge, Karlgren, Wilhelm and Needham: THE MEN HAD NO ACADEMIC DEGREES IN CLASSICAL CHINESE TO BACK UP THEIR KNOWLEDGE. Not only because they didn't exist but because an established university degree in the field was never a necessity for anybody to properly learn the language and they only needed their personal interest and their drive to learn it. Still, to these days, the men are beacons in the field of Sinology.

And it seems to me you keep defending that translations can be extremely different and still all make sense. So basically you like what translators have put into the text, not the original text itself. In that sense you actually don't show much respect for the original text do you?
I'm defending only what I know to be very thoughtful and careful translations, that not only provide the "translated words" but also the rationale behind their choice of words. Also, in that list you are compiling in the other thread, and by your words above, you appear to be placing all those books in the same class, the class of "translations." Only a very small percentage of those books are actual translations. The rest are the personal interpretations (not translations) of their authors upon the already translated words by that small percentage, and usually only upon the Legge and/or Wilhelm translations. If you are going to take the 95% or so of the books in that list as a measure of "accuracy in translation" it is no small wonder you would interpret the field of Yijing translation to be in a dismal state. Heck, I would too.

Of course I don't mean that being able to read the original text is the only measure, I myself spent nearly twenty years studying this book every single day viewing it from different angles. But without being able to read it I'd surely be stuck; with 113 different translations to choose from.
Well, welcome to the club. Nothing really peculiar in that fact. I hope you are not mistaken in believing some of us started studying the Yijing when this online forum came about. For the rest, read above.

So you believe that even if we could translate it almost perfectly it’s so difficult to understand that you need a PhD in psychology etc. to understand it? I agree it's difficult, but that is because it’s so ancient.
You are the only one quoting the need for PhD's in different fields; certainly not me... What I said is that "knowledge" in different fields, which can be obtained regardless of being inside or outside of academia, is indeed necessary to properly translate the text of the Yijing and that the sole ability to read Classical Chinese, as a singular discipline, falls way short of the necessary set of tools to do so. I don't know how to express it more clearly...

We didn't really have the means to translate texts like this before, because it is very time consuming to make databases of all the old characters from the most ancient text on oracle bones etc. Also oracle bone texts and bronze vessel texts were usually very simple, not really representing the everyday language. What about all the many other more ordinary texts that were lost: poems, messages, war strategies, deeds, farming manuals etc? if we had those it would be much easier to know the language, but they were written on bamboo, leather and silk and were of course lost. The bone and bronze texts are really not very good for learning the ancient language, but it's all we got and the people working with it have come far already. If Legge and Karlgren were alive today they would have had a much better chance. In my opinion you don’t have to be a psychic to understand this text, it was written in plain daily-life ancient Chinese.
I'm sorry to point this, but you are evidencing a certain lack of knowledge in ancient Chinese epigraphy and paleography and the philology that derived from that study. Do you really believe that those Shang and Zhou men inscribing plastrons and scapulae, the "literati" of their time, documenting their official contemporary affairs in that way, would reserve a better and clearer way of writing their thoughts for their "day-to-day life"? That they reserved a "plainer" Chinese for themselves? That they used some sort of "telegraphic" format for their official business and they would write the other stuff, not only in a plainer format, but more elaborately in their daily communications? Seriously? Please, pick up a few books and scholarly articles by David Keightley, David Nivison, Victor Mair, and Shaughnessy, to name a few.

The Mawangdui text is still surprisingly regarded by some people as a valid edition that can be used to pick characters from whenever there is something they don't understand.
Unless you have access to an older extant version of a nearly complete Zhouyi/Yijing, unknown to us, than the Mawangdui, I think the text deserves some respect as a reference for translations. Are you perhaps placing all your bets on the Zhou yi zhe zhong (周易折中), compiled in 1715, as the real and truly accurate version of the ancient Zhouyi when that has some 2000 years worth of transcriptions by different philosophical schools through the ages? I mean, it is really a personal choice and all serious contemporary translations are based on it, but thinking that something compiled in 1715 is the exact image of the ancient Zhouyi is a huge leap of faith.

The Mawangdui text sounds just like the other versions, and I don't know many people today that are silly enough to still think it was not made by a copyist who listened to the text from someone who knew it by heart! And yet we still see people take characters from it to make fit how they like. We also still see cutting and twisting definitions from dictionaries not at all relevant for this period.
Please read above as to why they might be using the Mawangdui text as a reference. You speak of possible copyist errors and I wonder how many more copyists it took, over millennia, to compile the Zhouyi Zhe Zhong in 1715 versus the Mawangdui text, which was buried about 168 B.C. ...

We even see ”translators” who don’t even bother to check a wider range of text examples than found in the dictionaries. Should be basic stuff really.
Is this what you see as a broad academic and insightful approach?
Who said those serious enough to actually attempt to "translate" the Yijing in a rigorous way do not check other text examples? You must be talking about the other 95% of books with the title "I Ching" that are sold everywhere. Anyone that can toss three coins, have an presumed gift for fortune telling, and can write more than two sentences in a coherent way, can publish one of those. Well, I agree, that's mostly junk and not translations.

Curious, just to give you a closer example, have you downloaded Bradford Hatcher's work? Go here. Is free. Read all of it and then come back and tell me that's not a thoroughly researched translation that took a "broad academic and insightful approach" to accomplish.
 

Sparhawk

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This does not invalidate all of their findings, but it does suggest that they be used with a greater degree of humility than anybody has seen so far in academic circles.

Amen, but who can place to much blame on them for coming up with some conclusions and educated guesses? For example, I'm having a really fun time (fun as entertaining and not derogatory) reading a forum on "An Examination of Whether the Charges in Shang Oracle-Bone Inscriptions are Questions" (Early China 14, 1989) where a number of known scholars argue, from very opposite positions, the fine details of how to read those inscriptions and what characters should be used or not as interrogative particles.

An article full of 貞, BTW, but besides the point... :D
 

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Hi All,

There are so many interesting points and perspectives mentioned in this thread with so little mutual understanding (or interest, it seems) in all that diversity. There rarely is a pure quibble over some fine point of text which isn't only a detail in a much larger argument in policy or belief.

The wonder of the I Ching is that is that it is able to give useful divination answers through its oracle to an amazing range and diversity of folks in their own individual terms. This thread began with the unexamined assumption divination worked by reflecting the individual unconscious. However, there is as much evidence in the research of those who care about such things that the Oracle speaks quite objectively although it answers individual subjective questions.

What do the words of the text, either ancient or modern truly command? I noticed one post speaking how "hex 33 retreat" was clear and simple. However, retreat in ancient military terms (cf. Sun Tzu) was the one maneuver where a commander of a small force could find personal freedom in his battle. It is much closer in meaning and intent to our modern term Flight involving an airplane that takes off into a new dimension of personal freedom.

The Yi community has at its core the group of folks who have found personal meaning and wonder from their use of the Yi Oracle to answer their own particular questions. Trying to make an objective judgment based upon such subjective personal roots is always difficult to get right in any way.

I am still amazed at the general agreement that the King Wen Sequence is an 8x8 checkerboard of hexagram pairs when the text is laid out in terms of 2 halves, the first of 30 hexagrams. The layers of context, prejudice, expectations and projections involved in each and every one of the views expressed would make several doctoral dissertations just to objectively describe and document their roots and development.

However, in the end the miracle remains that the divination techniques of the Yi work over the millennia to provide each person who consults the Oracle their own counsel that can make sense to them in their own terms and understanding. Nothing else comes even close to that universal capacity...

Frank
 

bamboo

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Hi All,


However, in the end the miracle remains that the divination techniques of the Yi work over the millennia to provide each person who consults the Oracle their own counsel that can make sense to them in their own terms and understanding. Nothing else comes even close to that universal capacity...

Frank

I think that is well said.
we love the same river and it is wide and mysterious

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sHKZkH6i20&NR=1
 

larsbo_c

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Luis:
Let's not start a war :) I think my arguments are very innocent:

1. You need to be able to read what you translate. I haven't been flashing anything, only stressing the importance of education, you can't learn this from sitting with Matthews at home.

2. I believe the Zhou Yi is a whole lot simpler to read than we think. We just can't see it without a context. The context is a little difficult to establish, but I believe it can be done.

3. I think that if we try to dig into the grammar and translate on a basis of a framework, we can determine which edition is most original. I think 1715 edition is very accurate and original; only need to slightly adjust one single character.
Kinky eh? :)

4. Mawangdui was just a grave text like grave money of clay etc. Shaughnessy's translation makes absolutely no sense. Seen anybody use it for divination?

5. I don't believe you have to take a myriad of things into consideration to understand and translate this text. It is good to know the surroundings of the subject but it can also take our focus away from the basic problems of reading it. I firmly believe it can be done with a combination of clever reading skills and respect for the original.

6. I believe no one has the right to put any personal ideas into this text themselves like Karcher do. We need to be objective.

7. I agree that we get answers from lesser translations, but I think it is not optimal.
Better translations, more nuanced and precise answers.

These viewpoints shouldn't provoke anybody.

If I sounded a little harsh it was because I don't think you have the right to lecture me. This is an open forum, if we attack each other, it will soon be very lonely here, members will be afraid to post anything but flattery. I appreciate your opinions and also Bradford's hard work, but we should let each other express opinions freely. Even if I don't agree with the more general trend here, I feel I benefit tremendously from the discussion.

(sigh...is my English really that bad? :)
 

bradford

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I think that we should argue, and point out what we think are errors,
and call them errors outright, at least to the extent we would risk
looking foolish or being found to be wrong.
What we shouldn't do is take it personally. They are only thoughts.
Puny little thoughts. No big deal.
 

Sparhawk

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Lars,

My wishes are far from starting a flame war. It isn't my intention at all. I will only ask, after you made your point about the quality of your English, which I believe is really good too: am I getting across with my own English or is that lacking in any way?

1. You need to be able to read what you translate. I haven't been flashing anything, only stressing the importance of education, you can't learn this from sitting with Matthews at home.

No argument there. However, I strongly believe that a good education can be found in many places and that expressions of accomplishment, in any given field, are not to be found only in a degree. That's the reason I used those names as examples, in the field of Sinology.

2. I believe the Zhou Yi is a whole lot simpler to read than we think. We just can't see it without a context. The context is a little difficult to establish, but I believe it can be done.

I would agree that a linear reading of the Zhouyi is somewhat simple. But my opinion is that said "simpleness" is deceiving, that's all. Furthermore, I agree that context, historical and otherwise, is key. This was also the reason I argued that it takes more than one discipline to engage the text properly.

3. I think that if we try to dig into the grammar and translate on a basis of a framework, we can determine which edition is most original. I think 1715 edition is very accurate and original; only need to slightly adjust one single character.
Kinky eh? :)

Well, I'm not one to argue with the scholarship of Li Guangdi and his compilation of the Zhou yi zhe zhong.I know the man was fastidious about "originality". Still, a compilation will always risk a measure of "polishing" in the process. I was simply presenting a logical argument about closeness to an original text, which, time wise, is on the side of the Mawangdui text. But...,​

4. Mawangdui was just a grave text like grave money of clay etc. Shaughnessy's translation makes absolutely no sense. Seen anybody use it for divination?

There isn't much to argue if you'll discard the silk text of the Mawangdui as Chinese fake money like the one I can buy in Chinatown... :D Besides, Shaughnessy never intended his translation to be used for divination. It is a comparative work.

5. I don't believe you have to take a myriad of things into consideration to understand and translate this text. It is good to know the surroundings of the subject but it can also take our focus away from the basic problems of reading it. I firmly believe it can be done with a combination of clever reading skills and respect for the original.

Not a myriad things, just a very few more than simply having the ability to read classical Chinese...

6. I believe no one has the right to put any personal ideas into this text themselves like Karcher do. We need to be objective.

Hey, amen to that! :bows:

7. I agree that we get answers from lesser translations, but I think it is not optimal.
Better translations, more nuanced and precise answers.

No argument there either. Just keep in mind that there are very few actual translations; the rest are wholehearted opinions that found a publisher... :D

These viewpoints shouldn't provoke anybody.

If I sounded a little harsh it was because I don't think you have the right to lecture me.

Well, the irony is that we departed from the gate: If I sounded harsh is because I thought you were lecturing me... :rofl: Seriously.

This is an open forum, if we attack each other, it will soon be very lonely here, members will be afraid to post anything but flattery. I appreciate your opinions and also Bradford's hard work, but we should let each other express opinions freely. Even if I don't agree with the more general trend here, I feel I benefit tremendously from the discussion.

:bows:


sigh...is my English really that bad? :)

Yours was very good. How was mine? :)
 

fkegan

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Hi Folks,

This entire thread from its beginning has been a set of arguments over various perspectives not quite noticing each another and then reacting badly over something else.

The essential difference in this forum is that we all share at least one context in common which is our use of the I Ching in our own personal divination. This puts us all upon a different side than the entire long academic lineage dealing with the texts and words of the Confucian Classic of Change.

Some of that difference has poked through in various threads, such as Wilhelm's commentary upon the difference between the wording in hex 57.5 and the judgment of hex 18 without the slightest notice that they appear together in the Oracle hex 57.5 >> 18.

Or my personal favorite in the discussion of the exact words of the text for hex 56.5 between the logical sequence that the arrow is shot and the pheasant drops and eventually the ruling 5th line wins praise and office and then the other meditative symbolism that the structure of trigram li looks like a pheasant's eye, but that disappears into heavenly sunshine when the moving yin line changes to yang.

The ultimate issue isn't arguing or 'pointing out errors' especially as this thread arose as much from an 'error' being pointed out that wasn't an error at all though few bothered to check the Source to notice that. There is an element of added richness to be found in realizing some post is based upon a long train of scholarship, even if the detail in the text turns out to be of only minor value in making sense of an Oracle. But it is only a bit of seasoning.

Overall, there is more to worry about in the general opinion that a certain phrasing assures folks that one hexagram is fortunate or another tells of misfortune and the simple meaning of the English name for the hexagram clearly describes the Oracle meaning for your divination. The structure of the Yi text is its own complex subject. Is it consistent poetry or a varied collection of slogans and commentary pieced together?

Personally, I have slogged through a number of different perspectives over the decades finding the simple structure of the line patterns in terms of gestalt symbolism the most insightful. However, that requires moving beyond the Established notions of Yin lines and hexagram pairs.

However, the actual Oracle answers to my personal questions remain the most amazing teacher of all. It is our individual subjective experience that illumines our perspectives and is the context of our opinions.

As to questions of English fluency, I find that a complete red herring. Folks with obvious difficulty with the language still manage to make their meaning and perspective clear and those of us with long native acquaintance and education in our mother tongue still have problems.

On good days we are able to notice interesting bits in other folks' posts, on bad days some detail in a post sets off an angry diatribe. In general they are all just part of our mutual introduction to one another.

Frank
 

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