Memorizing the I Ching 30. Li / The Clinging, Fire

[getojack]

OK, so I was walking down the street today, just wandering in a criss-cross fashion, not caring about the destination, in a 30.1 kind of way, when a thought came to me like the yellow light of 30.2. Thinking about 30, the words came, "drawn to the light like a moth to the flame." I thought of the power of personality, especially in the context of gurus and masters of all kinds throughout history, to be that flame to which others are drawn and attached. And I think it could refer both to the shining of that bright spirit to which others are drawn, as well as the act of being drawn to that light, becoming attached and clinging to that light, or that higher consciousness, no matter whether it's from the inside shining out or from the outside shining in. That's how I'm seeing 30 at the moment, anyway.

 

[rosada]

I really like that insight of clinging to the light, getojack. I didn't understand what one was supposed to cling to. Wilhelm says, "The sun and moon cling to heaven" but that doesn't even make sence. But if you think of clinging to the light as in clinging to what you know to be as your best self, well then, this makes total sence. And I suppose when one clings to their highest self one would naturally relate to the highest in others - like Namaste meaning "The divinity in me greets the divine in you" - and thereby illumine the four quarters of the world.

Jupiter the planet of abundance was strongly aspecting my Mercury, the planet of games today. So wouldn't you know it? The very day I'm trying to follow the mean I get all the best letters and could have clobbered my mother in Scrabble. I had to actually make an effort NOT to win by a landslide and it was very interesting to see what happened when I looked to take the middle path. As I usually just automatically go into killer instinct mode, by choosing to play with moderation I had to become awake and concious. Thus it seems that while following the middle path may give some side benefits of less stress and others may see you as being polite, the true benefit of seeking the mean - I think - is that it forces one to become more concious.

 

[rosada]

Nine in the third place means:
In the light of the setting sun,
Men either beat the pot and sing
Or loudly bewail the approach of old age.
Misfortune.

Here the end of the day has come. The lights of the setting sun calls to mind the fact that life is transitory and conditional. Caught in this external bondage, men are usually robbed of their inner freedom as well. The sense of the transitoriness of life impels them to uninhibited revelry in order to enjoy life while it lasts, or else they yield to melancoly and spoil the precious time by lamenting the approach of old age. Both attitudes are wrong. To the superior man it makes no differance whether death comes early or late. He cultivates himself, awaits his allotted time, and in this way secures his fate.

 

[bradford]

Nine in the third place means:
In the light of the setting sun,
Men either beat the pot and sing
Or loudly bewail the approach of old age.
Misfortune
.

This translation ignores an important word, ze,
at the beginning of the last clause, which makes
the laments of great age a consequence of not
banging on pots and singing. Consequently (ze)
it misses an important part or the meaning if
you don't know to read it this way.

 

[rosada]

Bradford, I am so glad you shared this with us! At my mother's senior residence they have an arts and crafts room with supplies for making posters and such. After reading your email I went over and made a great wall plaque for my sister's kitchen:

"Beat the pot and sing!"

It turned out really cute. I may make more for Christmas gifts.
Thank you!

 

[bruce_g]

Jack, nice images.

I wrestled with this one many years. Of course the older I get the more pertinent is becomes! I don't see it as one way or the other which brings good or bad fortune, but rather the consideration of the consequences of lamenting or beating drums, in each individual instance.

Today I overstimulated the neighborhood and myself, playing nasty, crunchy rock-n-roll, beating the drum loudly. Felt good. It was time for it. Another time, not so good.

To agree with Brad's point, I think it's a shame, that when a man or woman has ripened to maturity, that they so often don't shine more than they do. Old people should exhibit the same bright qualities as a baby.

 

[hilary]

Pot beating

 

[lightofreason]

30.3

Line position is ruled by hexagram 15 and its focus on issues of covering up, levelling out, reduce the highs, fill in the lows.

The traditional line comment is interpretable as:

Line 3
"The setting of the Sun[The end of the road/path. The light going out.]. No celebration, just a very old man lamenting the past. Unfortunate."

Note the focus on the light going out and its association with something being covered up by 15.

From the XOR perspective, the 15-ness of 30, how 15 is expressed through 30 is in the form of 21 with its focus on deviations and their solution, their correction as such, the focus on problem solving.

Deviations are thus extremes in need of evening out, reduction, imposition of 'modesty' but hard to cover up the 'light', better to focus on ensuring the light is in the 'right' direction, not deviating from the 'true' middle path as such (and so with association to the sun the light follows the cycle of birth/death etc)

This brings out modesty operating in/through a context guidance doubled and so direction setting, an ideology etc. - thus the cycles of the earth/universe go on and any deviation corrected (and so a waste of effort)

Chris.

 

[rosada]

After actually focusing on 30.3 these last couple of days I'm not so sure Wilhelm wasn't right after all. Encouraged by the idea that at 30.3 we should beat the pot and sing, I bundled my mother off to a restaurant the other night. I ordered wine, which I usually never do and then as I was enjoying myself mother strated muttering about how she was probably boring me and how I probably wished I was back home etc., a very depressing monolog that is not her style. So anyway, here we had the two extremes: me getting a bit toasted, Mom getting morose. It was not pretty. Being as how it was at the end of the day it made me think the problem was we were both tired. I think of a spinning top that when it is no longer energized enough to stay centered starts tipping wildly one way and the other. If I write my own I Ching I will say this line gives a warning that one's energies are depleted and now would be a time to be careful about staying on course, staying with what one is accustomed to, least one find they are not up to controlling unfamiliar situations as well as they were able earlier in the day as in 30.1 and 30.2. A time when staying with the middle way may be more tricky than it first appears.

 

[rosada]

Nine in the fourth place means:
Its coming is sudden;
It flames up, dies down, is thrown away.

 

[rosada]

Someone asked me to help them out with a project on very short notice. I totally disrupted my schedule, rushed to be of assistance, and they weren't ready and couldn't use my help after all. I think 30.4 warns that something may be a big waste of time.

 

[rosada]

Six in the fifth place means:
Tears in floods, sighing and lamenting.
Good fortune.

 

[rosada]

Took Mom to an outdoor concert in the park. Country Western singers. Alot of Somebody Done Somebody Wrong songs. Great evening.

 

[cesca]

Anyone have a take on why there's all these tears and lamenting, but it's good fortune anyway?

My best guess is that since it progresses to Hex13 TONG REN, there is success precisely because everyone is working for the common good rather than for their personal happiness. But that explanation somehow doesn't feel right.

 

[hilary]

My guess is that these are tears of compassionate recognition. Good fortune because someone is really being seen. Maybe something like this story. Or maybe good fortune because you go through the process of mourning, which you needed to do.

 

[cesca]

Great story. I just looked up Brad's interpretation of the line:

"He takes on the world’s great sorrows, the suffering, craving, blindness and waste, the failure of his own human kind to wake up and enkindle each other, and the most stubborn will with which humans cling to their ignorance, while everyone gnaws on everyone else, and all of those organizations we had so much hope for just turn into cancers and parasites. Not much to cheer up the lone soul. But every great one, and every bright light, will have many nights as dark as this one and will waste a lot of tears on things which will be transcended. Relief is on the way, as the tears will clean the eyes. They come through these nights with dawning awareness of fuel beyond wildest dream and reasons to shine today: if not you, then who; if not now, when? Light which learns is power. The suffering is optional, but swamp gas burns as well."

This makes sense to me: as you say, compassionate recognition -- but of the human condition. It is the Emperor line, after all.

 

[bruce_g]

John 11:35 Jesus wept.

http://www.gangaji.org/satsang/library/journal/journal2.asp

 

[charly]

My guess is that these are tears of compassionate recognition. Good fortune because someone is really being seen. ... Or maybe good fortune because you go through the process of mourning, which you needed to do.

Hilary:

Tears as sign of compasionate recognition makes much sense in the context of the whole hexagram. Rightly passing the process of mourning is indeed lucky. People having experienced heavy traums not ever can do it. Most victims of abuse use to be indifferent regarding another's suffering(also in front of his own suffering).

Compasionate recognition is a sign of humaneness and a sign of conserving the own emotional integrity. Lucky.

I believe that, among others, H.30 tells the story of the Holy Fire. From wild, fierce, natural force to Home God (or Godess), tammed source of heat and light. The «Trickster» work (1).

Li, as almost all tricksters, has two faces, fire is a fallen god. Like in the character LI where coexisted beast and bird, in fire coexists the male scary face and the female angelic face (2).

Li, as Rutt says (3), can be the oriole, little bird singing in the battlefields as an omen of Great Sacrifices, great war crimes commited in order to consolidate the Power.

This oriole can be seen as the image of a trickster ever singing in the middle of the worst calamities, a litle guy commited with freedom.

In extreme conditions only two exits can remain:

1) singing for freedom, the first luck (4)

2) weeping, being sad not only of the own adversity but of the others' adversity, the luck of not being dissociated, of not being identified with aggressors (5)

In H.30 the only lucky lines are the weak. In front of absolute power, king's power, the only alternative is emotional integrity, say, home and woman (6).

Maybe the bird is not the oriole, but poets have few ornithology.
That's the guy:

from: http://www.ngensis.com/aves-2.htm

and that:

from: http://big5.cpst.net.cn/gate/big5/anima.cpst.net.cn/dwdg/2005_05/1115625904.html

I'm grateful for the generous opportunity you offer in your page. Thanks.

Yours,

Charly

------------------------------------------------------------
(1) Tricksters like Prometeo or Old Coyote who took the fire from heavens for giving it to humankind.

(2) See Dan Stackhouse or LiSe pages.

(3) Fron Rutt's ZhouYi:

Li, in hexagram 30 ... generally about death and destruction. If the tag is taken to mean 'oriole' , that bird may be a related symbol... The vocabulary echoes Ode 168.6, where orioles sing while war captives are being brought for questioning and execution...

(4) Line 3:黃huang2 離li2 元yuan2 吉ji2
Yellow Fire/Bird primal luck!

(5) Line 5:出chu1 涕ti4 沱tuo2 若ruo4 ... 吉ji2
Issuing tears as streams... lucky.

(6) Thus, perhaps, the care of the cow, home, female symbol.

 

[rosada]

Nine at the top means:
The king uses him to march forth and chastise.
Then it is best to kill the leaders
And take captive the followers. No blame.

It is not the purpose of chastisement to impose punishment blindly but to create discipline. Evil must be cured at its roots. To erradicate evil in political life, it is best to kill the ring leaders ane spare the followers. In educating oneself it is best to root out bad habits and tolerate those that are harmless. For asceticism that is too strict, like sentances of undue severity, fails in its purpose.

The ruler of the hexagram, the six in the fifth place, is the king. He uses the top line to lead the armed forces (the trigram Li has weapons for its symbol). Since it is at the top and strong, the line is correct, and therefore does not push the business of war too far. It shows the light at its height.

 

[rosada]

Notes to Self on 30:

30.1 Plan your act before you go on stage.

30.2 Great performance!!!

30.3 Leave 'em while they're laughing (this line reads like a combination of 1.6 and 2.6, The Moment has passed, let it go).

30.4 Okay, one encore but not a whole 'nother show.

30.5 "Regrets, I've had a few, and yet, too few to mention..."

30.6 The Reviews. Don't be too hard on yourself. If there was anything you didn't like, you'll know how to plan it better next time.

 

[rosada]

Reviewing 30 and what's been going on this last week, it seems to me The Clinging is all about being true to oneself, planning, visualizing what you want and living the life you planned. 30.1.2.3 seems to cover visualizing what we want to experience, experiencing it, and then the tricky part about knowing what to do when the experience is over. 30.4.5.6 seems to put even more emphasis on the importance of knowing how to move on. 30.4 points out that life is short, 30.5 seems to say, yeah, and that's a bummer, it really is, we don't need to try to deny it by beating pots, nor does it help to bewail it, but we do have to recognize that's it's nature because when we do then we can move on and come to 30.6 where we don't give undo importance to any one moment, or any one lifetime. The sixth position is outside the energy of the hexagram, so 30.6 is outside The Clinging, so at this point there is no sadness that one cannot cling to life, or make one day last forever. Instead, one can review what went right, what did not, and vow not to repeat bad habits next time. The key thing seems to be that one does not burn out, but perpetuates one's good nature, and one's ability to move on, no matter what happens, good or bad during a moment, a day, or a lifetime.

 

[charly]

...The king uses to march forth and chastise. Then it is best to kill the leaders And take captive the followers. No blame.

It is not the purpose of chastisement to impose punishment blindly but to create discipline. ...

Rosada:

You have quoted Wilhelm/Baynes rendering of 30.6 and the following interpretation as a disciplinary policy. The hypothesis that Kings behaved based in convenience reasons. but it's not the only possible.

I post some quotes from other authors:

1) Blofeld lived in China, maybe he was exposed to the same confucian interpretations, but he only describes, he doesn't make a rule as Wilhelm do:

The King went forth to set things to rights and blessed (by Heavenly victory) he destroyed the leaders (of the rebels), but he did not chastise the (rebel) followers. No error!
BLOFELD

2) Kerson Huang from an opposing to confucians point of view also describes. Althogh mistakenly king acts without fault. Kerson provides a chinese version in simplified characters.

The King waged war and offered rewards for heads. The wrong captives were taken. No fault.
KERSON HUANG

3) The bloody version of Richard Rutt makes focus in behading and spectacle:

A triumph with behading of the foe when all the captured chiefstains are on show.
RUTT

4) Greg Richter in the only word by word translation among the quoted renders 嘉JIA as «good»:

The King sets out and advances. There is a good executioner, but is not the enemy who is captured. No harm.
RICHTER

I remember a study from Tony of Niza (Sadeian Universe) no more in the web, quoted at Biroco's page, but I can't get it, if somebody has it he might post a quote. I remember it speaks about SHAUGHNESSY «joy of cutting off heads».

About 嘉JIA, often translated as «excellent», «good», «fine», «celebration», «to praise», etc, has also the meaning of «banquet», «feast»:

嘉... 加 (phon) add to (→ place atop) + an abbreviated form of 喜 (vessel piled high with food → feast) → great meal with stacks of food → good; auspicious → praise (← praiseworthy feast). KANJI NETWORKS
http://www.kanjinetworks.com/

The use of the JIA character could mean that the King has true gluttony for cutting-off heads. The line ends «no wrong» it only points to a fact. The King is making his job.

A most appropriated warning for tricksters, diviners, withches and so, and among early chineses diviners can risk his head in his job.

Beware of kings, beware of power: if you are close to the power you are under fire, if you are the power (the King) you also are under fire.

Force is as pitiless to the man who possesses it, or thinks he does, as it is to its victims; the second it crushes, the first it intoxicates. The truth is, nobody possesses it.
SIMONE WEIL: The Iliade or the Poem of Force
http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~loxias/iliad.htm

As S.Weil says, power wants all, all men as corpses, all women as slaves.

Keep your head!

Yours,

Charly

 

[bruce_g]

This line reminds me of the Nuremberg Trials: a glorious way to wrap up the mess of tyranny. (with emphasis on the show/display)

 

[bradford]

This line reminds me of the Nuremberg Trials: a glorious way to wrap up the mess of tyranny. (with emphasis on the show/display)

Good connection. Also, the criteria for accountability there was "who knew what they
were doing". Nuremberg also fits 17.6 quite well. Maintaining the dual meaning for shou as leader and head is important in this context.

Yet another translation

30.6, Top 9, Zhi Gua 55: Feng, Abundance
(Fan Yao 55.6: screening self and family, three years not seen)

The sovereign takes advantage of emergencies to expedite
There will be commendations
And severed heads
The captives were never his enemies
Not a mistake

 

[bruce_g]

Yes, the trials must have elicited some sympathy (rightly or wrongly), as they were "only following orders", and were therefore not perceived as the real enemies. Still, it made the victors heroes big time, and sent out a message to sympathizers.

17.6, huh.. will chew on that awhile. LiSe has "The king offers a Heng-sacrifice at the Western Mountain." Can you tell something about the Heng sacrifice or the Western Mountain?

 

[bradford]

Yes, the trials must have elicited some sympathy (rightly or wrongly), as they were "only following orders", and were therefore not perceived as the real enemies. Still, it made the victors heroes big time, and sent out a message to sympathizers.

17.6, huh.. will chew on that awhile. LiSe has "The king offers a Heng-sacrifice at the Western Mountain." Can you tell something about the Heng sacrifice or the Western Mountain?

While you are chewing on 17.6, in relation to "only following orders," don't forget the title of hexagram 17. Following is no relief from ultimate accountability.

I personally don't take heng here to be a specific sacrifice, even though it's at a specific place (Mt Qi, a Zhou family shrine) but as a general term for offering or sacrifice, in this case human. My objection to scholars seeing human sacrifice everywhere in the Zhouyi notwithstanding, these two (with 30.6) I think are among the few places where it is in fact indicated.

 

[bruce_g]

Yuh, I was just reading your 17.6 comments again and can see where you're coming from with this.

Thanks

 

[bruce_g]

The key thing seems to be that one does not burn out, but perpetuates one's good nature, and one's ability to move on, no matter what happens, good or bad during a moment, a day, or a lifetime.

I think this applies to all of 30, yes?

Since fire is dependent on fuel, the fuel also must be something enduring; a renewable resource. Maybe solar power. But what fuels the sun? And what fuels what fuels the sun? etc. etc. Maybe we are the fuel and sacrifice which perpetuates the fire. And what we consume perpetuates us. So that, all life and light, everything which shows, is one perpetual fire - the Bright Bird.

 

[bradford]

I think this applies to all of 30, yes?

Since fire is dependent on fuel, the fuel also must be something enduring; a renewable resource. So that, all life and light, everything which shows, is one perpetual fire - the Bright Bird.

I think you have the core of 30 and flame here.
Beef is fuel as well.
All flesh is grass, and all grass is light.
Also, there is no independence without dependence,
no individuation without connectedness - this is
the important paradox in the two characters "Li"
used in this hexagram. Another way to see it using the
same ideas is in the Buddhist notion of conditioned
or dependent arising.

 

[bruce_g]

I think you have the core of 30 and flame here.
Beef is fuel as well.
All flesh is grass, and all grass is light.
Also, there is no independence without dependence,
no individuation without connectedness - this is
the important paradox in the two characters "Li"
used in this hexagram. Another way to see it using the
same ideas is in the Buddhist notion of conditioned
or dependent arising.

It would be easier to see for someone who had to raise and slaughter a cow before they could enjoy their juicy, flamed-broiled burger. And same for growing and harvesting the special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions and sesame seed bun.