Clarity,
Office 17622,
PO Box 6945,
London.
W1A 6US
United Kingdom
Phone/ Voicemail:
+44 (0)20 3287 3053 (UK)
+1 (561) 459-4758 (US).
Perhaps there is someone else here who understands this, but as Bob Dylan wrote, 'it ain't me babe'.I post the Bagua here and hope there would be someone who understands it.
I never got the idea that this thread is about 'African connections' so I'm not sure why you're bringing it up here?As for African connections to the i-ching, a quick search turns up a few interesting links.
"I gather then that this symbol's origins are found in a number of ancient (Egyptian, Greek, other European) traditions - and not with the I Ching."I never got the idea that this thread is about 'African connections' so I'm not sure why you're bringing it up here?
I don't see that it does. And Ifa is not Egyptian. And aardvarks, alligators, and apples are all different too, even if they all start with the letter 'A'.I Ching ... any resemblance to divination in Egypt
What is this resemblance of which you speak? Ifa is an oral tradition; Yi is written. The 'casting' is done in entirely different ways. The Yi is used for advice and divination; the only example I've seen of Ifa was done for healing. They largely have different numbers of 'parts' like they number of hexagrams (64), lines (386), trigrams (8), possible line types (4) ....The resemblance between Ifa and Yi is fascinating
I was referring to the fact that all these things have a great deal in common - they all start with the letter 'A', but if you drew meaning or inspiration from it, so much the better.thinking in my brain by aligning my ideas more efficiently, like a librarian organizing the files. Then I woke up this morning to read dfreed's comments about putting things in alphabetical order!
What is this resemblance of which you speak?
I appreciate you sharing this. It is the kind of information I look for when someone makes a statement, in this case about how one divination system has common elements with another system. And it's information I didn't see being presented before you shared it here.Both are counting oracles. Both involve the creation of figures ...
I believe that's true. I read where some traditional practitioners of Ifa do not like how it's being practiced by some, especially in the African Diaspora - the Americans and the Caribbean - because people are using charts, graph, and books with this 'oral' tradition, and are doing it for less than honorable or traditional reasons, i.e - they are doing it only to make money.I think a lot of Ifa knowledge is available only to its practitioners ....
Nor is Egypt an island cut off from the rest of the continent.I don't see that it does. And Ifa is not Egyptian. And aardvarks, alligators, and apples are all different too, even if they all start with the letter 'A'.
From: https://www.sacred-texts.com/cfu/choc/choc04.htm"... his view seems to be influenced by his knowledge of the sacerdotal vestments of Egypt. We are told that the high priest in his capacity as judge used to wear a breastplate bearing the image of truth or justice. One such shield has been found, upon which were two figures recognisable by the emblems on their heads: one with a solar disk as Ra, the sun-god or light, the other with a feather, as Maat or truth."
From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urim_and_Thummim"Many scholars now believe that Urim simply derives from the Hebrew Arrim, meaning "curses", and thus that Urim and Thummim essentially means "cursed or faultless", in reference to the deity's judgment of an accused person; in other words, Urim and Thummim were used to answer the question "innocent or guilty".
Assyriologist William Muss-Arnolt connected the singular forms--ur and tumm--with the Babylonian terms ūrtu and tamītu, meaning "oracle" and "command", respectively. According to his theory the Hebrew words use a pluralis intensivus to enhance their apparent majesty, not to indicate the presence of more than one. Along these lines the urim and thummim are hypothesized to derive from the Tablets of Destiny worn by Marduk on his breast according to Babylonian religion).
According to Islamic sources, there was a similar form of divination among the Arabs before the beginning of Islam. There, two arrow shafts (without heads or feathers), on one of which was written "command" and the other "prohibition" or similar, were kept in a container, and stored in the Kaaba at Mecca; whenever someone wished to know whether to get married, go on a journey, or to make some other similar decision, one of the Kaaba's guardians would randomly pull one of the arrow shafts out of the container, and the word written upon it was said to indicate the will of the god concerning the matter in question. Sometimes a third, blank, arrow shaft would be used, to represent the refusal of the deity to give an answer.
In accordance with the belief that Urim and Thummim translates to "Light and Truth", the Latin equivalent Lux et Veritas has been used for several university mottoes."
Perhaps true! And I often find history and facts just as fascinating.This is food for thought and i find the correlations fascinating.
I never got the idea that this thread is about 'African connections' so I'm not sure why you're bringing it up here?
Given the state of US politics and even spiritual matters, I think it's a slippery slope to nowhere if we don't make these sorts of distinctions
Sorry, perhaps that's too obscure or USA-based.I'm not seeing the connection between the invitation for ideas about Ouroboros and the bagua and US politics.
That's the most interesting thing I've read on this thread. One of my intellectual heroes is Joseph Campbell, who wrote many books about the common elements in mythological systems around the world. There's a surprisingly large number of cultures that have stories about god or the gods sending a flood to wipe out all of humanity except a few chosen people, including in cultures where it really would be an enormous stretch to claim that there was some kind of transmission from elsewhere. Campbell has great stories about missionaries preaching to communities in the Amazon, only to find them enthusiastically accepting stories of the flood, because they were so similar to their own myths. But people everywhere fundamentally have the same experiences of birth, living and death all over the world, and their myths reflect that. In some cases, there clearly is direct transmission. Perhaps the people receiving the myths were open to it because it made sense, there was that common basis for it.The resemblance between Ifa and Yi is fascinating - enough to make you wonder if it's a case of common ancestry (like swallows and martins), or parallel evolution (like swallows and swifts).
Yes.In fact, to me, it's even more interesting if there are similarities when there clearly isn't a direction connection or transmission.
Quite possibly true. But also, it just wasn't automatic or natural for all knowledge to be recorded in writing. Even much later, in Europe, up until after Gutenberg, a book was a rare and valuable possession. A prosperous middle class family might have owned a family bible, which would have been extremely expensive, and probably no other written materials. Instead, people generally memorized texts, including quite long ones. And the people who could memorize long texts were highly valued and played a special role in society. (You can read about this in the histories of Homer's Odyssey, which wasn't written by a guy called Homer -- in fact, almost certainly wasn't written down at all for a long time).The early verbal traditions of Yi also align well with Ifa practices. Divination, spiritual and shamanic traditions in most indiginous cultures were only ever by word of mouth to avoid the 'power' getting into the wrong hands and being abused. The modern day exponents of Ifa do seem to be experiencing examples of the traditions being disrespected still in this day and age.
Clarity,
Office 17622,
PO Box 6945,
London.
W1A 6US
United Kingdom
Phone/ Voicemail:
+44 (0)20 3287 3053 (UK)
+1 (561) 459-4758 (US).