Similarities Ancient Egypt and Ancient China between

[surnevs]

I were thinking when seeing this, posted by egyptologist Kara Cooney, that it's probably the first time such a comparison has been made.... But I don't know if it has been made before. Were it coincidental that the similarities mentioned in this introduction were present, has there been a contact between those two empires etc.

 

[Sugarvenom]

I'm not aware that Ancient Egypt had any direct contact with Ancient China. There may have been secondary trade contact (trading with people that China traded with), but I think Egypt's own trade routes only really extended, at their height, as far as central Asia maybe? I might be wrong though!

For what it's worth, you do often find similarities between ancient cultures, in different aspects of their society, architecture, religion and so on. If it can survive, and help people survive, in a hostile world without the protections of concrete and mass production, then there's likely a core of usefulness to it that other cultures may also stumble upon.

 

[surnevs]

I'm not aware that Ancient Egypt had any direct contact with Ancient China. There may have been secondary trade contact (trading with people that China traded with), but I think Egypt's own trade routes only really extended, at their height, as far as central Asia maybe? I might be wrong though!

For what it's worth, you do often find similarities between ancient cultures, in different aspects of their society, architecture, religion and so on. If it can survive, and help people survive, in a hostile world without the protections of concrete and mass production, then there's likely a core of usefulness to it that other cultures may also stumble upon.

When I saw the article - and I haven't read the book (!) - some vague suspections I've had about it ie possible connections between these two empires could be confirmed. The similarities thou could be random like You mentioned, not necessary a prove to that there were any communications between them. I belong to those who do not belive that the I Ching "is just the I Ching" meaning that it couldn't get deeper roots. Nothing seemingly has been found contradicting that it should be older than as accepted from the time of the Zhou Dynasty. What makes me curious concerning it's age are that Divination by means of tortoise shells and the plant Oracle is mentioned in 'the book of history' back from the time of emperor Yü (2205-2197 BC) A quote from James Legges I Ching, The book of China: ".... In the Shû King, in a document that purports to be of twenty-third century B.C., divination by means of the tortoise-shell is mentioned (The Shû II, ii, 18); and somewhat later we find that method continuing, and also divination by the lineal figures, manipulated by means of the stalks of a plant, the Ptarmica Sibirica, which is still cultivated on and about the grave of Confucius, where I have myself seen it growing (The Shû V, iv, 31)...."

 

[dfreed]

some vague suspections I've had about it ie possible connections between these two empires

Maybe when you read the book you'll let us know what you find. Otherwise, I'm not sure what you're hoping to find here?

These two civilizations are separated by eight centuries and about four thousand miles, and I don't know of any connections between their religious or spiritual beliefs.

There were oracle or divination methods / traditions in China that pre-date the Zhouyi, and there are records of at least two other "Yi" oracles, but that doesn't prove or provide any sort of connection between New Kingdom Egypt (1548–1086 BC) and Han dynasty China (206 BC–220 CE).

And there were other large and ancient civilizations that developed along great rivers: within the Tigris–Euphrates river system in the Fertile Crescent; along the Indus River valley in India and others.

There are also different types of divination using shells, rocks, bones, entrails, reading the shape of the land, and many others that we find throughout the world, but again, I don't know what connections are there between all these.

I get the sense that you're starting from a place - that just because you can't prove (or we don't have proof that) something didn't happened, that doesn't mean that it didn't happen: e.g. just because we don't have any record of space aliens visiting New York City, that doesn't mean that space aliens didn't visit NYC.

This opens up too wide a range of possibilities of things that can't be proven - so therefore they may have happened: my great-great-grandfather may have been a Tibetan lama; Native Americans may be the lost tribe of Israel; or the Hmong may be the lost tribe of Israel, or ...

... the Yi may have come from the Ifa oracle tradition of Africa, which then went to Egypt and then to India (where it turned into the Vedic tradition) and finally to China .... Or perhaps the first incarnations of the Zhouyi (going back tens of thousands of years) were sex manuals and mating rituals ....

I imagine we could spend at least a few dozen life times of imaging historic, spiritual, and oracular 'what ifs', so I'll just leave you to further speculation about this.

Best, D

 

[Gmulii]

Imagine in a few thousand years people dig up what is left of our world now and start to wonder what the hell is "pizza hut".

While there may be some alternative pizzas out there, that one seems to look in specific way, looking at the very few surface materials they can find, billboards, papers with advertising, maybe here and there some left signs or mentions in sources...

They come up with the great system of how to make something that perfectly looks like the pizza on the Images they see of old. There could be a whole movements about it, getting deeper in deeper in making it look like it, in better and better technologies related to that.

And at some point, someone may or may not realise that that hasn't got much to do with it, as how it "tastes" is where the essence of it is. And that can't be discovered from digging up what is left, only way to know that is if someone that was part of the process of cooking it tells you.

So how they connect... They connect in spheres that is unlikely to ever be seen from where history is looking at them or someone can dig up and find. As getting the correct "taste" becomes the important factor and no one will write that on billboards or advertising signs...

 

[surnevs]

Maybe when you read the book you'll let us know what you find. Otherwise, I'm not sure what you're hoping to find here?

These two civilizations are separated by eight centuries and about four thousand miles, and I don't know of any connections between their religious or spiritual beliefs.

There were oracle or divination methods / traditions in China that pre-date the Zhouyi, and there are records of at least two other "Yi" oracles, but that doesn't prove or provide any sort of connection between New Kingdom Egypt (1548–1086 BC) and Han dynasty China (206 BC–220 CE).

And there were other large and ancient civilizations that developed along great rivers: within the Tigris–Euphrates river system in the Fertile Crescent; along the Indus River valley in India and others.

There are also different types of divination using shells, rocks, bones, entrails, reading the shape of the land, and many others that we find throughout the world, but again, I don't know what connections are there between all these.

I get the sense that you're starting from a place - that just because you can't prove (or we don't have proof that) something didn't happened, that doesn't mean that it didn't happen: e.g. just because we don't have any record of space aliens visiting New York City, that doesn't mean that space aliens didn't visit NYC.

This opens up too wide a range of possibilities of things that can't be proven - so therefore they may have happened: my great-great-grandfather may have been a Tibetan lama; Native Americans may be the lost tribe of Israel; or the Hmong may be the lost tribe of Israel, or ...

... the Yi may have come from the Ifa oracle tradition of Africa, which then went to Egypt and then to India (where it turned into the Vedic tradition) and finally to China .... Or perhaps the first incarnations of the Zhouyi (going back tens of thousands of years) were sex manuals and mating rituals ....

I imagine we could spend at least a few dozen life times of imaging historic, spiritual, and oracular 'what ifs', so I'll just leave you to further speculation about this.

Best, D

I can aggree in what You say basically. My posting were more a wondering that I for the first time saw someone drawing parallels between these two old empires. But maybe someone has done that before ?
Later that evening it came to my mind that my reply to Sugarvenom maybe were a bit out of context, yet I'm still open to the possibility that the I Ching could once had been much more widespread globally and this I know is for now without reach to find proof on.
And I appreciate that You write You'll leave me to further speculation about this, which I've done for many years and maybe, maybe not will go on with. Thank You, I know You meant it in the best way.

 

[dfreed]

And at some point, someone may or may not realise that that hasn't got much to do with it,

I sort of lost you here. What is the “that” that doesn’t have a lot to do with ‘it’?

They connect in spheres that is unlikely to ever be seen from where history is looking at them ....

Again, I sort lost you here. Are you saying that there are connections between all these ancient Pizza Huts, but we can’t know what that is because we are missing the actual pizzas that they had been making and eating? Or?

And what’s the lesson here? What’s the conclusion you’ve come to? That we should speculate - even wildly - about bits and pieces we find left to us by ‘the ancients’ ....

Ex. we find exactly 24 slices of pepperoni on all the petrified Pizza Hut pizzas, so we speculate that these were ‘calendar discs’ which divided the year into 24 lunar cycles, and these were further divided into three periods of 8 pepperoni pieces, which we realize correlate with the 8 trigrams ...

And I write a book about my findings: Pizza Hut Yijing: the oracle of the ancients .... which is based, in part, on translations of omens found wrapped inside cookies that were found at other nearby temple sites whose name translates as ‘Panda Express’ ....

And based on recent findings in the field of zoological anthropology we believe that an animal called a ‘panda’ was originally from an area that used to be called ‘China’ .... and throughout the world in every ancient village site we also find many, many objects - which we believe were ritual in nature - and they all have the symbols ‘Made in China’ written on them, so our spheres of connection get ever wider, which leads me to my next self-published, follow up book:

“The Chinese, Walmart, Costco, Home Depot Yijing: the true, original oracle of the ancients” — which becomes wildly popular and comes with specific instructions for the proper use of this oracle (along with warnings not to deviate from said instructions for fear of upsetting the ancients and the book’s publisher).

.... Or are you saying we might want to question or be suspicious of making these sorts of spheres of connection?

Or maybe that this is all okay, as long as we keep in mind that much of what we’re concluding is likely ‘wildly speculative’.

Or?

best, d

 

[surnevs]

Kara Cooney, a reputable Egyptologist, would never lead attention to a book if it weren't within the reach of seriousity. To me, and I've never heard about any connection mentioned between Egypt and China before, it was like a "What ?" - for the first time in history some researchers came up with (solid ?) material that could show this ?
In the introduction (Amazon intro, sic) it reads:
" Although they existed more than a millennium apart, the great civilizations of New Kingdom Egypt (ca. 1548–1086 BCE) and Han dynasty China (206 BCE–220 CE) shared intriguing similarities. Both were centered around major, flood-prone rivers—the Nile and the Yellow River—and established complex hydraulic systems to manage their power. Both spread their territories across vast empires that were controlled through warfare and diplomacy and underwent periods of radical reform led by charismatic rulers—the “heretic king” Akhenaten and the vilified reformer Wang Mang. Universal justice was dispensed through courts, and each empire was administered by bureaucracies staffed by highly trained scribes who held special status. Egypt and China each developed elaborate conceptions of an afterlife world and created games of fate that facilitated access to these realms.
This groundbreaking volume offers an innovative comparison of these two civilizations. Through a combination of textual, art historical, and archaeological analyses, Ancient Egypt and Early China reveals shared structural traits of each civilization as well as distinctive features. "
I meant it (#1) simply as a note for those eventually interested in this topic.
That critique arose for me bringing it up at all is OK with me. Go on. Take it or leave it.

 

[dfreed]

centered around major, flood-prone rivers—the Nile and the Yellow River—and established complex hydraulic systems to manage their power. Both spread their territories across vast empires that were controlled through warfare and diplomacy and underwent periods of radical reform led by charismatic rulers

Yes, I too read the intro.

Even without having read the book, I have no heartburn with these 'connections' - I assume that we'd find some or all of these aspects, or qualities shared among many cultures. After all, we've been settling and farming in flood-prone river valleys, and fighting with others for a really, really, really long time.

I just feel that without further proof, none of this proves - and it's pure speculation - that the Zhouyi was more widely used across far distant and different civilizations, sometimes separated by many thousand of miles and years.

But that doesn't mean you shouldn't be interested in all this, or that you should stop looking - if that's what you or others want to do!

 

[surnevs]

dfreed, off cause, yes. This is why I placed my posting in the section Open space (- in not that far away Outer space when Mars has been settled and this beautiful Forum has found it's way up there, maybe ? who's nose ?)

 

[Gmulii]

I didn't mean there isn't a connection. I do believe there is, I also believe that same connections we can find in Kabbalah and even in people like Ptolemy and others that many of the sciences we know today can trace back to... Yet they were all speaking of something before..

But this are long and messy topics and I can't see anyway I can even begin to explain what I mean in a forum, so lets just ignore all that and move on. : )
But I was agreeing,just mentioning that we may need to search it in a different way to find it, sometimes.

 

[dfreed]

I also believe that same connections we can find in Kabbalah and even in people like Ptolemy and others that many of the sciences we know today can trace back to... Yet they were all speaking of something before..

Okay, thanks for clearing up what you were talking about.

My general sense is that oracles (and divination) work as connectors or 'bridges' to what we might call a more broad 'intelligence' that's alive the world or universe - and I think there are many different traditions which do this; perhaps in different ways.

Kabbalah might be one of them (I only say 'might' because I'm not familiar with Kabbalah); I think that Tarot is another. There is another divination text from China, the Tài Xuán Jing or "Canon of Supreme Mystery" from around 2 BC, which I have worked with just a bit, where I also find this connective-ness.

However, just like the places, and cultures, and people, etc. where these come from - and are used, I believe it is entirely possible that these oracles and divination methods are unique unto themselves. So, for example, I don't think the Yijing has to 'reach back' or come from another place - like Egypt or the Mayans, or Atlantis .... in order for it to be valid or for these other traditions to also be valid.

I am entirely comfortable letting the Ifa from Africa be the Ifa, and letting the Bible Lands be the Bible Lands; and letting the Egyptian Book of the Dead be itself, etc. - without thinking that they necessarily have to have the same 'roots' as the Yijing.

I think too that there is a lot more info and connections to explore that are 'closer to hone' and generally I find them more fruitful.

But if someone wants to look for the roots of the Yi, (or however else they want to explore) then they should go for it.

 

[Gmulii]

I'm looking into how we can improve the systems. Using the Chinese approach with Images in western astrology for example, or tarot changing possibilities into the readings... They give the impression they make a coherent system that can be used together.

I fully agree that may not be because there was historical connection, they just may point to the same system working behind it all.

 

[IrfanK]

I were thinking when seeing this, posted by egyptologist Kara Cooney, that it's probably the first time such a comparison has been made.... But I don't know if it has been made before. Were it coincidental that the similarities mentioned in this introduction were present, has there been a contact between those two empires etc.

The great Jungian mythologist Joseph Campbell spent his whole career examining common themes in mythologies around the world, as did Scottish anthropologist Sir James George Frazer, the author of The Golden Bough, much earlier. Campbell saw the idea of the hero who dies and is reborn (found in Christianity, the ancient Egyptian religion, and many others) as a metaphor for the agricultural cycle. He did look into the idea of common origins, but he also found similar myths in remote communities in the Americas, in the Amazon and elsewhere, places where you really can't argue that the ideas were transmitted from outside. So, it seems to be that people have common experiences, across cultures and across time. The idea of a male-female dichotomy is pretty basic and fundamental in most mythologies, often expressed in duotheistic systems, often Sky as male and Earth as female. You can certainly see that idea reflected in the Yijing.

So, these links you see may refer to basic archetypes that underlie these systems, rather than transmission between them. It suggests that there is a basic underlying structure, although the manner in which this structure is expressed may be culturally specific. The Catholics have Mary, the Egyptians had Isis, the Vedas had Kali, and the Javanese animists had Nyai Loro Kidul, queen of the south seas. You'll often find that the Goddess is associated with the moon, while the male counterpart is associated with the sun. And so on.

No transmission, just based on common experience. To my mind, that doesn't make the linkages less interesting. If anything, rather the opposite. It's worth exploring these ideas to try to find correspondences. Just don't get too fixated on the idea that one particular idea was derived from somewhere else.

 

[Sugarvenom]

Now I'm pondering! The other geomantic system I mentioned in my intro is actually from my Egyptian religious path. I'm part of a temple and the person who leads it teaches this divination system, which she came up with after forming a theory based on some interesting Egyptian art (she is an Egyptologist). There's a reason she hasn't gone public with this theory, mind you, there's no solid evidence that she's correct, and I'm respecting that at the moment.

That system is not one I could alter, it is taught "as is", but that doesn't mean I can't create a different system with similar principles that I can work on. I'll have to think about the merits though. Yi seems really good as it is, and often what I like about my divination systems is that they are imperfect. None of them can do everything. Whenever I have something to ask, I contemplate, what kind of answers can this system, or deck, etc, give me? Are those answers the kind of answers that would be helpful? Do I feel drawn to use a particular system? Perhaps I can get an answer from one system, and if I need something different or more specific as follow up, I can ask another system for it. Their diversity is their strength, even as they are similar in some ways.

Side note: I love that the Egyptians did everything differently. The sky female, the earth male. The sun female, the moon male. It makes stepping out of that box a fun exercise for my mind.

 

[IrfanK]

Side note: I love that the Egyptians did everything differently. The sky female, the earth male. The sun female, the moon male. It makes stepping out of that box a fun exercise for my mind.

Very interesting! I have a background in anthropology, with a strong interest in mythology -- and I'm fairly confident that I've never come across those associations before. But I trust your sources. There are some oddballs out there -- even the trigram associations don't quite fit the general pattern, Water, associated with the unconscious, emotions and so on, is the middle SON, not the daughter, despite the fact that those attributes might be associated with Female in other systems. Well, just goes to show, no system produces neat, easy solutions ....

Jospeh Campbell did talk about Egypt a bit, I remember him discussing something like a system of chakras, with many equivalences and correspondences with the Vedic system. Again, whether it's a case of transmitted ideas or just based on shared human experience is debatable, although I tend to lean towards the latter idea: if nothing else, it's a more interesting explanation!

 

[surnevs]

The great Jungian mythologist Joseph Campbell spent his whole career examining common themes in mythologies around the world, as did Scottish anthropologist Sir James George Frazer, the author of The Golden Bough, much earlier. Campbell saw the idea of the hero who dies and is reborn (found in Christianity, the ancient Egyptian religion, and many others) as a metaphor for the agricultural cycle. He did look into the idea of common origins, but he also found similar myths in remote communities in the Americas, in the Amazon and elsewhere, places where you really can't argue that the ideas were transmitted from outside. So, it seems to be that people have common experiences, across cultures and across time. The idea of a male-female dichotomy is pretty basic and fundamental in most mythologies, often expressed in duotheistic systems, often Sky as male and Earth as female. You can certainly see that idea reflected in the Yijing.

So, these links you see may refer to basic archetypes that underlie these systems, rather than transmission between them. It suggests that there is a basic underlying structure, although the manner in which this structure is expressed may be culturally specific. The Catholics have Mary, the Egyptians had Isis, the Vedas had Kali, and the Javanese animists had Nyai Loro Kidul, queen of the south seas. You'll often find that the Goddess is associated with the moon, while the male counterpart is associated with the sun. And so on.

No transmission, just based on common experience. To my mind, that doesn't make the linkages less interesting. If anything, rather the opposite. It's worth exploring these ideas to try to find correspondences. Just don't get too fixated on the idea that one particular idea was derived from somewhere else.

Thank You for the information and for the general admonition not to link two or more ideas with the same source. It's true and one can easy get paralyzed in to such connections, I know from my self.

 

[Gmulii]

Now I'm pondering! The other geomantic system I mentioned in my intro is actually from my Egyptian religious path. I'm part of a temple and the person who leads it teaches this divination system, which she came up with after forming a theory based on some interesting Egyptian art (she is an Egyptologist). There's a reason she hasn't gone public with this theory, mind you, there's no solid evidence that she's correct, and I'm respecting that at the moment.

That system is not one I could alter, it is taught "as is", but that doesn't mean I can't create a different system with similar principles that I can work on. I'll have to think about the merits though. Yi seems really good as it is, and often what I like about my divination systems is that they are imperfect. None of them can do everything. Whenever I have something to ask, I contemplate, what kind of answers can this system, or deck, etc, give me? Are those answers the kind of answers that would be helpful? Do I feel drawn to use a particular system? Perhaps I can get an answer from one system, and if I need something different or more specific as follow up, I can ask another system for it. Their diversity is their strength, even as they are similar in some ways.

Side note: I love that the Egyptians did everything differently. The sky female, the earth male. The sun female, the moon male. It makes stepping out of that box a fun exercise for my mind.

Hi!
Many years ago in my country there was an divination book that was saying it uses a divination system from ancient Egypt.
The idea was we draw symbols "/" with a pencil and we stop when it feels right. 6 lines like that with at least 12 symbols. Then depending if its even or odd number of "/" and the lines we read different text.

Looks like that:
///////////////////////////
////////////////////
//////////////////////
///////////////////
////////////
////////////////////
Today that clearly seems we were making hexagrams, but back then I didn't knew anything about the Chinese systems I think.

More then that, it feels almost exactly the same as some Chinese Divination systems today related to Yi Jing only the text was different yet more easier to understand then Yi Jing can be for someone that hasn't been using it long. Yet making of the Hexagram has its tips and tricks, I can't go into that in detail, but there are reasons approach like that is unlikely to work perfectly without adjustments.
But my idea is that it was one similarity very early on, between Chinese and Egyptian systems, even though I haven no idea what that oracle system was or if there is info in English about it(it was 25-30 years ago). Through the years there have been more but usually scattered, all over.

Can you link your post where you mention geomantic system related to Egypt?That is very interesting to relate to Chinese Feng Shui for me.

Edit: Got curious about it and searched if there is info in English. It seems its this:

Napoleon's Oracle | Consult Napoleon's Book of Fate Oraculum | Ask The Oracle Free - AstrOccult.net

Consult Napoleon's Oracle. Ask Napoleon's Book of Fate Oraculum free and get accurate answer to your question. This ancient oracle was often consulted by Napoleon. Now it is available for your consultation. Best free astrology, horoscopes, numerology readings, reports and occult services and...

www.astroccult.net

4 lines and it was *, though, it was really long time ago, so I have forgotten it was that much.
Still the odd and even part and other stuff points to something very close to what is used in Chinese systems, in my humble view.

 

[surnevs]

Hi!
Many years ago in my country there was an divination book that was saying it uses a divination system from ancient Egypt.
The idea was we draw symbols "/" with a pencil and we stop when it feels right. 6 lines like that with at least 12 symbols. Then depending if its even or odd number of "/" and the lines we read different text.

Looks like that:
///////////////////////////
////////////////////
//////////////////////
///////////////////
////////////
////////////////////
Today that clearly seems we were making hexagrams, but back then I didn't knew anything about the Chinese systems I think.

More then that, it feels almost exactly the same as some Chinese Divination systems today related to Yi Jing only the text was different yet more easier to understand then Yi Jing can be for someone that hasn't been using it long. Yet making of the Hexagram has its tips and tricks, I can't go into that in detail, but there are reasons approach like that is unlikely to work perfectly without adjustments.
But my idea is that it was one similarity very early on, between Chinese and Egyptian systems, even though I haven no idea what that oracle system was or if there is info in English about it(it was 25-30 years ago). Through the years there have been more but usually scattered, all over.

Can you link your post where you mention geomantic system related to Egypt?That is very interesting to relate to Chinese Feng Shui for me.

Edit: Got curious about it and searched if there is info in English. It seems its this:

Napoleon's Oracle | Consult Napoleon's Book of Fate Oraculum | Ask The Oracle Free - AstrOccult.net

Consult Napoleon's Oracle. Ask Napoleon's Book of Fate Oraculum free and get accurate answer to your question. This ancient oracle was often consulted by Napoleon. Now it is available for your consultation. Best free astrology, horoscopes, numerology readings, reports and occult services and...

www.astroccult.net

4 lines and it was *, though, it was really long time ago, so I have forgotten it was that much.
Still the odd and even part and other stuff points to something very close to what is used in Chinese systems, in my humble view.

I took a look at the link above about this Napolean Oracle and frankly the site looked more like an Advertising-site than a serious site. Not thereby to say that the Oracle itself (which I know absolutely nothing about) should be in that category.

 

[Gmulii]

We can see it in other places, here for example:

Hieroglyphics of a Rope-Dancer: *The Book of Fate* (1822)

An oracular hoax by William Henry Ireland, *aka* Herman Kirchenhoffer, that profited from the 19th-century mania for Egyptology and Napoleonic relics.

publicdomainreview.org

No idea why I linked that specific site, but there is info about it here and there it seems.
Here there is another edition from a while ago:

Napoleon's Oraculum and dream book. Containing the great oracle of human destiny : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

62 p. 16 cm

archive.org

It seems to be credible that it was published that long ago, as we can see scanned books from libraries with that date. But is the rest true, I do not know... There is more to the story in some sources, some were mentioning the name of the person that was suppose to have translated it...

Anyway, Napoleon had interesting influence in history, but considering everything I'm not sure the divination methods he used, should be highly sought after, real or not.

 

[surnevs]

Well, that's something else. We know that the egyptians used Dream interpretations, especially from the Bible where a Pharao engaged an Israelit - don't remember his name - who were skilled in interpretating dreams (a famous story that every child knew when I was young, except for me ). I haven't dived into the link's You just gave, just spotted the title "....... and Dream book ..... etc.". Well, thank You Gmulii for taken time to find this.
Were it Joseph ???

 

[Gmulii]

I'm happy to participate, thank you. : )

 

[dfreed]

I'm happy to participate, thank you. : )

Gmulii, I'm wondering, is

Bright Hall(Five Art Calculators)

Five Arts Calculators,Liu Yao(Wen Wang Gua), Bazi and XKDG, currently.

www.bright-hall.net

your website? Best, D

 

[Gmulii]

Its us, yea.
Started for fun with .exe calculators, first one was for WWG(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wen_Wang_Gua) then more.

Was for the forums, although initially for my own use, but didn't had reasons not to share.

Somewhere along the way, moved to web calculators, mostly because I moved back to Linux system and I found it difficult to run my own calculators. While websites are working everywhere. : )

Now we are working with AK for the WWG calculators, its all good I think.

 

[Sugarvenom]

Can you link your post where you mention geomantic system related to Egypt?That is very interesting to relate to Chinese Feng Shui for me.

I realised after I posted that I was referencing my intro which I believe is in the Change Circle, *smacks self* But there's not much to link in that case anyway. What I can link is my personal website about my "woowoo" life, which has a page mostly about that system. There's not deep detail because the method of the system is "oathbound", mostly because there is considered to be magic to the teaching and passing on of tools I think so if people were just learning it from PDFs around the web, that magic would not be getting passed on with it. But yeah that does mean I can only share so much. I hope the info on the page is helpful though!

For those who want to ponder where this system might have come from, looking up art of Ancient Egyptians playing the game "senet" may give food for pondering, but it's a bit of an obscure stretch to make.

 

[surnevs]

Hi again, sorry for have been absent, sparetime here. through around two years - only time given to join here and there, busy caused by You know this pandemi - where maybe I should have stayed away. Anyway I find it interesting that reactions came at all to my note on this new book about similarities between Egypt and China, I haven't expected any reactions at all. IrfanK actually answered my question as to wether this was the first time a study Egypt/China in special was published, more or less as those authors he mentioned did not take the relation those two empires between separately ie. they work with common aspects worldwide relations generally - myth, folklore etc. - between many countries as I know. I've met some of their studies here and there but only briefly in other contexts.
If this thread I started here have caused kind of gateways unexpectedly opened... Wauu, something good was achieved I think. Thank You.

 

[dfreed]

my question as to wether this was the first time a study Egypt/China in special was published

Another thing, you can do a few Google internet searches, like: "comparing ancient China and Egypt", or "comparing ancient civilizations". A quick search confirmed what I knew all along: that this has been done quite a lot, even before a reputable Egyptologist published her 2021 book.

 

[surnevs]

Linguistic similarities are not in themselves proof that there has been contacting between different groups of people. In this case, there seem to be so many correlations between languages that it can hardly be counted as a chance.
I am aware that this text does not deal with the correlations between Chinese and Egyptian. However, I believe that the Egyptians had so much contact with the Indo-Europeans that the relationship with Egypt further back in time may also have included them... (Whether the influences have come from the West to the East or perhaps, in fact, the other way around is an interesting question, since indo-Europeans could, in theory, have got their language and religious beliefs from the East.)


"This paper was designed with two purposes in mind. The first is to convey the idea that there may have been a tribe of Indo-Europeans that conquered the Shang of the Yin dynasty, resulting in the establishment of China’s longest lasting and possibly most influential dynasty, the Zhou. The second purpose is to investigate, if this is the case, whether the myths and legends of China are in fact those of this Indo-European conquering tribe, and to suggest also that their systems of science and philosophy heavily influenced the ancient Chinese. "
- writes Shaun C. R. Ramsden in his paper "Indo-Europeans in the Ancient Yellow River Valley"
The article:
http://www.sino-platonic.org/complete/spp311_indo_europeans_china_zhou_dynasty.pdf

(On page 64 / pdf page 66) Chiyou (蚩尤）is mentioned. I started another thread where his name is discussed HERE [Video])
A reference is made on pg. 56 / pdf pg. 58 to some hypothesis of the origin of the trigram names. Read the source HERE

 

[my_key]

The great Jungian mythologist Joseph Campbell spent his whole career examining common themes in mythologies around the world, as did Scottish anthropologist Sir James George Frazer, the author of The Golden Bough, much earlier. Campbell saw the idea of the hero who dies and is reborn (found in Christianity, the ancient Egyptian religion, and many others) as a metaphor for the agricultural cycle. He did look into the idea of common origins, but he also found similar myths in remote communities in the Americas, in the Amazon and elsewhere, places where you really can't argue that the ideas were transmitted from outside. So, it seems to be that people have common experiences, across cultures and across time. The idea of a male-female dichotomy is pretty basic and fundamental in most mythologies, often expressed in duotheistic systems, often Sky as male and Earth as female. You can certainly see that idea reflected in the Yijing.

The collective unconscious is described by Carl Jung in his transpersonal view of all things. This concept talks of the deeper realms of the unconscious mind where themes are not directly shaped by personal experience. Every human being that has ever lived is connected through their psyche to this deeper realm. This connection helps form the deep seated beliefs and instincts, that as you say, Joseph Campbell spent many years researching in the mythologies of cultures. The themes tend to mainly coalesce around life, death, sex and spirituality.

So there most probably is a connection between Egyptian and Chinese culture and I agree it is readily noticable around the spirituality aspects of Yi. Additionally a number of the Egyptian gods had oracular duties to perform in their respective roles.

 

[surnevs]

The collective unconscious is described by Carl Jung in his transpersonal view of all things. This concept talks of the deeper realms of the unconscious mind where themes are not directly shaped by personal experience. Every human being that has ever lived is connected through their psyche to this deeper realm. This connection helps form the deep seated beliefs and instincts, that as you say, Joseph Campbell spent many years researching in the mythologies of cultures. The themes tend to mainly coalesce around life, death, sex and spirituality.

So there most probably is a connection between Egyptian and Chinese culture and I agree it is readily noticable around the spirituality aspects of Yi. Additionally a number of the Egyptian gods had oracular duties to perform in their respective roles.

% The below-attached pdf is yet another example where there's a story about Dream Interpretation.

But also, later in the article:

" The Egyptians believed that a man's fate or destiny was decided before he was born, and that he had no power whatever to alter it. Their sages, however, professed to be able to declare what the fate might be, provided that they were given certain data, that is to say, if they were told the date of his birth, and if they were able to ascertain the position of the planets and stars at that time. The goddess of fate or destiny was called "Shai," and she is usually accompanied by another goddess called "Renenet," who is commonly regarded as the lady of fortune; they both appear in the Judgment Scene, where they seem to watch the weighing of the heart on behalf of the deceased. But another goddess, Meskhenet, is sometimes present, and she also seems to have had influence over a man's future; in any case she was able to predict what that future was to be. Thus we read that she and Isis, and Nephthys, and Heqet, disguised as women, went to the house of Râ-user, whose wife Râ-Tettet was in travail; when they had been taken into her room they assisted her in giving birth to triplets, and as each child was born Meskhenet declared, "He shall be a king who shall have dominion over the whole land." "

The book from which these quotes are taken:

EGYPTIAN MAGIC
by E. A. WALLIS BUDGE
LATE KEEPER OF THE EGYPTIAN AND ASSYRIAN ANTIQUITIES IN THE BRITISH
MUSEUM
Kegan, Paul, Trench and Trübner & Co., London
[1901]​

and can be downloaded from the link below.

*) https://www.pdfdrive.com/egyptian-magic-d53935918.html