Structure and Meaning of Trigrams

[dmgiles]

Hello!

I'm new to this forum. I've been carrying around a question about the trigrams for a while and I haven't found any clear answer to this question so far in my research. It MIGHT be under my nose...

How does the structure of the trigrams create the meaning of the trigrams?

It's clear to me that three yang lines will yield a trigram that is yang in essence... but how do two yang lines under a yin line come to mean "joyous" or "lake"?

How does on yin line between two yang lines come to mean "clinging" or "flame"?

More importantly, perhaps:

What do the different positions in the trigram mean? Certainly one yin line will have a different meaning if it's above two yang lines, versus between two yang lines, versus below two yang lines...

Thank you in advance for your generous insight.

 

[fkegan]

How trigram lines become trigram meaning...

Hi dmgiles,

There are many sources of explanation of the trigram meanings. In the index of the Wilhelm under trigram is a good place to start. For an alternative view look to my webpage:
http://www.stars-n-dice.com/fluxtome.html
using the Find search function on your browser for trigram references.

In general, like casting three coins for oracle lines, what is unique upon a background of two determines meaning in terms of Yang and Yin. A unique 2 with two 3 values is a yin line. If all three are the same, then it is an unstable or moving line of that type, so 9 is moving Yang and 6 is moving Yin.

All the other interpretation details depend first upon the hexagram overall to give the context for meaning. Within that Yang lines in odd places in the hexagram lines, 1-6 are correct, similarly Yin in even numbered places. Yang lines form relationships with Yin lines in the same order in upper and lower trigrams and each line interacts with the line before it and behind it. The commentary in Book III of Wilhelm goes through this in detail with each line as well as the hexagram overall.

Good luck with your Yi studies,

Frank

 

[elvis]

Hello!

I'm new to this forum. I've been carrying around a question about the trigrams for a while and I haven't found any clear answer to this question so far in my research. It MIGHT be under my nose...

How does the structure of the trigrams create the meaning of the trigrams?

Creation of the symbols, be they digrams or trigrams or hexagrams etc are built bottom-up general to particular. Thus the QUALITIES of yin/yang are developed and in doing so finer differentiation of the meanings occurs. The method of creation is called recursion where we build 8 trigrams etc from layering the yin/yang dichotomy. (another way of interpreting is each line is a WAVE and we build a complex waveform of meaning by summing the individual waves to give us as a 'wave' of meaning)

The ancients needed to reflect on local context history/legend/myth to use as analogies to represent what was being felt. These days we can be more precise based on understanding of brain dynamics in eliciting meaning and so use alternative methods as covered in the Emotional I Ching material.


E.g. "Lake" covers sharing of space with another/others (bonding) and that includes self - as such it covers self-reflection as it does depth as it does joy etc etc and the general side of the coin we can call passion with all of its suffering/pleasure etc.

The other side of the coin is represented by mountain.

 

[bradford]

Hello!
How does the structure of the trigrams create the meaning of the trigrams?.

Hi Michael-
A good and legitimate question. I've struggled long and hard with it and come up empty, otherwise I'd have published something in my Xiao Xiang chapter. The interpretive algorithms that I look for personally are those that would have been on the minds of the early authors, but back that far they didn't even have a concept of Yin and Yang in play (that surprises most people, some stomp their feet and sputter, but YinYang came much later). It's clear that the authors had ideas for the six places, but not for the three. Some academics even suggest that trigrams were not yet on the minds of the Zhouyi authors, but I disagree strongly with that one. The San Cai, Heaven-Man-Earth was a much later invention too. We can make stuff up now, anachronistically, and try applying it retroactively to add to our understanding, and that often gives us good insights, but we seldom get an understanding that is fundamental to the Yi in this way. Frank and Chris do this all the time - in fact it's about all that they do.
My best guess is that the authors just meditated on the whole symbols, made the most obvious assignments first, and then filled in the blanks. After that the meanings grew by accretion, particularly with "the family" associations, eldest daughter, etc. After that you could start to discern some vague meanings in the line places simply using the brain's insistence on finding pattern and meaning. But it's not fundamental to how the meanings are grown.
I did come up with one anachronistic analysis once, but it's not to be taken as fundamental:
The Three Trigram Places:
3. After going (Gen simply stops, Dui will have some satisfaction first)
2. While going (Kan concentrates and integrates, Li appreciates and differentiates)
1. Beginning (Zhen simply goes, Sun is ready to go, given the right opportunity)

 

[fkegan]

We can make stuff up now, anachronistically, and try applying it retroactively to add to our understanding, and that often gives us good insights, but we seldom get an understanding that is fundamental to the Yi in this way. Frank and Chris do this all the time - in fact it's about all that they do....

My best guess is that the authors just meditated on the whole symbols, made the most obvious assignments first, and then filled in the blanks. After that the meanings grew by accretion, particularly with "the family" associations, eldest daughter, etc. After that you could start to discern some vague meanings in the line places simply using the brain's insistence on finding pattern and meaning. But it's not fundamental to how the meanings are grown.

Hi Brad,

You clearly have fundamental problems with my perspective; more interested in denying anything outside your comfort zone of easy assumptions and expectations. To be anachronistic assumes that history and artifacts are all that matter; thus any way they are obtained or given some chronology is the be all and end all of scholarship. This I call the attitude of foolish promoters and accomplishes of grave robbers, invaders and despoilers of sacred ground and other folks homeland.

However, beyond that technical and moral quibble between us. I am the only one to EVER figure out how to apply Occam's Razor to the mystery of the King Wen Sequence, solving it clearly and simply. Also explaining the original legend that he rearranged the hexagrams by their line patterns alone, giving meaning to them without words or component elements. Only later the next generations added the commentary upon individual lines, trigrams, etc. that you have cataloged and chronicled so ably.

Oh, yes, and in terms of translation of the original text I was involved with Gia-fu with his Taoist translation based upon his direct connection to his Taoist teachers and ancestors.

My own work integrates fundamental symbol principles of the I Ching, Astrology and the Pythagorean Computer to simplify and explain all three individually and together. But of course all of that is not within your tunnel vision--even the literal text of the OED fails that test too.

Though you do mention your guess that the ancients (or authors in your jargon) meditated for their insights. That is entering the inner mystical reality that transcends time-and-space. That is what Gia-fu did in his translation, that is what was given to me in my work. You see the glow of the warm fireplace within the ancient windows but you won't open the door and go in...

Ever consider writing to a newbie in terms they could understand and use in their own learning steps or is that beneath you high dignity too? Seems to me another aspect of you eduction rather than education. If you are going to focus upon words, its vitally important to get them right.

Frank

 

[bradford]

Frank
I think that the most profound Yijing discovery ever made by anyone was an anachronism, dating no further back that the 11th century current era - that's of course Shao Yong's Early Heaven arrangement. It shows the King Wen arrangement up for the precisely half random, half meaningful piece of obfuscation that it is, regardless of what patterns the paranoid can see in it. But it still doesn't help me to explain why the text says "no blame" or "be true" in a particular place. It doesn't help me to understand what the classic is telling me in these particular words. Neither does your work because you have abandoned the notion that the classic text has any discoverable meaning, at least not compared to your vaunted wisdom. But I'll go with the dragon that's shown three millenia of staying power - I just don't think your thought will prove all that durable.

 

[fkegan]

Frank
I think that the most profound Yijing discovery ever made by anyone was an anachronism, dating no further back that the 11th century current era - that's of course Shao Yong's Early Heaven arrangement. It shows the King Wen arrangement up for the precisely half random, half meaningful piece of obfuscation that it is, regardless of what patterns the paranoid can see in it. But it still doesn't help me to explain why the text says "no blame" or "be true" in a particular place. It doesn't help me to understand what the classic is telling me in these particular words. Neither does your work because you have abandoned the notion that the classic text has any discoverable meaning, at least not compared to your vaunted wisdom. But I'll go with the dragon that's shown three millenia of staying power - I just don't think your thought will prove all that durable.

Hi Brad,

You deny the wonder of the KWS? Your thinking goes no further than the Earlier Heaven?
Enough said, you are 4 millennia out of place.

Why would one be paranoid to see pattern in the Chou Yi? Without it you only have tortoise shell divination. There are heaps of those things for centuries and they disappear by 1000BCE, you think that is because of the E.H.A. of the trigrams?

You miss that I believe deeply the classic text has absolute meaning, just not in Western thinking imposed upon it. My work is all about explaining why a particular hexagram would include the slogans it does. Things don't seem explained to you since you are only looking at the bark and not the tree and never the whole forest. It is your limitation in understanding not my evil rejection of established text. You are totally projecting your own paranoia, since you brought up that term, that anything creative would be desecration.

You doubt my work will last for 3 millennia? You miss the point of my insight: There is a 4 millennium delay between discovery of a new insight or technology and its common use. My view is that in another 900 years my work will be obvious and the middle school kids studying the Yi in science class would go "Duh? I learned that in 6th grade" if introduced to my work. Mine is only special now, 900 years early.

But thanks for showing what is your problem with my insights. You do know that Legge was all Brit and not much Yi in his work?

Frank

 

[tuckchang]

Hi !

Provided you haven’t been yet, would like to introduce another method, the conventional way, of studying the line, the trigram and the hexagram as well as the I Ching: http://www.iching123.com/basic_text.htm.

Regards
Tuck

 

[elvis]

As always the traditionalists are 'stuck' due to their being tied to the metaphor rather that what is represented. Bradford's focus on the binary is closer to home than Frank's focus on the traditional but Brsdford then gets stuck in confusing classes of meanings with instances.

We can roll back to the neurological, cognitive levels to cover the trigrams as classes of meanings derived from the more primitive levels of our neural/cognitivre natures and then customised using local terms. As such we are dealing with qualities covering the dynamics of wholeness, partness, static relatedness, dynamic relatedness and one level of qualification to give us our eight classes that can then be used to develop more compositre classes open to local context labelling and colouring.

 

[elvis]

BTW - note that the binary COMPASS sequence covers structure, the traditionsl COMPASS sequence more procress and the rotation of the binary the sequencing through the WHY/HOW hierarchy of abstracte/concrete present in our brains.

The traditional prose associated with the symbols covers perspectives of local contexts but to understand what is going on needs only understanding of the class natures that can then be mapped to existing local contexts and so one's own perspective if need be.

 

[fkegan]

Hello!

I'm new to this forum. I've been carrying around a question about the trigrams for a while and I haven't found any clear answer to this question so far in my research. It MIGHT be under my nose...

How does the structure of the trigrams create the meaning of the trigrams?

It's clear to me that three yang lines will yield a trigram that is yang in essence... but how do two yang lines under a yin line come to mean "joyous" or "lake"?

How does on yin line between two yang lines come to mean "clinging" or "flame"?
More importantly, perhaps:
What do the different positions in the trigram mean? Certainly one yin line will have a different meaning if it's above two yang lines, versus between two yang lines, versus below two yang lines...
Thank you in advance for your generous insight.

Hopefully by now you notice that your question is a big important one and is worthy of your own study upon the matter.

Getting back to your original question:
The trigrams form a simple picture by their lines, like a triangle within the analysis of a polygon. Yang lines are full and tend to diffuse themselves outward. Yin lines are empty and tend to draw in from around them. The two together are like a hill and a valley. The hilltop rolls down stones, the valley accumulates them.Their Chinese names have components about a hill and a valley.

So a Yin line between two Yang lines draws the pair of Yang lines together and thus clings to them. Fire clings to a log following its shape by its flames.

Everything in a trigram or hexagram follows the rule of sequence. The bottom line follows the 2nd line which follows the third line. The third line leads the trigram toward the upper trigram, following the fourth line, etc.

Thus two Yang lines following a Yin line looks like a pretty face with an open mouth or a lake with a bit of wave action on the surface.

In those trigrams with both Yang and Yin lines, the two lines form the background and the unique line shows the nature of this trigrams. Those with one Yin line are feminine, those with one Yang line are masculine. If this line that shows gender is the first line it is first born, if in the second or middle place then the middle child, and in the 3rd or final place the youngest child. The trigrams all the same lines are Father and Mother.

From these principles, looking at the trigrams as line drawings of abstract symbolism or x-ray films of the skeleton of the timing represented; the basic meaning of the trigram is available to be imagined.

As they say, the rest of the vast and competing literature is Commentary.

Good Luck,

Frank

 

[heylise]

Hi Michael,

I think there is certainly a meaning in the places. I don't agree with Bradford about the ancients having no idea about yin and yang back then. These names for it came later, but before those there were other names for it, they knew about warm and cold, light and dark, summer and winter, male and female, active and receptive and so on. They were very aware of nature and everything in it, but had no need yet to catch it in philosophical terms.

The three lines of the trigrams are one above the other, like a lot in their surroundings. Earth below heaven, matter below air, light things rising above heavy things, dark in a pit, light on a mountain top.

The trigram for lake does make sense to me: the open receptive surface of water above the non-receptive hard rock. Water which is on all sides soft but has a very hard core, a big power embedded in it. Fire the opposite, attacking and sharp to the outside, but nothing tangible inside. Mountain hard rock resting on soft earth. Not all is very clear, but it is not totally random either.

LiSe

 

[fkegan]

The trigram for lake does make sense to me: the open receptive surface of water above the non-receptive hard rock. Water which is on all sides soft but has a very hard core, a big power embedded in it. Fire the opposite, attacking and sharp to the outside, but nothing tangible inside. Mountain hard rock resting on soft earth. Not all is very clear, but it is not totally random either.

Hi Lise,

In the above you are expressing your personal associations rather than either the observable world or the symbolic abstraction. Wonderful as artistic license but not so useful to connect to and understand the traditional commentary or the inherent semiotic and semantic content of the trigrams.

The fullness of the lake (water) gives way to the openness of its surface where waves form and the water evaporates. (cf hex 61 and 10) No rock in a lake, rather lakes form in depressions or low places in the topography.

Fire is the opposite of running water since they are both fluid, although one tends to sink downward and the other floats upward. Fire is only sharp outside if you are young or naive enough to reach out your fingers into it. Fire is the result of combustible gases released from its fuel, the log in the fireplace, it clings to the outer shape of the log since it is dependent upon the log reacting to the general heat to transform the solid wood into fluid gas which is then ignited. The Chinese ideogram for "NOT" is based upon a set of logs burning up and becoming no more. This is the essence of fire the special energy that destroys what it clings to while creating some that arises more from our understanding of heaven or the sun than from anything else earthly.

There is no soft earth under some hard mountain shell--that would be a Good Humor ice cream bar. The weight of the mountain makes the earth hard and helps squeeze out the rain that falls on the mountain top to form the artesian spring of hex 4. The definition of a mountain is a clearly visible peak turned into a mountain by the two valleys that surround it--Yang line atop two Yin.

It helps to read the text of the Commentary in your many books on your bookshelf or research the reality of the natural world as explained by our science or go out into actual natural settings and observe these basics objectively (not just as subjective background to your own inner musings) that remain the same today as they were three or four millennia ago. To just think about what feels good to you as projected out on these elegant line patterns and universal archetypes and make up poetic wordings of no reality outside of your own inner personal imagination is hardly useful or accurate just self-indulgent and inappropriate.

Particularly in a discussion requested by a newbie to begin to understand the Yi. Reminds me of the line in Classic Peanuts that Linus would have to go to school twice, once to unlearn what Lucy taught him (eduction complete with the yell to knock his block off and actually bowling him over) and then again to become educated in the understanding of his culture.

Frank

 

[hilary]

I find the products of LiSe's imagination tremendously useful in understanding the Yi, and have done for years.

 

[hilary]

Brad - suggestion - you could link to your site in your signature, allowing all readers to download your book and reach their own conclusions about how far you've travelled .

 

[bradford]

Another unexplored niche on Clarity. Thx.

 

[fkegan]

I find the products of LiSe's imagination tremendously useful in understanding the Yi, and have done for years.

Hi Hilary,

Sadly, that explains a lot. The Yi ultimately isn't poetry, it has poetic phrases as well as slogans, and imagery. Just as a woman isn't, as Napoleon put it, a mechanism to produce babies; rather a person who has the ability to reproduce.

Imagination sparks imagination. Yet as Aristotle put it, the brain is a radiator throwing off sparks of imagination meaning very little. It is what grabs the heart that matters (in our terms, only what grabs you enough to change your heart rate is truly persuasive rhetoric).

Understanding the Yi follows from the premises, assumptions and context within which you operate. The ideal of discussion is to learn the limits of each of these by being reminded of where they leak and fall short (cf. hex 47).

There is a great difference between the child, the child like and the childish. Young children innately understand notions of chi and Tao (though the researcher only recognizes chi). A new article published this week documents this: http://www.nybooks.com/articles/23694
New York Review of Books Volume 57, Number 4 · March 11, 2010 What Babies Know and We Don't [Great article in a great journal, BTW]

The child like is the conscious adult quest for this early state. The artistic involves many threads and personal subjectivity.

I enjoy LiSe's artwork, but not any claim that it is anything more than decorative in terms of Yi themes.

But thank you for sharing your position.

Frank

 

[dobro p]

My best guess is that the authors just meditated on the whole symbols, made the most obvious assignments first, and then filled in the blanks. After that the meanings grew by accretion, particularly with "the family" associations, eldest daughter, etc.

I agree with you, generally, but I want to make sure I understand you. What do you mean by 'whole symbols'?

Next question: which came first, the family associations (eldest daughter, etc) or the trigram names?

Finally, since you know so much more about the history of the Yi than I do, how does this idea strike you, historically speaking: originally, the trigram meanings had no place in the Yi particularly, but as time passed they worked their way into the Yi as they suggested themselves to the users (but they were by no means applied comprehensively).

 

[meng]

Irrelevant, I guess, but I still get more interactive meanings from trigrams than from hexagrams. Very hard for me to imagine hexagrams predating trigrams. I can see how they may have been initially designed separately, and then the reasoning match was just too good to resist. Kind of like "hey, you got chocolate on my peanut butter" and "hey, you got peanut butter on my chocolate!" They just go well together.

 

[meng]

I enjoy LiSe's artwork, but not any claim that it is anything more than decorative in terms of Yi themes.

But thank you for sharing your position.

Frank

What an absolutely ignorant statement, to say nothing of your greasy motive to defame her and her legitimate work, for no other apparent reason then to make yourself and your work appear greater. I find it laughable that a Daoist master has ever had anything to do with you, other than to let you be his kiss ass groupie for awhile. You are rock bottom in my book, old man.

Hilary, feel free to move this where you deem appropriate.

 

[elvis]

tsk tsk tsk Kegan.

 

[maremaria]

There is no soft earth under some hard mountain shell--that would be a Good Humor ice cream bar.

There is a saying here that come from the past , where people had litle field or biger ones to produces good for their home.
"common on ! i didn't ask to to plow a mountain". used when you ask something simple from someone and s/he complains because to them it feel like a heavy work to do. Perhaps those people though that a mountain is something hard, but of course they were just farmers and didn't hold PHD in geology ...

Water is H2O, fire might be "the result of combustible gases released from its fuel, the log in the fireplace, it clings to the outer shape of the log since it is dependent upon the log reacting to the general heat to transform the solid wood into fluid gas which is then ignited" but in the mind of the people there are something else.

To me Yi is poetry, is art because most of the times works as if you have been exposed in a piece of art. and you don't really need much to understand it. Just an open mind and a open heart.

 

[fkegan]

Irrelevant, I guess, but I still get more interactive meanings from trigrams than from hexagrams. Very hard for me to imagine hexagrams predating trigrams. I can see how they may have been initially designed separately, and then the reasoning match was just too good to resist. Kind of like "hey, you got chocolate on my peanut butter" and "hey, you got peanut butter on my chocolate!" They just go well together.

Hi Bruce,

Here you find the true crux of the issue. How could 6 line hexagrams arise before the simple, elegant, understandable and delightful trigrams? That is the ultimate mystery of the King Wen Sequence and the Chou I in a nut shell or a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup!

Yet truth is stranger than fiction and this is the reality both historical and conceptual. The hexagrams were a Great Leap Forward; but they turned the page and left folks behind. The trigrams come later but they are conceptually primary. The individual lines and their relationships are a later generation, yet they are the foundation of universe understanding and use of the Oracle. Remarkable and wonderful and awe inspiring.

So, in your metaphor, first comes the Reese's Peanut Butter Cup as a new product and then kids take it apart as they eat them to focus upon the peanut butter and the chocolate and then they learn that the combination is truly special. Yes, brilliant.

Frank

 

[fkegan]

There is a saying here that come from the past , where people had litle field or biger ones to produces good for their home.
"common on ! i didn't ask to to plow a mountain". used when you ask something simple from someone and s/he complains because to them it feel like a heavy work to do. Perhaps those people though that a mountain is something hard, but of course they were just farmers and didn't hold PHD in geology ...

Water is H2O, fire might be "the result of combustible gases released from its fuel, the log in the fireplace, it clings to the outer shape of the log since it is dependent upon the log reacting to the general heat to transform the solid wood into fluid gas which is then ignited" but in the mind of the people there are something else.

To me Yi is poetry, is art because most of the times works as if you have been exposed in a piece of art. and you don't really need much to understand it. Just an open mind and a open heart.

Hi Marie,

I agree. The Yi is an open fountain that any and all can enjoy and use for their own benefit. However, it takes a great deal of structure and development to create, deliver and maintain that fountain. Some may enjoy the simple pleasure of the water. Others, like me, are fascinated by the structure and engineering involved in the project. There is room enough for both perspectives. The point of all the engineering is to make sure the fountain remain pure, simple, abundant and fun. The fun and the benefit is also the result of the all the hard work by the folks working with the pipes and the test kits.

Or in the terms of your remark, "I did not ask to plow a mountain" The essence of agriculture is the long term development and investment required to create cropland fields from raw land. It is a major infrastructure project that requires vision and investment and long-term planning. Then folks can work their own plot and provide for their families and pay the rent that makes the investment in developing the land worthwhile and profitable.

It doesn't work the other way around. From a bunch of folks who find a simple request a terrible burden each concerned just with their own chores an entire village of fertile fields and public buildings at their core will not grow of their own like mushrooms after the rain.

Together the various perspectives work for a community of opportunity and useful products. This requires respect for diversity and that other perspectives may not be your interest, yet they can still be important and interesting to others. However there are limits to what can claim universal acceptance under diversity, especially in the context of a thread to instruct about how meanings are associated to trigrams. Poetic or imaginative flights of fancy are fine as long as clearly indicated as subjective and personal. As a way of studying inherent meaning they can be misleading and cause folks to be led astray in difficult ways.

One example: The trigram Dui or Lake based upon an ideogram of a marshy lake must reflect hex 47 in its nature since it is another hexagram about lakes. To claim that the two Yang lines could be hard rock forming the lake is poetic for nowadays when we have swimming pools and artificial lakes built behind dams to hold water for hydroelectric projects. However, in ancient China, as noted in hex 47 a lake is not a fixed container, but a place which only fills up with water if the inflows are greater than the outflows and seepage into the ground and evaporation, otherwise it dries up. The content and energy of Dui is its water or the diversity of life that abounds in wetlands or marshy lakes.

Frank

 

[maremaria]

This requires respect for diversity and that other perspectives may not be your interest, yet they can still be important and interesting to others.

Frank

Theoretically speaking.... I guess

 

[dmgiles]

Much Thanks!

I've found several of these answers to be quite helpful.

Cool!

 

[chushel]

Hi Michael,

I think there is certainly a meaning in the places. I don't agree with Bradford about the ancients having no idea about yin and yang back then. These names for it came later, but before those there were other names for it, they knew about warm and cold, light and dark, summer and winter, male and female, active and receptive and so on. They were very aware of nature and everything in it, but had no need yet to catch it in philosophical terms.

The three lines of the trigrams are one above the other, like a lot in their surroundings. Earth below heaven, matter below air, light things rising above heavy things, dark in a pit, light on a mountain top.

The trigram for lake does make sense to me: the open receptive surface of water above the non-receptive hard rock. Water which is on all sides soft but has a very hard core, a big power embedded in it. Fire the opposite, attacking and sharp to the outside, but nothing tangible inside. Mountain hard rock resting on soft earth. Not all is very clear, but it is not totally random either.

LiSe

Thank you LiSe. :bows:
This is a very helpful post for me. It allows the images to become alive and fluid-- not fixed.
I find that when that occurs, I can EXPERIENCE the meaning in fresh and unexpected ways.
Chushel

 

[fkegan]

Theoretically speaking.... I guess

Hi Maria,

No, it is not at all theoretical. The geologist speaks of your hillside being in danger of coming down in a mudslide with the next storm may be based upon theory but it is very practical. Thinking only of the fun of the water fountain in the park is good and proper, as long as there is also room for those who are busy testing the water and speaking up when it seems to have problems...
This is a thread about how to begin to associate meaning to the yang and yin lines of the trigrams. There are many ways to play with that theme, all of them have their merits and difficulties. Some seem clear and simple but also involve deep troubles.

Thank you LiSe.
This is a very helpful post for me. It allows the images to become alive and fluid-- not fixed.
I find that when that occurs, I can EXPERIENCE the meaning in fresh and unexpected ways.
Chushel

Hi Chusel,

The notion of making your own alive and fluid associations to any symbolism is important to your own exploration. However, there is a danger in believing LiSe's artistic musings upon the hexagrams are in any way the actual meaning or origin of the trigram lines. They are sweet candy, however like the sweets made with ingredients dried with fans powered with leaded gasoline containing toxic level of that heavy metal. Ok in small does, great as an example of what one individual might do for their own advanced study; though not so good as a guide to beginners starting off their studies taken without a grain of salt...

As long as you are just enjoying the passing poetry...yes, I would agree the fluid imagery is liberating. Seeing lakes as full of rocks or mountains filled with soft fluff like clouds is a flight of fancy to be admired but it wasn't what was in anyone's mind in ancient China. They were observing and meditating upon actual Lakes of their experience made of water contained in the local topography or mountains of heavy rock stretching up high yet remaining stable in their composition making a clear and stark impression in the panorama by their summit framed in the valleys that surround that summit.

Frank

 

[maremaria]

Theoretically speaking.... I guess

Frank, an example what "theoretically speaking " means : A lady after giving a great speach against the use of real fur, leaves the room wearing her Chinchilla coat.

 

[fkegan]

Frank, an example what "theoretically speaking " means : A lady after giving a great speach against the use of real fur, leaves the room wearing her Chinchilla coat.

Hi Maria,

That isn't an example of the theoretical, but of hypocrisy. You will have to explain how you found my statement hypocrisy. I respect diversity, but that is not the same as declining to comment upon what I believe are errors. Everyone is welcome to their own opinions, but not their own facts. There would be no discussion if all that was said was, that is your opinion. Some things are clearly only matters of opinion or differences in taste. Others are suitable disputes over objective content.

When the purely subjective is presented as objective sources of meaning that is a problem--unless and until clearly labeled as personal artistry or imaginative flight of fancy. To say some specific lake with a rocky shore is so filled with rocks that they are overflowing out upon the shoreline is a poetic and imaginative subjective opinion to be respected under diversity. To say all lakes in general or the Yi trigram Lake is about being a collection of rocks that is a misunderstanding of the symbolism to be noted for its error while being respected for its imagination and subjective diversity.

However, I would like to hear how you found my remarks hypocrisy.

Frank