Tenth Wing--Zagua "Miscellaneous Hexagrams"

[tacrab]

The Tenth Wing, the Zagua (Ts'a-kua) is of unknown origin. It is a mnemonic poem for a hexagram order that is "scrambled" compared to the received order (which itself has a puzzling order). The Zagua is translated in its entirety in Legge and Rutt.

I've posted a PDF of the two orders here (mid-page) so that people can study them side-by-side, and a short blogpost about it here.
Will be interested to hear if anyone has any theories about it

 

[hilary]

I must admit, I've never looked for any logic or pattern in the order of the Zagua. Maybe I should! Your pdf makes it much easier - thank you.

 

[Freedda]

Is it possible that it is a long rhyming poem or ode - loosely based on the Yi - that was composed in no particular order, just to make it rhyme - and we have the option to read it like that, or pull it apart to find meaning in the individual gua, or .... ?

And maybe there really is no connection between the received order and the tenth wing order, sort of like putting coins in the juke box and basing the playlist order on your favorite songs - maybe after a few or more drinks.

Or maybe it's like:
dear - doe a dear a female ...,
sun - ray, a drop of of golden ...
myself - me, a name I call ...
run - fa, a long long way to ...

 

[tacrab]

My presumption is that, given the high stature of theYijing, that everything in it is there for a reason.
The clear connections between the Zagua and received order are the pairs, and the fact that Hexagrams 1/2 and 31/32 are in the same positions in both. That's all, apparently.

 

[hilary]

Yes, maybe there's nothing to it. Maybe there is. All we can say for sure is that we won't find anything without looking.

...the fact that Hexagrams 1/2 and 31/32 are in the same positions in both.

...like that, for instance! I've been using the Zagua in readings for donkey's years and never knew that.

 

[tacrab]

Richard Rutt's Zhouyi has the most info I've been able to find, discusses the format of the text/poem.
Basic questions: Is the Zagua order
Random?
Jumbled?
Driven by the text?
Or by the hexagram structure?
By trigram symbolism?
By relationship to received order?

 

[Freedda]

My presumption .... given the high stature of theYijing, (is) that everything in it is there for a reason.

It is a mnemonic ... for a hexagram order that is "scrambled" compared to the received order - which itself has a puzzling order ....

Richard Rutt's Zhouyi has the most info I've been able to find ....

So, what we have here are poetic hexagram verses in some sort of 'scrambled' order, which are a scrambling of an otherwise 'puzzling order'. But you think there's a reason for all this 'scrambling' and 'puzzling'.

Well I suppose that is possible. But I assume you haven't found the order and therefore you are just assuming it has some rhyme and/or reason to it - which you have yet not discovered. Is that about it?

Richard Rutt says, "If it is ... profound, the depths are obscure .... There is no obvious logical reason for this arrangement .... rhyme patterns appear, but they are very irregular." (And he points out that at the end of the Zagua, eight of the hexagrams are not paired nor in any seemingly logical order) ....

So, I agree that there is no harm in exploring / looking into this random collection of verses - and I'd welcome to see what patterns / connections you find - but until then, it's a random collection of mostly pair verses about the hexagrams.

I've been using the Zagua in readings for donkey's years ....

When you say 'using' do you mean you look at the verse of a specific hexagram found in the Zagua, to see if it provides any additional information or meaning about that particular Gua? That seems valid, just like we might look at the other Wings for further insight.

But if this is what you're doing with the Zagua then it seems that its 'order' - possibly aside from the pairings - is not really relevant to how you're using the Zagua. Or is the particular order here also important?

All the best ....

 

[tacrab]

If any interesting things are discovered, e.g. patterning, it doesn't necessarily affect how we USE the text, but can expand our understanding of it.

 

[hilary]

Basic questions: Is the Zagua order
Random?
Jumbled?
Driven by the text?
Or by the hexagram structure?
By trigram symbolism?
By relationship to received order?

Very good basic questions. So far, I can't find any patterns related to trigrams or types of pair. There is a mini-pattern with three complementary pairs: at the beginning, you have 7/8, 19/20 and 3/4 together, and then further along there are 33/34, 13/14 and 49/50 grouped together. But unless we can find any more patterns made with complements, this looks coincidental.

When you say 'using' do you mean you look at the verse of a specific hexagram found in the Zagua, to see if it provides any additional information or meaning about that particular Gua?

Exactly. That's what this Wing seems to be for: a quick, snappy insight into the meaning, facilitated by contrast. Contrasts are a universal, useful tool for identifying and understanding things. Another such tool is story-telling - and there's a Wing for that, too. I think these Wings are meant for use in readings, as keys to unlock the hexagram - which would be why they're such a disappointment to authors who are looking for metaphysical profundity (and/or who just aren't interested in divination). They belong to the realm of practice, not theory.

That seems valid

Thank you.

But if this is what you're doing with the Zagua then it seems that its 'order' - possibly aside from the pairings - is not really relevant to how you're using the Zagua. Or is the particular order here also important?

No; it's just about the pairs. Why people (Wilhelm/Baynes) split them up so you get one half of the contrast and not the other with each hexagram, I have no idea. It defeats the object altogether.

If any interesting things are discovered, e.g. patterning, it doesn't necessarily affect how we USE the text, but can expand our understanding of it.

True - though expanded understanding tends to seep back into usage in the end.

 

[Freedda]

That's what this Wing seems to be for: a quick, snappy insight into the meaning, facilitated by contrast.

Yes. One way to see these are as different divinatory tools in our Yi toolbox that people can - if they want to - make use of (and there are of course other tools as well). And the Wings are part of these. The 'Wings' that I'm more familiar with are the Tuan Zhuan, 1st and 2nd Wings; the image commentaries, the 3rd and 4th Wings; the Shougua or trigram commentaries, the 8th Wing, and now the Zagua, 10th Wing.

What I'm saying about the 10th Wing is that I don't see a meaningful or understandable order to its sequence - except that most (but not all) of them are paired. And I don't see any tie-ins between the two sequences.

For example, for the Received Order, if we counted in 13 hexagrams from the beginning, we get Hex. 13 and it's pair, Hex. 14. But if we count in the same with the Zagua sequence, we get Hex. 26 and it's pair 25 (which are 'reversed' in their paired order); and there is no connection I can find between 13th place Hex. 13 and it's 13th place Zagua counterpart, Hex. 26. They are not related as opposite, reverse, inverse, or nuclear hexagrams.

When I pick Hex. 61 and 62 from the received order, the connection to their Zagua counterparts gets even more tenuous, since they are Hex. 63 and 54! And further, the last four hexagram 'pairs' in the Zagua are not even 'pair's in the sense I understand them; instead we have 28-44, 53-27, 63-54 and 64-43!

So, yes, many people find the text of the Zagua (and the other Wings) meaningful, but there doesn't appear to be any rhyme or reason for the sequence of the Zagua, nor any way that the hexagrams in this sequence correspond with their received order counterparts. But perhaps someone will discover these connections some day.

All the best ...

 

[tacrab]

In the Zagua, eleven pairs are in "reverse" order; thirteen if you count the shuffled ones at the end of the order.
I count the shuffled ones as still paired, but for some reason, shuffled.

 

[Freedda]

I count the shuffled ones as still paired, but for some reason, shuffled.

Stephen Karcher, whom is very big on using pairs in Yijing interpretation, says:

​

Pairs "of two interconnected six-line figures are the basic units of Change. A Pair holds the two Primal Powers (yin and yang) ... in a single effective image, an interchange between Inspiration and Realization.​

​

"A Pair is a subtle interpretive tool. Each locates and describes a deep transformation .... Each generates a set of paired figures across the internal matrix of its lines. These describe the interchange between the interconnected lines and themes of the two hexagrams that make up the Pair."​

I wonder then, since he is applying these to the sequential 'pairs' of the received text, how might it apply to the non-sequential jumbled pairs which are found in the Zagua? Re: 28 paired with 44; 53 paired with 27, etc.

What I understand you are saying is, the Zagua's hexagrams are presented in a different order than the sequence of the 'received order', but they are still presented as 'pairs', which by your definition includes:

​

* sequential pairs: 21-22, 34-35 (as Karcher, others seem to understand and use them), and​

* reversed sequential pairs: 46-45; and​

* non-sequential jumbled 'pairs' like 28 with 44, and 53 with 27.​

... and that despite the Zagua's arrangement appearing to be illogical, or at the very least irregular, that there just may be a deeper or hidden reason for this arrangement / sequence, but we just haven't found it yet.

 

[tacrab]

I see your point, about what constitute a pair in that last secction. I've been viewing them as still being their regular sequential pairs, just interspersed. Will have to mull on the idea that they might be paired non-sequentially.
Yes, my assumption is that the Zagua order must have some rationale, just like I assume the received order must.
But what? Why?

 

[Freedda]

Yes, my assumption is that the Zagua order must have some rationale, just like I assume the received order must. But what? Why?

Okay, I sort of get that. But it's not something I spend much time pondering, just like I don't look for mathematical reasoning nor DNA sequencing in the Yi.

So I'll just have to trust that if you find something earth-shattering, that you'll share it with us.

 

[hilary]

A thought: Rutt's translation shows that the original rhymes, but doesn't reproduce the rhyme scheme. Anyone looking for patterns should probably be checking that, too.

 

[Freedda]

Rutt's translation shows that the original rhymes, but doesn't reproduce the rhyme scheme.

I don't really understand; I don't know what you mean by a 'rhyme scheme'. Can you say more about this?

Anyone looking for patterns should probably be checking that, too.

Would this entail looking at another translation? And do think that by looking at the 'rhyme scheme' we'd understand more about the order and pairings in the Zagua, which appear to be illogical, or at the very least irregular, and include non-sequential 'pairs'? Or would it instead just give us more insights into the individual hexagrams we're looking at? Or maybe ...?

 

[hilary]

I don't really understand; I don't know what you mean by a 'rhyme scheme'. Can you say more about this?

The pattern of which lines rhyme with which other lines. Poets everywhere use the sound-patterns of their verse to imply connections or contrasts.

Would this entail looking at another translation?

Nope, at the Chinese.

And do think that by looking at the 'rhyme scheme' we'd understand more about the order and pairings in the Zagua, which appear to be illogical, or at the very least irregular, and include non-sequential 'pairs'? Or would it instead just give us more insights into the individual hexagrams we're looking at? Or maybe ...?

Most probably, it wouldn't give us any insights at all - that's what happens with about 98% of my bright ideas for things to look into. (The remaining 2% of the time makes it all worthwhile!) But if anything, it might point to where the authors saw connections or groups among the hexagram pairs.

 

[Freedda]

The pattern of which lines rhyme with which other lines. Poets everywhere use the sound-patterns of their verse to imply connections or contrasts.

I've been using Rutt's Zhouyi for Harmen's latest online course and I did so, in part, because it's a translation that was unfamiliar to me. Rutt makes use of a lot of rhyming in his translation:

Hither and thither you move, distraught;
your friends all follow your every thought.
- Line 31.4​

.... that's what happens with about 98% of my bright ideas for things to look into. The remaining 2% of the time makes it all worthwhile!

Thanks. I have a book I've read a number of times, Art & Fear: Observations On the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking, but David Bayles and Ted Orland.

One the things they say in the book is 98% (or thereabouts) of the art we make will be .... crap, or not that good, but we need to make that 98% to get to the 2% which is good.

 

[hilary]

I've been using Rutt's Zhouyi for Harmen's latest online course and I did so, in part, because it's a translation that was unfamiliar to me. Rutt makes use of a lot of rhyming in his translation:

Hither and thither you move, distraught;
your friends all follow your every thought.
- Line 31.4

Yes... and on the one hand it's good that he draws attention to the fact that the original rhymes, and on the other hand I really hope the original doesn't sound so much like bad doggerel. (Somehow I don't expect it does - I doubt it would have caught on!)

Let's see, that 31.4 comes from...
憧憧往來。朋從爾思
which in modern pinyin transcription is
chongchong wanglai. peng cong you si.

Which is not necessarily how it would originally have sounded - reconstructing original pronunciations is a whole other academic field I do not understand at all. But if the pinyin does reflect the original sound of it, then it looks as though it's actually chongchong that goes with peng cong - that is, longing-longing (or hesitating, wavering, distraught, etc) with 'follow'. Their following rhymes with your mental state - which would be a lot more significant than rhyming 'distraught' with 'thought'.

(Not that I could do any better if I were trying to translate it into verse.)

(Also note - I know nothing at all about how rhyme works in Chinese poetry, ie what 'feels like' a rhyme, or how different schemes are used, or anything. That would be something worth learning in all my spare time...)

 

[tacrab]

Here's a sample from Rutt, to show what Hilary's talking about:

震起也 Zhen is to rise,
艮止也 Gen to restrain
損益 Sun and Yi
盛衰之始也 start to wax and wane.

(referring to Hexagrams 51, 52, 41, and 42, respectively.)
The 也 is a grammatical marker, in this case functioning like "is."

These kinds of mnemonic verses are used quite commonly throughout Chinese history to memorize ideas, and facts e.g. acupuncture point functions. Can be chanted to help memorize. Straightforward rhymes and rhythms.
There are so many homophones that rhymes are easy to come by, though literary poetry is a very technical field, as it also incorporates tones.

 

[Freedda]

Yes... and on the one hand it's good that he draws attention to the fact that the original rhymes, and on the other hand I really hope the original doesn't sound so much like bad doggerel.

These kinds of mnemonic verses are used quite commonly throughout Chinese history to memorize ideas, and facts e.g.

I guess I'm a bit lost here. I find it interesting that Rutt uses rhyming in his Zhouyi, but I have no illusions that it at all matches how the Zagua - or any other Chinese text, ancient or otherwise - rhymes. I just find it interesting that he included these in his translation.

As to mnemonic verses (which are used to help us remember something), I don't see how they are related to the main notion that the Zagua appears to have no logical or meaningful sequence.

Unless you're suggesting that the sequence of the Zagua is meant only to facilitate the construction and use of the mnemonic verses. That makes sense and it helps explain why many of its pairs are out of order, and also why many of the 'pairs' aren't even pairs in the way many of us understand and use them; instead the Zagua's authors 'paired up' 28-44, 53-27, 63-54 and 64-43 because this 'order' helped when they were creating the mnemonic verses.

 

[tacrab]

Freeda...
I think there are several points.
One, Rutt, throughout his Zhouyi and Wings translations, attempts to convey the feel of the original text's poetic feel. Other translators do this mostly by using a poetry-like layout. But he actually imitates the original. l This is particularly useful for those who cannot read and understand ancient Chinese.

Two, studying the rhyme scheme can help a reader understand the structure of the text. For example, whether or not the text is divided in half, as is the received order.

Three, I see zero need to create a Zagua order to make a rhyme scheme. Chinese lends itself, as I've mentioned earlier, to poetry very easily. It's not like English in which rhyming poems sometimes do a lot of strenuous gymnastics to make rhyme and rhythm work. For instance, in Chinese, there are over one hundred characters pronounced "fu", which could be rhymed with one of the hundreds of characters for bu/chu/gu/lu/mu/ etc.

So my conclusion is that it is a mnemonic for its particular hexagram order. It gives us three valuable things: the easy-to-remember "keys" to hexagrams, their pairs (except for the last eight), and to the Zagua order itself, which is a whole mystery.

 

[Freedda]

Three, I see zero need to create a Zagua order to make a rhyme scheme.

.... and to the Zagua order itself, which is a whole mystery.

No worries. I was speculating on the mystery of the order, but I am not wedded to my idea - though it does make all the pieces fit together for me. Also, you may see zero need to order the Zagua so that it rhymes, but since we don't know why it is as it is, perhaps some ancient Confucian scholar did see a need to re-order the received order of the Yi to make his rhyming schemes work? Or is this an idea we should definitely rule out in trying to understand the mystery of the Zagua's order?

But besides that, I keep coming back to what we all seem to be saying here (I think):

* the Zagua might be (or seems to be) a way of using rhyming schemes as a device for remembering or memorizing something about the hexagrams (maybe something to do with their meanings);

* the order is different from - and doesn't seem to have any logical relation to - the received text.

* the Zagua includes pairs, reversed pair, and non-pairs, and

* the order of the Zagua is still a mystery, but some people assume there's a reason that it's the way it is.

 

[tacrab]

No; it's just about the pairs. Why people (Wilhelm/Baynes) split them up so you get one half of the contrast and not the other with each hexagram, I have no idea. It defeats the object altogether.

Remember that Wilhlem did not invent this splitting up of Wing material--inserting the material with relevant hexagram. That was attributed to Fei Zhi, two thousand years ago., reflecting the two traditions for the Wings. One tradition is the splitting up of the material, and the other is presenting the Wings intact as individual texts (Rutt, Legge do this). Both methods have merit.

perhaps some ancient Confucian scholar did see a need to re-order the received order of the Yi to make his rhyming schemes work?

I think it's the other way around. Someone took the received order and re-ordered it, creating the Zagua order, and then created a rhyming scheme by which to remember it.

 

[Freedda]

Someone took the received order and re-ordered it, creating the Zagua order, and then created a rhyming scheme by which to remember it.

You keep saying this, but then you say you have no idea why he/she/they did this - only that you assume they had a good reason for it (even though there is no order or reason for the pair-not pair arrangement, except that some, but not all, of the hexagrams are presented in pairs).

Assumptions only get us so far: I might assume that our current president is not a tyrant or a fascist, but that doesn't make me right.

 

[hilary]

The thing is, David, that if you assume there is a reason, or a pattern, then you have a chance of finding one. If you assume there is nothing to be found, you are 100% sure of never finding anything.

 

[tacrab]

Call it a hypothesis, then.
Until archeology/textual analysis etc. provide us with more data.
Then we can create new ideas/assumptions/hypotheses!

 

[Trojina]

The thing is, David, that if you assume there is a reason, or a pattern, then you have a chance of finding one. If you assume there is nothing to be found, you are 100% sure of never finding anything.

Amen !

 

[Freedda]

... if you assume there is a reason, or a pattern, then you have a chance of finding one. If you assume there is nothing to be found, you are 100% sure of never finding anything.

I'm reminded of the expression, "if you 'assume' something, then you make an ass our of u and me". That may not be proof of anything, but it seems to fit the definition of a hypothesis, and until it's proven otherwise, should we assume it's true?

If you look back through my posts, I never said people shouldn't look for a deeper meaning here, and if fact, I said I welcome hearing what people find when they delve more deeply into the 'assumed order of the Zagua'.

What I said is I'm not all that interested in it right now, so I'm not going to be the one exploring these assumptions. And if I said otherwise, then I apologize for my error.

Call it a hypothesis, then. Until archeology / textual analysis etc. provide us with more data. Then we can create new ideas/assumptions/hypotheses!

So now your assumption has morphed into scientific hypothesis?

I am not a scientist, but my idea of a hypothesis is that based on observations, there is an assumed unknown reason, pattern, object, etc. behind what's being observed. For example, astronomers and physicist observe the movements of a group of stars, and their gravitational pull, and the gas clouds that have formed around them and they then create a specific hypothesis that there is a black hole located nearby - and then they may go looking for it.

But with your hypothesis, all I'm hearing is that you assuming something has to be there, even though there doesn't seem to be any evidence or rationale for your assumption ....? And if this is true, does it also mean that that we should apply the same hypothesis / reasoning to the Mawangdui Silk Texts arrangement, or the binary order of the Yijing or the reverse binary order, or the Eight Palaces arrangement ....?

And if I'm wrong about this, I'd be interested to know what you have found out so far about your Zagua hypothesis? Have you found a meaningful and understandable reason for the rather random order of the Zagua and it's mish-mash of rhyming pairs, and reversed pairs, and non-pairs?

Or should I assume that I'll have to wait a bit longer for evidence that any of this is true? If that's the case, I'm fine with it; I can be patient and see if in the future, sometime somewhere somehow someone finds something meaningful in the arrangement of the Zagua or any of these other arrangements - and thus proves your hypothesis correct. I would - without my typical sarcasm - really welcome that.

 

[Trojina]

This is harassment dressed up rather badly as something else. It's a very poor show in this area of the forum IMO.

Someone's idea, someone's work is continually disparaged rather stupidly as 'assumptions' (when it has been said over and over and again it is an exploration for goodness sake. This is 'I Ching News', some exploratory ideas someone is sharing. It is not

"Is this acceptable or even interesting to David Freed ?"

I prefer this section as 'I Ching News' personally and I regard what is happening here as nothing but harassment. So why is harassment being allowed to go on here ? @hilary