Translating 32.5: wife - people, husband - child

[ewald]

In the last two lines of 32.5, there are the characters for [main woman in the household] followed by [person, people] and [main man in the household] followed by [child].

Wilhelm, Legge and Balkin in their translations in fact ignore the characters for [person, people] and [child]. Balkin for instance has:
<blockquote>Giving duration to one's character,
One perseveres.
Good fortune for one in the position of a wife,
Misfortune for the head of the household.</blockquote>
However, I don't quite see why these characters could be left out, so I think such a translation is not correct.

Others take the characters for [main man in the household] followed by [child] as meaning "young men." But, [main man in the household] is an adult, so I don't quite see how this could be combined with [child] to form one kind of person, as that would be an "adult child." Similarly, [main woman in the household] followed by [person, people] is combined to "married women," however [main woman in the household] already means [married woman], so that doesn't convince me either.

So I think these characters stand for 4 different categories of people, not 2, it's about [main woman in the household], [person, people], [main man in the household] and [child].

My current translation for 32.5 is therefore:
<blockquote>One's integrity is durable.
Commitment of a housewife to people brings good fortune,
of men to children misfortune.</blockquote>
Another possibility would be:
<blockquote>One's integrity is durable.
Commitment of housewives and people brings good fortune,
of men and children misfortune.</blockquote>

Comments?


Ewald

 

[frank]

Hi Ewald,

I have books on the yi where the Zhen character actually is in the first part of line 5...
Heng Qi De Zhen... and not Heng Qi De...

Then that part of the line would be something like: "Contstantly trying out his / her virtue"... I read, as Schuessler does, Zhen as "To Try Out" Zhen can also mean, again to Schuessler, "Correct", so it also could say: "Constantly correct his / her virtue"

The other parts of the line say:
1. Fu Ren Ji... Fu is a woman, Ren People, perhaps more then 1 married woman?

2. Fu Zi Xiong - Man, Child, Misfortune...
"Fuzi", acording to the translation I have by Kerson Huang (in a computerprogram, where you can actually 'click' on the characters to see the meanings in english) is term for a disciple to say to his confucian master... Perhaps then Manchild could be an indication of someone who's a disiple...

32.5 "Constanty correct his / her virtue; for married women: hapiness, for disiples: trouble..."

Something like that?

Hug,
Frank

 

[ewald]

Hi Frank,

Thanks for your comments.

Indeed, several authors have Zhen included in the first line. As the original text does not have punctuation, it is up to the translator as to where exactly the commas should be. I've found that in a couple of instances the meaning of some hexagram line was suddenly a lot clearer if I moved a comma to a different place than as to the convention, so I'm making use of that freedom.

In 32.3, there is the same beginning of the line text as in 32.5, only it has the character for [not] added to it. Therefore it makes sense to me to move the comma before Zhen, so as to have a similar text. Having [permanency] and [constancy] in the same line seems like superfluous, but not impossible to me.

The meanings that I have listed for Zhen are: persistence, determination, devotion, dedication, to be correctly firm, chastity of a woman, pure, correct, loyal, inquire by divination. I'm not quite convinced that Zhen can mean "to try out," as that seems too "loose" to me. I think Zhen has mostly to do with intent, in action, as well as reflected in divination. "Constantly correct his / her virtue" seems like a valid option to me, though.

As for your suggestion that Fu Ren means "married women," that seems not impossible, however, I don't see why the author of the text would do that, as Chinese characters can be read as plural also, and in this line, it doesn't quite matter wether it's plural or not.

Lindict has for FuZi (under Fu): teacher, master or common laborer. Disciple makes sense to me, though.

Something to ponder.


Ewald

 

[auriel]

mighten it be construed as "several wives: good fortune, [as] men with children inappropriate" ?

the sense of 32 for wilhelm ,et al, is that durable character as 'commitment' or virtue is good. at line 5 then, its good for women and people in general- one's peeople(?) to be [slavishly] loyal but not so good for the master or for his kids

another reading: take many wives, but don't make babies- actually a very taoist idea- of duration-

 

[bradford_h]

I don't think this line can be understood without looking at the Fan Yao, 28.5.

 

[ewald]

I noticed that LiSe in the Fan Yao - reverse line-pairs thread said that the woman and the man 32.5 are those from 28.5. Unfortunately it's not obvious to me that these are the same people. (I find the principle of similarity in mood and intent of Fan Yao lines evident, but I'm not willing to go as far as to assume they are necessarily about the same situations and people.)

Would you care to elaborate on how you see that 32.5 can be understood from 28.5, Brad?

Ewald

 

[ewald]

Hi Auriel,
I think that it's not possible to translate that as "several wives," as a Chinese character for "several" would need to be there. Similarly, [misfortune] can in my opinion not mean "inappropriate," and there are Chinese characters available that could say that.

I can see the loyalty thing.

Ewald

 

[bradford_h]

Perspectives on duration and what it means to be constant are relative to many things. Gender, age, and position in the world especially. The notion itself must be adaptive to these special circumstances.
The thundering winds, the storm, only looks like it comes and then goes from these local perspectives. In fact the storm wanders the globe, ever adapting to context. Constancy can only keep going by changing like this, according to necessity.

 

[ewald]

Okay, that's how you see the meaning of 32.5, as also in your C-YiTran.pdf. I checked how you see 28.5, however I'm still unable to see how the one is illuminated by the other.

Ewald

 

[bradford_h]

You have all the clues you need, if you don't refuse to compare the vocabularies of the two lines.
Tee inna win. Give it some time

 

[cal val]

Rick Kunst's notes on this line are interesting.

http://research.humancomp.org/ftp/yijing/yi_hex32.pdf

The part about chastity is auspicious for the wife but ominous for the man... excuse me???? What's this double standard... stuff??? *grin*

I'd love to know what you come up with Ewald.

Love,

Val

 

[freemanc]

I love threads like this.

I think we're looking at a line about succession challenge, and should be translated to underscore the conflict of interest between the wife's people and the husband's child. Something like:

32.5.2) Reading: for the wife's people auspicious, for the husband's child, ominous.

This isn't the same as in my book; (Val, you might pencil this into the margin). In the book I also took the dodge of mushing "wife person" into wife, and considering the zi sort of a suffix, as in junzi.

Another thought is to read the husband and wife as a trope for relations between the royals and the ministerial classes. Perhaps we can see this as another incursion from the Duke of Zhou's story.

(insert boilerplate about this being from the zhouyista perspective here)

fondly,
FC

 

[lightofdarkness]

IC+:

Line 32.5

"Continued commitment to one's 'way' is being tested. [On reflection] It is advantageous just to follow [with one's heart] than to attempt to lead [with one's intellect]."

 

[bruce]

I realize that this isn?t authentic translation, and also that there?s a missing element of misfortune. I offer the latter as a given: misfortune if the wife is antisocial, or spoiled children rule the house.

Housewife attracts good fortune by virtue of her hospitality,
Establishing a reliable base for the husband to create trade relations:
Good fortune for husband, wife, children and guests.

 

[auriel]

the duration in 32 may refer to sexual loyalty/performance with a pregnant wife. (see line 4 espeacially). in this case, while other readings are valid, there may be referance to some folk saying or superstition, as found in other cultures, that sex during pregnancy makes daughters, good for the matralineal succession.

 

[auriel]

as to 28.5- the poplar tree is used as a live fence, its roots excellant for preventing soil erosion. this may well have made it a good metaphor for family dynasties.

i don't know what word wilhelm,etc. translates as poplar

 

[bradford_h]

on 28.5-
The word for poplar is pronounced Yang (rad 75+9) and it?s actually much broader in meaning than Poplar. It?s closer to the family name Salicales and so would also imply willows, cottonwoods, aspen, poplar, birch, etc. They are all known for their flexibility and tolerating lots of wetness. The term is frequently used in references to life?s more erotic dimensions, oddly, because this family usually reproduces by cloning or suckering.

 

[freemanc]

Bradford,

Can you elaborate any on poplar or willow as a poetic convention? This seems to enrich our reading of 28 a lot!

In general, there seem to be a lot of things in the Zhouyi that are conventions of the literary age, such as the oriole serving as the "Bird of Filial Return" in Hexagram 30.

FC

 

[matt]

"Continued commitment to one's 'way' is being tested. [On reflection] It is advantageous just to follow [with one's heart] than to attempt to lead [with one's intellect]."

I believe Chris said it best.

 

[bradford_h]

Freeman-
Not while all my China resources are in storage.
You might try Eberhard's Dictionary of Chinese Symbols (I may have confirmed it there), or look down the page to the phrases in C-E dictionaries like Mathews for idioms, etc. There are a couple of hits on Willow searchng the Shijing text, but only one is a sexual encounter. Willow especially is also used for spring and youth.

 

[freemanc]

Bradford, Thanks, I may have a chance to look at the Eberhardt at a big library soon.

We haven't taken a turn for the absurd yet, so here goes.

A cursory google about chinese poetry and willow came up with this. Pink floyd lyrics, including one with willow, cribbed from Tang dynasty poetry...

http://www.cjvlang.com/Pfloyd/

Actually some of Roger Waters lyrics are quite lovely.

FC

 

[bradford_h]

FC-
Eberhard's is a fun book. Not too scholarly or expensive.
You can also find loads of willow associations in Japan - the "Flower and Willow World" is the life of a Geisha.