Hello everybody,

i have a few questions concerning the text evolution of the Yi. Shaughnessy calls the text which Wilhelm translated the "received text". Thats the one we all refer to here (not necessarily Wilhelms translation though).
As much as i know in the Yi manuscripts previous to the 'received text' (f. e. Mawangdui) the Hexagramms were not numbered and not inter-linked. Additionally a yang line got the number 1, a yin line No. 8.

From Shaugnessy´s book "Unearthing the Changes" i know that the text itself went thru some changes though i never came across a source which gave me some more informations on who and when the 'Yi system' (numbering, linking etc) was changed.

My questions are:

- is it known when for the very first time a numbering did appear?
- if so, was it the same order as it is today?
- is it known who or which school or religious group did, so to say, invent or introduce the linking (f. e. Hex 1.1 to Hex 44)
- in the time between the very old manuscripts (B. C.) and the 'received text' (A.D) there should have been published some more compilations/variations of the Yi. Can somebody help me with some historical information regarding the text evolution from the f. e. Mawangdui to the 'received text'?
- the line numbering was obviously changed. When, which century, did that appear for the very first time?

Many thanks in advance for any help.

I'm eager for the experts to post.


(In the meantime, my limited understanding has King Wen as the one who put the trigrams together and 'made the hexagrams' and wrote the Judgement. Then his son writing the line text. And a group of people much later writing the Image.)

As far as I know - which is not very far - there are a couple of earlier manuscripts than the Mawangdui, but they are written on bamboo strips, which means they are out of order, and only parts of them survive. I think I remember reading that some of these fragmentary bamboo strips showed hexagrams in the received sequence. I don't think we will ever know the age of the received Sequence, though I would love to, as I find its patterns, reflections, stories and so on endlessly fascinating. There is quite a bit of textual and structural evidence that the Yi's composed as a whole unit, with the hexagrams in this order.

The interlinking of hexagrams - well, it's a fact about the hexagram Qian that it differs only in its first line from the hexagram Gou. That's always been true.

The earliest records we have of divination with Yi are in the Zuozhuan, which was written in the 4th century BC but describes readings that took place in the 7th. (So you get to decide whether or not these descriptions are an accurate reflection of how readings might've been done back then.) The accounts clearly state that the diviner received 'the line of [hexagram] that is changed to make [hexagram]'.

Also, the book is called 'Yi', Change. Of course, we don't know why that's so, but we might make a guess that it's because its lines change.

I'm not sure how much is known about how the various tributaries and versions of the Yi became the received text. Anyone...?

Edward Shaughnessy's Unearthing the Changes is a good source on these questions. Also see Larry Schulz's articles at http://hexagrammatics.weebly.com.

Thank you, Tacrab! The article under 'Schulz 2011' has a perfect summary of the history of the received Sequence.

Hi all,
thanks all for your answers. I own Shaughnessy`s book (Unearthing..) which is really interesting.
Nevertheless to me there seems to be is a historical time gap between the excavated bamboo strips and the 'received text' (the one we all read).

So Wilhelm returned from China with a book whose origine he did not trace back. As a very, very well educated man who was familiar with the bible and it´s many different editions, i simply don´t buy he didn`t enquire the Yi´s origine or editions. China is not Switzerland and there might have been regional different editions of the Zhouyi. Wilhelm must have asked where the book was from and if there were different (regional, cultural) editions etc...

However, the text by Schulz is complex and interesting but not all together enlightening to me. He is more interested in the numbering /sequencing of the Hex´s and less in the historical text evolution. I am surprise how little is known (at least here in the west) about the text (evolution) itself apart from the bamboo strips text. (And the bamboo strip texts presented in Shaugnessy´s book differ a lot from the 'received text'.)

Everybody who is a bit, realy only a little bit into literature, notices that the linking (from a line to a Hex) as many people here perform it, does not work concerning the text. It appears to me the Hex sequencing was so obscure it gained much more interest than the text itself and it´s many (linked) metaphors.

Isn´t it strange that in China, where the written texts were so important and were cared so well for, so little is know about the history of the Yi text?

lilly said:

Everybody who is a bit, realy only a little bit into literature, notices that the linking (from a line to a Hex) as many people here perform it, does not work concerning the text.

Click to expand...

Could you clarify this part?
(I'm not sure what you mean here.)

What is a 'received text' ?
A text that has 'received' a form by which it keeps its stability copied and passed down through the time.

Our last 'received' form is the 1715 Imperial edition here in link. https://iiif.lib.harvard.edu/manifests/view/drs:16765324$73i

This latest form, how you can see, lacks hexagram numbering.
Numbering is a trick used by Westerners to put in use this eastern device.
As per the name 'hexagram' used firstly by Legge to translate the chinese term Gua.

But the Yi, received its first defined shape in136 bce, becoming a chinese 'Classic', during the Han.

Little has changed since then (in the 'received' text), but naturally we lost lots of manuscripts in this 'jet-lag'.

As we still have lots of, and it worth to have a look in one of the richest repository of digital manuscript, the Hathi Trust Digital Library

We have to consider and keep in mind, that these were oral times: the fact to have some differences (not big how you said, -you should take in account that a difference in the shape of a character do not mean definitely a difference in its meaning -but this lead us far in the old chinese language-) among these manuscript is still a great sign of the prestige conquered by this book even in an oral and may be vague 're-text' culture.

Problems arise when you talk about 'interlinking'.

This is not a feature of the book itself (even if there are occurrences in terms and phrases that show a linkage between hex structures and their text): this is the way the book was put in use.

And the archaeological discoveries have shown that the Da Yan Zhi Shu method was not the only one used to prompt to the book.

And that versions previous the 136 bce 'imprimatur', could even came from different school/way of interface or use the book.

For example, in the Zuozhuan, quoted by Hilary, an interesting feature in the use of Zhou Yi prognostication is the practice of juxtaposition of two hexagrams instead of the custom of referring to individual changing line as 9 or 6 in this or that place .
This practice is realized by the use of the possessive particle zhi as in the example from 5th year of Duke Zhao: "Meeting MingYi (hex n.36) zhi Qian (hex n.15) [like a 36 's 15] indicates the first line of the Ming Yi hexagram, the Line Remarks of which is quoted subsequently. [...] Thus the formula 'meeting Hexagram 'a' 'zhi' Hexagram 'b' is the way an individual line in Hexagram 'a' is referred to in The Zuo Commentary and Discourses of the States.

Hexagrams way of readings are various [without considering the so called 'digit hexagram' too sparse in scapulae or pottery and bronzes] cause hexagrams are not in use only in YiJing, but have an history that go beyond and before the Yi (others known texts used hexagrams, as Lienshan and Guicang).
Some scholars have imagined that these different way of reading and interpreting the outcome of somewhat divination procedure, have been object of selections in composing the Book of Changes.

Some remarks:

why you said “Additionally a yang line got the number 1, a yin line n. 8”?
where it came from?

ZhouYi lines just express value: ___ it's 7 (not one) and _ _ it is 8.
This is per Chu Manuscript to MaWangDui one.

Yin and yang or hard and soft are nothing but added ideas.

For the sake of a compelling knowledge I link here two basics:

- Yijing entry, in Ancient and Early Medieval Literature, vol.III - Brill Publishing
- HanXue entry, in A companion to Yijing Numerology and cosmology
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A book tha worth a reading among others, with a friendly historical survey:
The I Ching - A Biography by Richard J. Smith

[ Hilary, how can I make use of chinese characters an pinyin tone transliteration here?]

Dear Lilly,
Some interesting questions. But we must remember the strength/weight of tradition, when it comes to using, understanding, interpreting, and questioning ancient canonical texts, whether it concerns the Yijing, the Bible, or any other work. When it comes to questioning, researchers will have different methods and questions depending on their own cultural and intellectual background. Someone from the year 2017 in the United States is going to ask vastly different questions than some from 1900 in China, or someone from either country in the 1950s.
We should not fault Wilhelm for lacking insights (from modern academic trends or from archeological discoveries) that came after he was long gone. He was studying a particular long-standing school of Yijing thought. If he did have questions, he might not have wanted to ask them, out of respect for his teacher.
I agree, Richard Smith's I Ching, or also Fathoming the Cosmos are great resources for Yijing textual history.

Thanks everybody for your comments and thanks fabiogalassi for your in depth posting above. Much appreciated!

Fabio, i mind to remember having read that the numbering of the Hex lines is/was not always 6, 7, 8, 9. Somewhere in Shaughnessy´s book i found (probably for the Shanghai Museum Manuscript) that the numbering was 1 for yang lines and 8 for yin ones. Usually i mark text in books but this one is so overall well crafted, i did not want to disgrace it with a marker. I just did look thru the chapter but couldn´t find it right away (lot of text and many footnotes) but i will search.... However, on page 16 you find some informations on an excavated pottery paddle which has Hex numbering 116111 on it. On page 20: textual material from Warring State period, tomb2 at Bashoan, the prognostication was recorded as 166866 - 166116. That 1 was used as number caught my attention as i always thought that would make sense.

My personal interest is less in the Yi as oracle book or its historical evolution pre-Han time but rather in the text as 'pure' literature. If you regard it as literature than all previous texts offer information but they all differ partly 'bigly'. For an average reader the 2 phrases:
'...words unending'
'..much talk'
doesn´t make much of a difference but in the whole context they might as well make a significant difference. The same for the Hex "The Well". Shaughnessy offers a a different translation* for The Well namely The Trap. For Hex 44 he suggests/ translates 'Hitting'. (*translation of Shanghai Museum manuscript, ca. 300 BC). (Both of his translations make really sense to me.)

Shaughnessy states that the Zhou Yi / Zhou Changes was established about 300 BC. My questions in my very first posting above referred to the time between 300 BC and the 'received text' (Wilhelms translation). I was wondering why Wilhelm, a highly educated man, especially in literature, seems to have never investigated the text´s origine or regional versions etc. ... may be he wrote about it and i missed it? Certainly i do not fault Wilhelm, tacap, i just wonder as the education of someone like Wilhelm usually was much better and broader than it is today. People like Wilhelm usually were educated in greek, latin, history, literature, writing etc. comprehensively. They knew very well how to handle texts. His outstanding translation of the Yi proofs it.

However, if you approach the Zhouh Yi as literature (not as an oracle book) then 'the world' looks different. A similar text is simply not the same text.

Moss Elk said:

Could you clarify this part?
(I'm not sure what you mean here.)

Click to expand...

Yes i like to give it a more comprehensive posting than i am able to tonight. Give me a couple of days...

Dear Lilly,

my way to approach the Yi-'this wondrous sea' is to work within a narrative game, where all I study and read, is not to know more but to have more connections availables so to play time by time a literature fluid creation.
By the way..some feedbacks on:

> "the numbering was 1 for yang lines and 8 for yin ones":
I naturally respect Shaughnessy and his scholarly studies. I take care of others too, as per the possible misreading 1 for 7 in Yi Hexagrams renditions, referring to the thorough research of Chen Jie: "Origins of Numbers in Shifa of Tsinghua Bamboo Slip Manuscripts" naturally interrelated with the last "Stalk Divination" by Constance A. Cook and Zhao Lu on the ShiFa manuscript too.

> "an excavated pottery paddle which has Hex numbering 116111 on it":
we have to keep separate so called 'digit hexagrams' from Yijing ones. The formers, quite certainly, came from completly different divination systems and more, are truly represented by numbers, while Yi Hexagrams carry 'values', and the signs used to express them are not of the same species of formers [ref.: Zong-kun Li: The Illness Accounts and Denotations of "Numerical Diagrams" and Xing Wen: Hexagram Pictures and early schools: reconsidering the Book of Changes in Light of Excavated Yi Texts.

> text as 'pure' literature:
loving this, I hope you will love too Ming Dong Gu, chapter 3: "The Zhouyi and Open Representation" in his "Chinese Theories of Reading and Writing" [SUNY Press]

fabiogalassi said:

[ Hilary, how can I make use of chinese characters an pinyin tone transliteration here?]

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Oh, dear, sorry. The forum has a problem displaying Chinese characters. I once contacted support, implemented their advice on how to fix this - and that promptly broke a lot of forum features, like post editing. It was all a bit of a disaster.

If you post Chinese characters, they will not display correctly - but if someone uses the 'print view' of the thread or just hits 'reply with quote' on your post, they will be able to see the characters. So it is still worth posting them.

Pinyin tone transliteration... I thought that was just numbers 1-4? Or at least it can be written that way, and even vBulletin can cope with that...

lilly said:

My personal interest is less in the Yi as oracle book or its historical evolution pre-Han time but rather in the text as 'pure' literature....

Click to expand...

I'm interested in all three, and Yi probably 'grabbed me' most to start with because it's literature. Some unsolicited advice that you probably already know: to appreciate it as literature, you need to look at the whole book - the shapes and kinetic energy of the hexagrams, all the relationships created by their changes, and the Sequence in all its glory. It's all involved in creating meaning.

(And of course if you want to see Yi really creating meaning, try talking to it.)

I was wondering why Wilhelm, a highly educated man, especially in literature, seems to have never investigated the text´s origine or regional versions etc. ... may be he wrote about it and i missed it?

Click to expand...

Assuming that investigating the origins goes together with trying to unearth 'original' meanings... it's partly, as Fabio says, that a lot of information was just not available in 1950. (The inscription that gives the name of Prince Kang in Hexagram 35, for instance.) However, I think there was already some work in China concerning origins and early meanings that he either ignored or didn't know about. He was transmitting a venerable tradition, not reporting on the state of scholarship - he may well have felt he could do one or the other, but not both.
(Note: I have just edited the above to remove the completely embarrassing mistake about Wilhelm's date of publication, with thanks to Harmen for pointing it out, ever-so-tactfully in private...)

(For comparison - Minford's I Ching is divided into two separate translations: book of wisdom, and Bronze Age oracle. Maybe that's a more sensible approach than trying to mix the two?)

fabiogalassi said:

> "an excavated pottery paddle which has Hex numbering 116111 on it":
we have to keep separate so called 'digit hexagrams' from Yijing ones. The formers, quite certainly, came from completly different divination systems and more, are truly represented by numbers, while Yi Hexagrams carry 'values', and the signs used to express them are not of the same species of formers

Click to expand...

This is interesting, thank you! I have been trying to imagine what the connection/relationship might be. I read that the 'hexagram numerals' were accompanied often by the word 'yue', 'says', so they are translating the numerical quantities into qualities so they can 'speak' as an oracle. Though what they said is brief, and doesn't seem to bear much relation to what the same hexagram says in the Yi.

I wonder how the Yi-authors knew what each pattern said.
(I will be wondering that for the rest of my life.)