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Blog post: Hexagram 5, and rain-making (a rethink)

hilary

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desertrain-150x150.jpg

What are we Waiting for?

Wilhelm says Hexagram 5 is about waiting for it to rain. SJ Marshall says it meant waiting for rain to stop. So too does Stephen Field: the hexagram name means ‘to stop for the rain’, but originally would probably have had the ‘water’ radical added and meant simply ‘drenched’.
In my book, I apparently decided discretion was the better part of valour, and wrote about ‘a farmer waiting for the weather to change’!

Here’s how to Wait:

Here are some ancient forms of the character ? xu, Waiting, from a lovely Chinese etymology site. This is the character as it was engraved into bronze vessels, at around the same time as the Yi was first written down:

  • xu4.jpg
  • xu2lg2.jpg
  • xu1lg.jpg
The first shows a human figure in the rain. I think, from his long, flowing sleeves, that he is probably dancing. But what’s happening in the other two pictures?
Wu Shamans in ancient China performed sacrificial rain dance ceremonies in times of drought. Wu anciently served as intermediaries with nature spirits believed to control rainfall and flooding.[SUP][6][/SUP] “Shamans had to carry out an exhausting dance within a ring of fire until, sweating profusely, the falling drops of perspiration produced the desired rain.”[SUP][7][/SUP]
Wikipedia
(Wilhelm was right all along. Let’s all take a moment to be deeply unsurprised.)

What does this mean for interpretation?

Waiting is active

Firstly, it confirms something we already knew, just from reading the Oracle –
‘Waiting, with truth and confidence.
Shining out, creating success: constancy brings good fortune.
Fruitful to cross the great river.’
– namely that Waiting is not a passive, inert activity. Have truth and confidence (the most vital component of any offering or ritual); shine out; dare to cross rivers, taking risks to move towards what you need.
This is important, because our modern associations with ‘waiting’ are quite different: ‘this is beyond your control, so all you can do is be patient and have faith.’ The dancing shaman, pouring with sweat, is not just being patient.

Waiting and shining out

The Yijing is poetry, and as in any poem, every word is pregnant with meaning.
Take the first words of the Oracle:
‘Waiting, with truth and confidence.
Shining out, creating success…’
The standard divinatory formula found in other hexagrams is ‘from the source, creating success’, ?? yuan heng. Hexagram 5, uniquely, replaces that with ‘shining out, creating success’, ?? guang heng. (Heng means ‘success’ and also, originally, a successful offering, one made and accepted.) Scholars have suggested that this exception in Hexagram 5 must be a scribal error.
Here is the character guang as it would have been written when the Yi was first recorded:
guang.jpg

This is a human figure with fire above. It ‘rhymes’ with the name of the hexagram, when it shows a person under the rain. It’s joined with heng to show that this is the offering given and received that engenders creative flow.
There may be other hints of that dancing shaman in the text, too. Waiting begins at the ‘outskirts’ in line 1, almost certainly the outskirts altar, the place where you make offerings to nature spirits and for the fields. Here it’s good to use ‘perseverance’ – as in the name of Hexagram 32 – which Waley thought meant a simple ritual to fix the omen of good fortune by drawing circles around it. (More from LiSe.)

Waiting isn’t just rain-dancing

It’s important not to take the etymology too literally, though. ‘Waiting’ isn’t simply synonymous with ‘dancing in a ring of fire’.
The other lines make this clear, I think. Line 5, for instance:
‘Waiting with food and drink.
Constancy, good fortune.’
Dancing in a ring of fire with food and drink? Unlikely. No… ‘waiting’ is more general and more universal; the shaman is still dancing, but in the distance.

Sympathetic magic

Waiting isn’t passive, but I don’t believe it’s about making an exceptional effort. The dance isn’t about exertion, but sympathetic magic. You make your body rain – ‘with truth and confidence’, making it true in your self first – and you receive rain. A gift from your body calls a gift from the spirits: it’s reciprocal.
And this, I think, does make sense with the remaining moving lines. Your experience will correspond with where you wait.
‘Waiting on the sands,
There are small words.
In the end, good fortune.’
5, line 2​
Wait on the sands, shifting underfoot, and there are small words. (Also, the character for ‘sand’ is composed of ‘small’ and ‘water’: this could even be a desert. Small water matches small words. Hard to believe it could rain, when there’s so little water?)
‘Waiting in the bog
Invites the arrival of robbers.’
5, line 4​
Wait in the mud, in the bog… well, I remember once, at five or six years old, having to make my way out of a field in my stocking feet because the mud had claimed my boots and I couldn’t pull them free. Wait in the sticky mud, and invite the sticky-fingered.
‘Waiting in blood.
Come out of the pit.’
5, line 4​
Where you wait corresponds with your experience. Yi doesn’t need to spell this one out.
‘Waiting with food and drink.
Constancy, good fortune.’
5, line 5​
Wait amidst plenty, using up your reserves, like a naturally lucky person who has nothing to worry about – and it will be so.
And then there’s the final line:
‘Entering into the pit.
There are uninvited guests,
Three people come.
Honour them: in the end, good fortune.’
5, line 6​
Line 6 isn’t about Waiting any more; instead, it’s about what comes to you uninvited – what you didn’t dance for.
5.6 changes to 9; the fan yao, 9.6, says the rain has come, and now is no time for further effort. Scott Davis suggests ‘three people’ in 5.6 refers to the Sequence of Hexagrams:
‘Rain-making rituals of Hexagram #5 are connected to “dense clouds but no rain” and “rain and rest,” arriving after an interval of three hexagrams (like three unexpected guests), thus in Hexagram #9.’
Scott Davis, The Classic of Changes in Cultural Context
So line 6, the one line thatdoesn’t mention waiting, is the one where this is beyond your control, so all you can do is be patient (and respectful) and have faith…

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Trojina

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The dancing shaman, pouring with sweat, is not just being patient.

But he isn't having any effect on the rain either, he's passing time in dancing, unless you actually believe he was making the rain come ? Whether he dances or not makes no difference to the rain so he's not really doing a lot of work but he may look impressive.
 

hilary

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I suppose I should reserve judgement until we have done some controlled rain dance experiments. But if I'd lived 3,000 years ago, at the time when the Yi was written, I would absolutely have believed that the shaman made the rain come. That's what's important for understanding the hexagram.
 

Trojina

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mely that Waiting is not a passive, inert activity. Have truth and confidence (the most vital component of any offering or ritual); shine out; dare to cross rivers, taking risks to move towards what you need.
This is important, because our modern associations with ‘waiting’ are quite different: ‘this is beyond your control, so all you can do is be patient and have faith.’ The dancing shaman, pouring with sweat, is not just being patient.

I can see waiting as being a time of faith and so of good cheer while waiting for the rain which will come or stop whichever way one takes it. This shaman, not mentioned in Wilhelm of course nor in your book, who might be getting drenched or sweating, can't for me be an example of what to do whilst waiting, though it could be if he is enjoying the dancing along with the feasting.

But overall you are giving the impression this manic dance sweat activity is really a necessary part of waiting, hexagram 5. But wait, no, you aren't completely you say


Waiting isn’t just rain-dancing
It’s important not to take the etymology too literally, though. ‘Waiting’ isn’t simply synonymous with ‘dancing in a ring of fire’.
The other lines make this clear, I think. Line 5, for instance:
‘Waiting with food and drink.
Constancy, good fortune.’
Dancing in a ring of fire with food and drink? Unlikely. No… ‘waiting’ is more general and more universal; the shaman is still dancing, but in the distance

I agree placing too much emphasis on etymology, taking it too literally, even though one cannot really ever know for sure if that's sweat or hair or something else, could well be misleading. But I am confused with what you're saying since there is manifestly no shaman anywhere in the lines, dancing, sweating or doing anything, you say the shaman is still dancing but at a distance ?

You see the shaman is not in the lines so you say he is still dancing elsewhere ?

If he is manically dancing for rain rather than being sure of it and so relaxing he's doing the opposite of what the Image says from Wilhelm

'Clouds rise up to heaven:
The image of WAITING.
Thus the superior man eats and drinks,
Is joyous and of good cheer.'

I know the I mage is much later but still.


Overall you seem to be saying waiting, hexagram 5, is not passive. We wait with confidence, believing that the rain will come. We don't worry or try to make provision for it not coming we just wait because we can't make it come. That part is clear. But then you are saying actually we can make it come by metaphorically doing this frenzied sweaty dancing the shaman believes will make the rain come.

That idea, that one can make nature obey seems the opposite of all that Yi is so I have reservations about this shaman and what role he plays. Even a shaman can only wait for rain to come or stop as heaven wills it, he cannot command it. He can dance but his sweat doesn't 'earn' rain - I feel, and I may be mistaken, you have given the shaman a bit of a work ethic. :mischief:
 

Liselle

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Overall you seem to be saying waiting, hexagram 5, is not passive. We wait with confidence, believing that the rain will come. We don't worry or try to make provision for it not coming we just wait because we can't make it come. That part is clear. But then you are saying actually we can make it come by metaphorically doing this frenzied sweaty dancing the shaman believes will make the rain come.

Good summary...I'm trying to think about one particular clearly-resolved 5uc example of mine in relation to it. Maybe sometimes the frenzied sweaty shamanic dancing can be very metaphorical?

Copied from the unchanging-reading thread:
I once asked, "How likely [a pair of married public figures] are [at a particular event]?"

(I asked this for no better reason than idle curiosity and probably boredom :rolleyes:.)

Yi's answer was 5uc. About a week later, I was watching the news. There was a story about a different public figure who was involved in the event, and as video filler they showed that person at this event, and lo and behold, there in the same shot was the couple I'd asked about.

There was the straight waiting part - I waited, and got my answer via the waiting. Yi didn't tell me outright; it told me how the answer would come. I didn't do anything to try to find my answer, such as Googling for information about the event. I'm not sure I was interested enough for anything like that.

The "shamanic activity," such as it was, was really quite subtle, I think. What did I do that might pass, sort of, for fiery rain-dancing?

- this was a while ago and I don't remember very well, but apparently I made a point to watch the news during this time period. I don't, always. (As time has gone on, news-watching has dwindled to very close to "never," but I don't remember where I was on that continuum back then.)

- I had my ears pricked enough that when the event was mentioned*, I noticed and reacted by looking at the television. This may not seem like much, but it's not unusual for me not to do those things. Just now as I type this, I'm thinking it was a vaguely 55-ish moment - look at the TV now - and I do have a habit of reacting to 55-ish moments with thoughts like, "Oh, do I really even care; it's too much bother."

- and then I paid enough attention to the crowd to notice these particular people in it. They were not remotely a focus; these were generic crowd pictures.

Part of this looked an awful lot like pure luck - tuning to the right TV channel on the right day at the right time, which required things like being at home and in front of the television at that time. Of course it's possible the same crowd pictures were on other news programs on other days and times, but I only saw it once, not multiple times. Yes, Yi had told me "expectant waiting," but knowing it's possible and then catching the particular moment are two different things. (Maybe unless you're Yi...)



* edited: I am hopeless. I don't even read my own post very well :rolleyes:. It was even more subtle than that. The news didn't mention the event; it mentioned this other person who was at the event. The event pictures were in the story merely because it had been a recent thing the person had participated in. So the "shamanic" activity (hahaha) had to include my ears/brain making this association...
 

Trojina

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If you are interested in something or it has caught your attention then you are primed to notice it. That's basic psychology of attention and it's the way you will hear your name if it's mentioned in a crowded room where you will not pick up on other words.. So if I'm thinking about buying a new model of electric toothbrush there suddenly seem to be a heck of a lot electric toothbrushes about.

I'm not doing anything shamanic it's just something has come into my awareness so my awareness will pick it out. I guess you could call awareness, and the magic of it, shamanic. It can work too I notice if one says 'I never see xyz...' and then xyz will appear, that's happened to me a lot. So it doesn't matter if I have said object x is never seen or that I want object x the fact that it is in my awareness brings it to me one way or another. And of course perhaps my awareness doesn't bring it my awareness just notices it.

Many answers to questions come the way you describe with the celebrities. You don't have to consciously do anything it just comes in time and I notice that over and over again.

In terms of the sequence one could even say that Not Knowing goes to Waiting because waiting is an essential element of knowing. There is nothing to do but wait in many situations we can't find an answer to.
 

Liselle

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I guess you could call awareness, and the magic of it, shamanic.
That's a good way to put it, I think. (Not that I know anything about shamanism other than references like this blog post.)

I can see my example in that way, as a metaphorical and very subtle rain dance, but as you said, literal rain dances aren't the same.

And of course perhaps my awareness doesn't bring it my awareness just notices it.
...because literal rain has nothing to do with noticing rain or being aware of it. Unless - maybe - if we knew more about rain dances - the timing of a rain dance had something to do with the shaman being aware of something? No one would do a rain dance unless it hadn't rained for enough longer than usual for people to start caring, and longer-than-usual intervals between rain are less frequent by definition than average intervals, which might mean there's a good chance it will rain soon - nice time for a rain dance? ;) (Would be a good thing to Google about, on some other day than this, as it is going on noon here, and I have a lot to do today, and here I sit.)

You'd also think if there was something to notice, that typically heralded rain, people other than the shaman would figure it out, too, eventually, which might be why there aren't shamans doing rain dances anymore.

In terms of the sequence one could even say that Not Knowing goes to Waiting because waiting is an essential element of knowing. There is nothing to do but wait in many situations we can't find an answer to.
Good point :bows:. I wonder where in the sequence is the fruition? 14, maybe? (Maybe this is in Hilary's course.)
 

Liselle

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What you mentioned about the Image being very different from frenzied rain dancing...I wonder if they can both true at once, in their own ways? In my example - it was too long ago to remember very usefully, but the moments of rain-dancing (turning on the news, vs. not; being alert enough so my attention could be caught) were surrounded by vast amounts of time when I wasn't thinking about it at all and just going about my normal activities. Like you said about 'xyz'.

So, dance for rain at appropriate moments, and the rest of the time, eat, drink, relax, don't worry about it?

(I've probably dissected this example past the point of reasonableness by now lol.)
 

Trojina

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That's the same as was already suggested here

It’s important not to take the etymology too literally, though. ‘Waiting’ isn’t simply synonymous with ‘dancing in a ring of fire’.
The other lines make this clear, I think. Line 5, for instance:
‘Waiting with food and drink.
Constancy, good fortune.’
Dancing in a ring of fire with food and drink? Unlikely. No… ‘waiting’ is more general and more universal; the shaman is still dancing, but in the distance.

If there were an emoticon for a raised eyebrow I'd put one in.

Looking at the 3 pictures the cloud has been taken down by pic 2 to become shoulders, that's not enough for me to think it's sweat dripping off him. And in the top picture he looks like he's kneeling more than dancing. It actually looks like kneeling and pleading. They aren't long sleeves but his arms extended in supplication and readiness just like all those gestures you see in art and movies where the hero falls on his knees opens his arms to plead with the skies, with God. You can see the foot on the right side. He has a very flat head though. That could be because it's thrown back. Actually if he was kneeling and pleading his head would be thrown back wouldn't it, he wouldn't be gazing ahead. This is picture 1


pleading man.jpg





Also, observing men sweating (at the gym) I note it does not fly off in beads from their armpits but drips off the forehead onto the nose.

Also we don't see it fly off the armpits in droplets because they are clothed. Hilary said the man wore long sleeves, hence he is clothed, hence the clothing would soak the sweat up, hence those dots under the alleged armpits may not signify sweat.
 
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hilary

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... there is manifestly no shaman anywhere in the lines, dancing, sweating or doing anything, you say the shaman is still dancing but at a distance ?
Saying there is no shaman in the lines is a bit like seeing a lot of references to 'television' and saying 'there is manifestly nothing there about seeing far.' The word waiting is the picture of the rain-shaman and it is in 5 out of 6 lines.

If he is manically dancing for rain rather than being sure of it and so relaxing he's doing the opposite of what the Image says from Wilhelm

'Clouds rise up to heaven:
The image of WAITING.
Thus the superior man eats and drinks,
Is joyous and of good cheer.'

I know the I mage is much later but still.
The Image comes from the 5th line. There's more than one way of Waiting.

As I was trying to say, we need to take this idea of the dance quite loosely, generalise it and look for what's universal.

But then you are saying actually we can make it come by metaphorically doing this frenzied sweaty dancing the shaman believes will make the rain come.

... and those are two things I don't think are the universal, generalisable, relevant part.

Not the huge physical exertion, because a) line 5 and b) I somehow doubt that exerting yourself to the point of sweating profusely was anything very exceptional back then. You didn't have to buy a gym subscription to see people sweating, and people sweating didn't 'make' it rain. What happens with the shaman is something different.

And not making the rain come, either - at least, I don't think that's the idea. I think it's more that you and nature are part of the same fabric. What you do is tied up with what it does - you're not just a spectator/ impartial observer. Apparently there was a broad understanding in early China that if nature was not behaving harmoniously - if the seasons weren't seasonal - then this was because humans were out of synch in some way. The human round of offerings and observations is part of the working of the whole thing. So 'shaman rains, clouds rain' is not exactly a transitive thing, as if the shaman is turning on the celestial tap - it's a rhyme.

Anyway, the lines get a bit subtler by suggesting that where (or how) you wait, aka the kind of dance you do, is what invites your experience.
 

hilary

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...and the most successful kind of waiting-dance is line 5's: eating and drinking, enjoying. That's a line I think is probably more extreme than it seems to us. If this year's crops are in doubt because of the weather, then sitting down for a good feast of your remaining, fast-dwindling supplies is an act of extreme trust.
 

Liselle

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That's the same as was already suggested here

If there were an emoticon for a raised eyebrow I'd put one in.

Okay, I see that now... at the time, I was responding to what you'd said in rebuttal, by trying to see if the idea seemed to exist in my example. Which - maybe/probably, but it's worth about what any other single example is worth.

The concept here - Hilary's post, the relationship of shamans to rain, what was believed about it, and so forth - is not the easiest thing in all the world to grasp (understatement), and I haven't grasped it. Hence the energetic hugging of an example.

@hilary;, I'm sorry for copying. It wasn't intentional.
 

Trojina

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Oh no I wasn't implying you were copying, you weren't, I was only saying it's the same point that's all.
 

Liselle

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It was probably your pet mouse who typed the part about the raised eyebrow, then. ;)
 

Trojina

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Saying there is no shaman in the lines is a bit like seeing a lot of references to 'television' and saying 'there is manifestly nothing there about seeing far.' The word waiting is the picture of the rain-shaman and it is in 5 out of 6 lines.

What I meant was the word 'shaman' or idea of a shaman at all, is nowhere in the text in Wilhelm, nor your book, nor Bradford's as far as I can see. If the shaman is so central then why isn't the hexagram called 'shaman dancing' or something ? Oh because the idea is this shaman dancing is the word for waiting. Well then why isn't it in the text.

It's not clear, how would anyone know if they just bought your book, how the little character drawing by hexagram 5 related to the meaning of waiting.


The Image comes from the 5th line. There's more than one way of Waiting.

As I was trying to say, we need to take this idea of the dance quite loosely, generalise it and look for what's universal.

I kind of think we already have, I feel I got there without the idea of the shaman, even if the shaman is absolutely central and I never knew.



... and those are two things I don't think are the universal, generalisable, relevant part.

...don't know what 2 things you mean..ah you say below

Not the huge physical exertion, because a) line 5 and b) I somehow doubt that exerting yourself to the point of sweating profusely was anything very exceptional back then. You didn't have to buy a gym subscription to see people sweating, and people sweating didn't 'make' it rain. What happens with the shaman is something different.

Those drops in the character might be rain or sweat or something else...but you seemed to see the sweat as indicative of great effort

And not making the rain come, either - at least, I don't think that's the idea. I think it's more that you and nature are part of the same fabric. What you do is tied up with what it does - you're not just a spectator/ impartial observer. Apparently there was a broad understanding in early China that if nature was not behaving harmoniously - if the seasons weren't seasonal - then this was because humans were out of synch in some way. The human round of offerings and observations is part of the working of the whole thing. So 'shaman rains, clouds rain' is not exactly a transitive thing, as if the shaman is turning on the celestial tap - it's a rhyme.

Yes, I know one is part of the waiting, that you and the time are one, that you and nature are part of the same fabric and I understood that before knowing much about the shaman.

Anyway, the lines get a bit subtler by suggesting that where (or how) you wait, aka the kind of dance you do, is what invites your experience.

And sometimes they simply describe it.
 

Trojina

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It was probably your pet mouse who typed the part about the raised eyebrow, then. ;)

The raised eyebrow was at Hilary's quote not you ! If you look you can see it actually followed the quotation. I was only saying 'look this is the same as what Hilary meant'

Bizarre misunderstanding on your part I think. It's not saying you were copying her just saying you were thinking along the same lines but expressing it differently. Like in conversation all the time 'oh yeah that was what John just said" etc etc.

You really got that wrong believe me. Looking back I can see why you might have thought that but no, I was not raising an eyebrow at you at all but at something in the quote.

This part of the quote to be precise

Dancing in a ring of fire with food and drink? Unlikely. No… ‘waiting’ is more general and more universal; the shaman is still dancing, but in the distance.

...which I now think I possibly took too literally as if Hilary was saying there was little man dancing away in the distance, it sounded bizarre, but she must have meant 'distance' as in he's there but quite a long way from how we receive it today - or something.
 
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Liselle

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Oh, I see - okay.

"Raising an eyebrow" can indicate disapproval, but you meant it the other way. The joys of written communication...
 

Trojina

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Yes I was disapproving, though not terribly seriously so, of what H said in the quote of the shaman dancing in the distance. It just sounded absurd to me but I think she meant the word 'distance' in a different way to how I read it.

I'd say raising an eyebrow was questioning, generally critically, the truth or validity of something.

Perhaps we should move on from eyebrows
 

Liselle

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Oh - I thought the whole thing, your first two sentences plus the quote, were of a piece, and they weren't. Joys of written communication, part two lol.


Moving away from eyebrows, yes - I think part of why this post is hard is because it's hard to understand it as it would have been understood in ancient China. We can try imagining, but it's a lot to imagine. The facts about how rain dancing - a foreign concept to us - was done and how they perceived it, but then also the way it was incorporated into hexagram 5 and how it applies when we get 5 in readings. And as you say, it's invisible unless one really digs into it.

Hilary probably had been digging and thinking for a while before she wrote about it, and we're trying to understand it in 24 hours or less... let's give ourselves a break...
 

Trojina

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Miscommunication number 3


Moving away from eyebrows, yes - I think part of why this post is hard is because it's hard to understand it as it would have been understood in ancient China. We can try imagining, but it's a lot to imagine. The facts about how rain dancing - a foreign concept to us - was done and how they perceived it, but then also the way it was incorporated into hexagram 5 and how it applies when we get 5 in readings. And as you say, it's invisible unless one really digs into it.

I don't find the concept hard at all, it's how I've been understanding 5 for years, I mean that one is part
of the waiting, that it's not only passive waiting but also the idea of waiting in a certain way, that there's different ways of waiting as in the lines - all that. I am familiar with the idea of a rain dancer, ordinarily thought to dance for rain though now Hilary says it's not like that here because

And not making the rain come, either - at least, I don't think that's the idea. I think it's more that you and nature are part of the same fabric. What you do is tied up with what it does - you're not just a spectator/ impartial observer. Apparently there was a broad understanding in early China that if nature was not behaving harmoniously - if the seasons weren't seasonal - then this was because humans were out of synch in some way. The human round of offerings and observations is part of the working of the whole thing. So 'shaman rains, clouds rain' is not exactly a transitive thing, as if the shaman is turning on the celestial tap - it's a rhyme.

I know why people did rain dances, possibly still do in some parts of the world. That understanding, that humans are out of synch and need to make offerings is pretty universal in human history.

Above, in the quote, Hilary is saying in Yi, because it's poetry, this isn't presented as the shaman making it rain, it's more that he becomes it, is it. So something confusing there is the mix of actual history, what they did and why they did it and Yi as poetry and our use of it as an oracle.

I suspect as with most actual practices of that kind there would have been different emphasis in different areas with different things in mind. I think in the most fundamental sense rain dancers danced to bring rain. Hilary moves away from that, saying here, in Yi the dance is the waiting as the character for waiting is the shaman dancing.

So I'm not joining you in finding it hard, I do understand.

The discussion is around I don't/didn't entirely agree with the depiction of the shaman as frenzied dancer as an example of how waiting happens but Hilary isn't saying that entirely because she herself
says


It’s important not to take the etymology too literally, though. ‘Waiting’ isn’t simply synonymous with ‘dancing in a ring of fire’.
The other lines make this clear, I think. Line 5, for instance:
‘Waiting with food and drink.
Constancy, good fortune.’
Dancing in a ring of fire with food and drink? Unlikely. No… ‘waiting’ is more general and more universal; the shaman is still dancing, but in the distance.

The important part for me is 'the shaman is still dancing but, in the distance'. At first I thought she was placing him a little way off from each subject in the line in a cartoon like way. I now think she means 'distance' in the mental interpretative sense. As you are saying here

And as you say, it's invisible unless one really digs into it.


So my main point was/is yes he's invisible and why does he not appear anywhere in the text ? Well not in Wilhelm or Hilary's book anyway. When I say the shaman is not in the text, there is no mention of a shaman dancing Hilary said

Saying there is no shaman in the lines is a bit like seeing a lot of references to 'television' and saying 'there is manifestly nothing there about seeing far.' The word waiting is the picture of the rain-shaman and it is in 5 out of 6 lines.

I understand that too but there is no actual text that describes a shaman dancing in her book, in Wilhelm or Bradford that I can see. He's not just distant he's virtually invisible as you say and he would be to most people who weren't especially aware of etymology. There's the drawn character in Hilary's book under 5 but nothing about the fact it's meant to be a shaman.

Television involves seeing far so you are saying Hilary Waiting involves the dancing shaman. I can't disagree, he is the character for 5 though no one knows for sure, and they likely never will know for sure what the drops above him or to the side of him are. You also say

It’s important not to take the etymology too literally, though. ‘Waiting’ isn’t simply synonymous with ‘dancing in a ring of fire’.

It boils down in my head to how literally or seriously to take the etymology at all. Some authors seem to hang a lot on it and some don't to the point where the shaman vanished. I'm instinctively doubtful about hanging too much on what a character looks like.




So what I'm taking away from the blog now is, the central point is, not that waiting is so much more active than we think because look how hard this shaman is dancing, which was my first impression on reading (and not one that I was taken with), but that the shaman though terribly terribly distant, is still present. The key sentence being for me

Dancing in a ring of fire with food and drink? Unlikely. No… ‘waiting’ is more general and more universal; the shaman is still dancing, but in the distance.

I do think that last key sentence is a difficult sentence to decipher. That is not because I don't understand the concepts or that it's terribly hard, I just couldn't see in what sense distant.

He's very distant in practice for most who use books where he's not there and people wouldn't actually know he was unless they burrowed more into the etymology. I sometimes think burrowing more into the etymology takes one further away from Yi rather than closer to it, at least in interpretive terms.
 

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I have no idea what the 'copying' thing is even about, but I admire the expressive power and versatility of Trojina's eyebrow.

As to why this isn't mentioned in my book - because that was 9 years ago (!), and I hadn't seen the bronze character and put 2+2 together on this until last week. I only knew the character showed man + rain or man + droplets, and you can't tell from that whether he's waiting for the rain to start or stop.
 

Liselle

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I don't find the concept hard at all, it's how I've been understanding 5 for years, I mean that one is part
of the waiting, that it's not only passive waiting but also the idea of waiting in a certain way, that there's different ways of waiting as in the lines - all that. I am familiar with the idea of a rain dancer, ordinarily thought to dance for rain though now Hilary says it's not like that here because

And not making the rain come, either - at least, I don't think that's the idea. I think it's more that you and nature are part of the same fabric. What you do is tied up with what it does - you're not just a spectator/ impartial observer. Apparently there was a broad understanding in early China that if nature was not behaving harmoniously - if the seasons weren't seasonal - then this was because humans were out of synch in some way. The human round of offerings and observations is part of the working of the whole thing. So 'shaman rains, clouds rain' is not exactly a transitive thing, as if the shaman is turning on the celestial tap - it's a rhyme.

I know why people did rain dances, possibly still do in some parts of the world. That understanding, that humans are out of synch and need to make offerings is pretty universal in human history.

Above, in the quote, Hilary is saying in Yi, because it's poetry, this isn't presented as the shaman making it rain, it's more that he becomes it, is it. So something confusing there is the mix of actual history, what they did and why they did it and Yi as poetry and our use of it as an oracle.

I really do have to spend some time with Google, or something, and read this thread a lot more times, because I at least am finding this hard and confusing, despite all these strenuous efforts to work through it and explain (which I do appreciate, thank you!). Part of my trouble, I still do think, is that I fundamentally "know" that rain dancing is hooey, therefore a distinction between "makes it rain" and "becomes the rain"--- I mean, I understand the concepts of something being symbolic rather than literal, and making offerings to appease the gods in hopes of a desired outcome (if that is what's meant), but I'm having trouble integrating. Or something. (Also, unlike the two of you, my poetic muscles are puny.)

I only knew the character showed man + rain or man + droplets, and you can't tell from that whether he's waiting for the rain to start or stop.
It could be either, couldn't it? If people are going to try to intervene when it's not raining enough, people might also try to intervene when it's raining too much, mightn't they?

Also - actual question @hilary; - with all the flood imagery in the I Ching - does it have anything to do with this? Do we know what caused the flooding? Too much rain, or...? (Have you already told us this somewhere? I have a bad memory sometimes.)
 

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Sorry to be slow - spent the day learning/trying to learn how to edit Powerpoint slides!

The big mythical flood, the one Yu sorted out, isn't associated with rain, but with earthquakes and overflowing rivers. The exciting geological (pre)history thing isn't to do with rain, either ( https://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/answers/2016/08/15/hexagram-43-is-in-the-news/ ).

Of course in general too much rain would make your reservoirs overflow, which can't be much fun if you live in a pit dwelling. But my impression is that the big worry was rivers bursting their banks, which isn't necessarily associated with local rain.
 

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The shamanic influence is key here. Rather than just waiting passively this hexagram seems to be more akin to " attend to what is needed ". ( Karcher ) By attending to the rituals and symbology of the 'rain dance' this will evoke a gathering of energy around you and the situation in order to be able to face confidently the dangers ahead and to be confident in overcoming them.
 

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In terms of the sequence one could even say that Not Knowing goes to Waiting because waiting is an essential element of knowing. There is nothing to do but wait in many situations we can't find an answer to.

Good point :bows:. I wonder where in the sequence is the fruition? 14, maybe?

Or 9.6! (Hilary kindly answered the question before I asked it, not that I noticed :rofl:) -

If Hexagram 5 is waiting for rain (and it is... blog post coming...) then it has to wait until 9.6:

'Already rained, already come to rest...'
 

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I live in northern California where we have experienced extreme drought the last several years. We also have a large Indian population and awareness of shamen. A couple of years back when we hadn't had rain for a record number of days and it was getting really scary - waiting in blood! - I attended a picnic and "rain dance". Masses of people from the surrounding towns gathered together for the event and it was a remarkable experience. The beating drums and the shaman's dance created a vibration that seemed to shift reality and we all sensed it. Two days later it poured rain.
 

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Two days later it poured rain.
Miss Skeptic is skeptical. :hide: What had the weather forecasts been saying? Were there any news stories about it?

Per NOAA (it's their educational site for school children, but):
A seven-day forecast can accurately predict the weather about 80 percent of the time and a five-day forecast can accurately predict the weather approximately 90 percent of the time. However, a 10-day—or longer—forecast is only right about half the time.
 

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90% of me agrees with Miss Sceptic, especially with the 'two days later' part. 10% of me observes that I have serious conversations with a 3,000-year-old book and it gives me intelligent answers, so I probably shouldn't throw stones.
 

Liselle

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:rofl:



(later: I'm not sure why I thought that was that funny. Don't mind me :rolleyes:)
 
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