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How to understand the changing lines in hex. 44

O

ole

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There are some lines that remains a mystery to me, f.ex. hex.44 (Coming to meet) line 2 and 4.

Fish in a tank/wrapper is used as symbol in both.
In 2.line it says:
There is a fish in the tank. No blame.
Does not further guests.

In 4.line it says:
No fish in the tank.
This leads to misfortune.

Reading different translations and comments on this, it seems that authors are also puzzled by these lines.
Some (the ones that hold on to hex.44 as about the *negative* feminine) say it is about "inferior elements" that can rotten like fish in a tank. But then, how comes that its a misfortune NOT to have them in a tank (line 4).

Karcher think of them to be about pregnancy, as he also see hex. 44 as a whole to be about a positive meeting with the strong feminine.

Line 5 is also a mystery. Here it is about a melon instead of fish. Again traditionally the melon is seen as a symbol for something that could decay. But a "hidden line" or "hidden beauty" as Balkin translates it, that "falls down from the sky" - does it mean pregnancy?
 
R

rosada

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Good morning!
A few weeks ago a visitor came to our house. After he left I asked the I Ching, "What was that all about?'" and got 44.1.2.3.4.5.6>24

This toss seemed to neatly define the episode.

44. An unexpected intruder.
A fellow came onto our property asking permission to hunt deer. He had a large coil of rope which he offered togive us in exchange for this favor. We turned him down.

44.1 It must be checked with a brake of bronze.

Ordinarily the fellow would have not been able to get on our land but the metal gate was open.

44.2 There are fish in the tank. No blame.
Does not further guests.

There are deer on our land. Not problem. But this "guest' would not further them!

44.3 If one is mindful of the danger, no mistake is made.

This line implies one might be indecisive about the temptation. The only indecision here was how to get rid of the guy. I got my husband.

44.4 No fish in the tank. This leads to misfortune.
Turns out my husband knew the man, a neighbor, and although he had to tell him "No fish!" (no deal) he was able to do it in such a friendly way that no harm was done.

44.5 Then it drops down to one from heaven.
The fellow offers us the rope anyway, as it seems he had lots of it.

44.6 He comes to meet with his horns.
Humiliation. No blame.

We did not accept the rope even as a gift. The fellow left. I don't think he had any negative feelings towards us, but if he did we sure didn't care!

Insidentally, 44 talks about meeting people half way. We went out to meet this man as his truck drove up to our porch. By not requiring him - or letting him! actually come to our door I think we disposed of the whole incident more smoothly.

Rosada
 

cal val

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Hi Ole...

Steve Marshall devoted a chapter to this hexagram in his book, The Mandate of Heaven.

On this forum in a very lively discussion entitled "44-33 Does it mean stop, it'll be good if you don't do a thing" (which you can access by using the hexagram index or search engine on the left side of this page), he said this about lines 2 and 4 in particular:

<blockquote>"Tank" in Wilhelm is a mistranslation of Cary Baynes from the German. Wilhelm had "container" and Baynes naturally but mistakenly thought of a tank. It is actually a willow-wand fishtrap placed in the river from which are divined marriage omens. If it catches a fish, lucky, if not, ominous. I wrote a whole chapter about this. Yes, the second line is a good omen (and not in a "minor sense", no this is a really good omen), the fourth line is a bad omen, irrespective of later ideas of correspondence."</blockquote>

Love,

Val
 
R

rosada

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Greetings Val,

Wow, this is a very important clarification!

To apply what you are saying about 44.2 to my own experience, I was interpreting " There is a fish in the tank. No blame. Does not further guests" as meaning that while there were deer on my property and there was no blame in this, and that I was not obligated to further the desires of the intruder/guest."

Now I see it that the intruder was the "fish" that I had caugt in my tank/net. I was very polite so there was "No blame," but did not let him get any further to hunt my "guests"/the deer.

Not so clear about what this new understanding means for 44.4. Perhaps "No fish in the tank this leads to misfortune" means if one does not stop the intruder there will be a problem? In my case I did not stop the intruder - but I got my husband and he did. I am always worrying that if the I Ching says something is bad, it just is, can't be changed. But i guess that's just the language problem and that if the Yi points out something negative it's so that you can change it?

Anyway, thank you for the insight!

Rosada
 
J

jesed

Guest
Just in case the commentarie could be useful, another way to see this.

General aspect: This hexagram is about the exercise of POWER and GOVERMENT.
The common people take the initiative to meet the the nobles. This is dangerous, a temptation, but it can be a good meeting.

So, the hex is about how to handle the relationship with common peoble, because IT IS UNEVITABLE that rulers meet with them. So, you cannot eliminate common people, but need to learn how to handle them to avoid danger.

(By extention, it can be apply to lower aspects of personality and negativities)

Line 1: If you let common people do what they want, their power will grow and drop you from power.
Line 2: If you keep common people under your control, is not a fault; but be careful they make alliance with forengeir states.
Line 3: Some times your are tempted to do alliance with common people in order to face dificult times. But only if you can realize it is dangerous, you can avoid great harm
Line 4: When the noble put common people away, they won't help him anymore: Pitfal
Line 5: When the ruler is a self-development one, he can tolerate common people; he doesn't force them to do right, but transforms them with the quiet influence of his example. Good fortune
Line 6: A sage that face strongly the common people will be acussed of pride and suffer humilliation. But it is not fault

Best wishes
 

cal val

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Hi Rosada...

Oh I don't know. I just find the historical information fascinating... and I think it does help to understand what the ancient people who wrote the line might have meant to interpret it. But when it gets right down to it, I read intuitively (and from experience... like you just did). If and when all goes well, the answers jump out at me. They feel right. So if your take on 44.2 felt right at the time, I suspect it probably was.

And YIKES! That whole story sounds pretty scarey. He brought a gun and a length of rope onto your property??? Did you ask the Yi any follow up questions... like just how stable is this guy?

As it happens, as much as I am able to easily discern what 44 means for other people I read, I don't get what it's been meaning for me lately, and it's been coming up daily for the last few days. I don't have any addiction... or attraction to anything else I would consider dangerous to dally with, and it's been the answer when I've asked the Yi to tell me something descriptive of the man the universe is touting for me. I'm at a loss on this one, and I have a gazillion questions myself.

Love,

Val
 
J

jesed

Guest
Hi Val
Just in case the commentarie could be useful

Among other meanings, when the questions are about relationships, 44 is also about people destinated to be together:
"When heaven and earth come to meet each other, all creatures prosper; when a prince and his official come to meet each other, the world is put in order. It is necessary for elements predestined to be joined and mutually dependent to come to meet one another halfway. But the coming together must be free of dishonest ulterior motives, otherwise harm will result" (Wilhelm commentarie of 44's Judgment)

Best wishes
 
J

jesed

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ps

As I told before: there is a common misunderstanding about 44. . it is about somethig more than temptation and danger.

Irony: 44 is about copulation. In the same way many people sees 44 only as tempation and danger, many peolple sees copulation only as something "nasty".

But life depends of copulation????. (Don't forget it when read 44)
 

jte

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"And YIKES! That whole story sounds pretty scarey. He brought a gun and a length of rope onto your property??? Did you ask the Yi any follow up questions... like just how stable is this guy? "

Yeah, sounds like it probably wouldn't be advantageous to marry this one... =)

- Jeff
 
H

hmesker

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<blockquote><hr size=0><!-quote-!><font size=1>quote:</font>

Irony: 44 is about copulation.<!-/quote-!><hr size=0></blockquote>
I think this is a misconception. Quoting myself (with scrambled Chinese characters, too bad, can't do anything about it):

The Shuo Wen comes yet with another character for &#23012;, it says: &#23012;, &#20598;&#20063;. "&#23012; means ou &#20598;". &#20598; has many meanings, of which one is 'a mate' or 'to mate', and this is probably the reason why several writers translate hexagram 44 as 'copulating'. But the Shuo Wen is the only dictionary which explains &#23012; in this direction. There are no texts available where &#23012; is used in the meaning of 'to copulate'.

See http://www.i-tjingcentrum.nl/serendipity/archives/56-A-Mulan-in-the-Yijing.html

Harmen.
 
J

jesed

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Hi Harmen

Only a little thing:

I know actual academic studies look only (or mostly) to "original text". But there is, as you know well, a huge more material and developments (even non-writed developments). My commentarie "44 is ABOUT copulation" doesn't belong to Zhouyi or direct text. But for those other developments.

Of course, study "original text" is not only useful and worthly, but needed. But knowing others developments is useful and worthly too.

Best wishes
 
H

hmesker

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Hi Jesed,

If that is the case, can you motivate why '44 is ABOUT copulation'? I assume you do not just repeat what others have said before you, you probably have your own ideas about this. And if 44 is about copulation, why couldn't any other hexagram be about copulation as well? In short, what makes you say that 44 is about copulation?

Harmen.
 
B

bruce

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Just a comment on 44.4 ? I?ve found and applied this to mean that if we turn away from things or people which are less than we consider to be ideal, we lose the potential (fish = fertility) to further them and ultimately ourselves. These fish may seem to be unimportant to us at the time and not worth troubling over, however if our creel is empty we may go without dinner, or at least desert some time in the future.

Applied to this hunter on your property, Rosada, your first interpretation sounds pretty good, but you might also consider that it is not uncommon for a hunter to provide the land owner with a thank you token of fresh venison, assuming your family eats meat? This could be an example of ?no fish in the tank?, if you forbid him to hunt. And this is how I would interpret your line 4. You could always make hunting rights contingent upon sharing of the game taken.

Btw, a deer hunter typically carries a deer rifle, and rope to tie up the game. Nothing to be aghast about.
 

cal val

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Hi Rosada...

Thank you so much for sharing your experience here. Reading it has forced me to think about 44 possibilities that I haven't really wanted to think about... and...

Rather than hijack Ole's thread, I've started a new thread about it... if you're interested. I invite Jesed to read it... there might be something of interest for him there. And, of course, I invite Harmen and anyone else who has put a lot of study into 44 to read it as well.

http://www.onlineclarity.co.uk/I_Ching_community/messages/92/5464.html?1131571129

Love,

Val
 
J

jesed

Guest
Hi Harmen

Sorry to read this from someone i respect so much like you: "I assume you do not just repeat what others have said before you, you probably have your own ideas about this"

Why was necesary the rudness to say you are not agree with my point of view?

Yes, I have my own ideas about why I think 44 is about copulation (among other several meanings)
Yes, those ideas are (in part) learned from what other had said
Yes, I take my own conclusions about it
No, I'm not interested in egos battles.

So, if my commentarie that 44 is about copulation is useful to someone, best wishes to them
If the commentarie is not useful to someone, best wishes to them
If someone want to do a proper-maner interchange of ideas about it, I will do
If someone want to do a ego-batlle about it, he can fight my shadow

Best wishes
 

bradford_h

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All the lines and all the hexagrams are about copulating. Every one can address a question about coupling. It's a very naughty book. There's just a really big variety of ways to do it. 31.X is one of the best. 54.0 is trouble as well. The hardest maybe is 12.0, back to back. And some lines just say GFY.
This tip for young lovers who've already done all the surfaces in all the rooms. The Yi is full of ideas.
 
B

bruce

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lol.gif
right on Brad
 

cal val

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I can imagine your parents' confusion, Brad, when they found the Yi under your bed rather than a Playboy.
 
O

ole

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Thanks for all the enlightening information - especially I was inspired by the link to Steve Marshall you offered,Val.

I was looking up "fish" in Ritsema/Karcher. The Chinese term YU can be translated to: scaly, aquatic beings hidden in the water; symbol of abundance; connected with the Streaming Moment.

If this is true translations, it does not support the idea of some "rotten" inferior influence.

And we are then left with two total opposite interpretations of lines in 44.

And I sympatize with having an open attitude to symbols, again referring to you, val.
Still there is a problem with this. As a westerner, when I was new to I ching, I understood the Dragon, as an evil symbol, as it always have been in our fairytales, which gives rise to a peculiar interpretation of Hex.1,1.

One of my friends ask me a question, just as I was going to fetch another translation of I Ching to bring a different light on his cast. He asked: "Shouln?t the cast I did be interpreted in accordance with that particular book we were sitting with, when we did the cast?"

Taking this idea further: lets say I developed an alternative divination system, composed of 64 abstract principles I found meaningful and created 6 ways of dealing with the principle for each - would it not be a strange assumption that my cast could additionally be interpretated using the book of Change?

Sometimes I think that all our hard efforts to investigate into what a line might have ment for people living in a cultur we hardly know, is waste of energy. That is if we stick to the assumption that I Ching is about synchronicity.

Probably I ching has gone through a lot of change it self during the time it were developed. There is not much evindence that the full developed system fell down from the sky in a final,complete version.
Balkin points to the irony that all the wisdom that is found in IC, was not to be found in the original Bronze age divinatory text. That if one strips away confucian, daoist and neo-confucian interpretations, one does not get profound and eternal vision of human life, but advices about whether the king should go on a hunt, what to do with captive soldiers and the best way to perform human sacrifice!
Perhaps these guys would be surprised to see that thousand of years later we are using this tool to decide if we should buy a new computer :)
 

cal val

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Hi Ole...

Very interesting post. I've found that the Yi's answers usually seem to be well reflected in whatever interpretation I pick up... except for Wilhelm/Baynes. I've always had a lot of difficulty with that one. I even threw it out once many years ago and didn't buy a new one until almost three years ago. Since studying only the ZhouYi and looking for historical information such as that Steve Marshall provided, I now know why I've had such trouble with Wilhelm Baynes. He's made a mush of the ZhouYi and the wings and stirred it just a little too much. It now sits on my shelf collecting dust.

I've never made that assumption that I Ching is about synchronicity... and never will. My experience has been otherwise. My experience is that the mind is very powerful and has the ability to control the outcome of the coin toss.

I disagree very much with this alleged statement by Balkin. I believe if you strip away all those contradictory and conflicting interpretations (many ideas advanced in the daodejing pointedly contrast Confucian philosophy), you get a much clearer image of what the lines really mean.

Love,

Val
 

bradford_h

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I think somebody needs to take a few moments to ponder, and try to come up with a couple of reasons why, to the Chinese as elsewhere, the fish might symbolizes the feminine sex. Try, for example, looking up Vesica Pisces in the dictionary. It's only really a puzzle for those who can't see any intentional humor in the Zhouyi's text.
 
H

hmesker

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<blockquote><hr size=0><!-quote-!><font size=1>quote:</font>

Why was necesary the rudness to say you are not agree with my point of view?<!-/quote-!><hr size=0></blockquote>
Jesed, I did not mean to be rude, it was just a way of saying what was on my mind: "if Jesed's view is not based on translation, then it must stem from something else. I wonder what that is. Surely he is not saying '44 is about copulation' just because others have said that before him."

If I have offended you I am sorry for that.

Harmen.
 

bradford_h

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When people say that a certain hexagram is "about this or that" I think they are missing the broader function of the Yi. I wasn't joking in saying that any line can be a response to a question about copulation. And a line which has some fun with an image related to copulation can be the response to a question about auto mechanics or credit card bills.
The hexagram themes are metaphors and analogies which are intended to recall certain ways of responding to life, certain approaches or attitudes. To always take them too literally is to miss out on their broader applicability. The images need to remain more flexible than such literal interpretation allows. There are only 450 responses here to speak to all possible questions.
 

void

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I looked up vescica pisces in the Concise Oxford dictionary. It says its a bladder - or pointed oval used as an aureole in medieval art.

So I have to admit I'm not that clear about why fish represent women. I'm assuming you mean fish represent female genitalia ? Bit insulting to refer to women only by their genitalia ? I don't get it, I never knew fish represented women before ??? What then represents the male ? The boar ?
 

void

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Ole I agree with Val if all the overlayed interpretations are stripped away, Confucian etc and you get near the bare image of the line it becomes a hundred times richer in its application.
This is because an image can be used in a million ways to a persons mind, so many ways in which it reflect their different situations.

In this respect those who bring us knowledge of the 'original' meanings of lines are doing something of incredible value - restoring the Yi to us.

The great thing is mostly when I read the original meaning of a line it never clashes with my own experience but kind of confirms and supplements it.
 

lasublime

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just a little something about fish and copulation, when my grandmother had a dream and fish were involved she always would say, 'I saw fish in my dream,someone in the family is pregnant' and you know what, she was always right!!
 
H

hmesker

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<blockquote><hr size=0><!-quote-!><font size=1>quote:</font>

When people say that a certain hexagram is "about this or that" I think they are missing the broader function of the Yi.<!-/quote-!><hr size=0></blockquote>
Hi Brad,

I agree, especially when a view is not based on translation, but on interpretation. And with interpretation every hexagram applies to everything. Which is a good thing, of course. Every hexagram can tell a lot about an aspect of a certain situation. In other words, if you see 44 as 'copulation', I think it talks about it in a specific way, not just about it as a technical act. Since every hexagram can say something about copulation, then what does 44 say about it? That is interesting to ponder on.

Best,

Harmen.
 
B

bruce

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Original transcript translation seems to me to be an essential baseline, and I?m extremely thankful for the likes of Brad, LiSe and Harmen for presenting their knowledge within the form of these dialogues.

I have always felt that the most important thing to realize when working with the Yi is that every dynamic is an operating component within ourselves. Being completely honest with ones self is the only way to recognize Yi?s most intimate truths. Nothing substantial can be gained without applying each principle within our own thought processes regarding our own person. Yi is like an ultimate self-adjusting tool. But it can be hard doing that if the student is usually looking outward for solutions. It?s hard to remove the spec in someone?s eye with a beam in our own.
 
B

bruce

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As for Ole?s last comments: ?That if one strips away confucian, daoist and neo-confucian interpretations, one does not get profound and eternal vision of human life, but advices about whether the king should go on a hunt, what to do with captive soldiers and the best way to perform human sacrifice!?

It?s no different now than it was then, Ole. You can strip away everything Confucian or Taoist, and still arrive at the same meanings. Taoism didn?t invent Tao, it only gave it a name. Today as then, the majority of inquiries are not about self development, but about the best or most acceptable way to perform this or that ritual, or paying rent, or making enough money, or gaining the affections of another. Now as then, there are also those who seek and find ?an eternal vision of human life?.
 

bradford_h

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Talk about insulting to women (which the fairly universal symbolism of the vesica pisces as the birth canal is not) the title of Hexagram 44 in the Mawangdui text is a different Gou - a female dog, a bitch, esp in heat, to hound, a term of contempt. But I would submit that when the aroma of one's fingers and moustache reminds one of fish, one has not been disrespecting one's woman then either.
But that isn't the point. The broader theme here, which the hexagram names need to be stretched out to cover, is keeping clear of influences which undermine higher order and purpose, keeping clear of interference, avoiding being seduced away from what is more worthy. Sexual eduction just happens to be a very powerful symbol of this. So line one looks at self restraint, line two at saving yourself from random acts of generosity, line three at a consequence of weakness, line four at the consequences of being too strict or aloof, line five is a celebration of deferred gratification's timing, and line six suggests that the point of all that protective headgear was not to avoid relationship.
 

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