27. I / The Corners of the Mouth (Providing Nourishment)

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-- -- above KEN KEEPING STILL, MOUNTAIN
-- --
-- --
-- -- below CHEN THE AROUSING, THUNDER
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This hexagram is a picture of an open mouth; above and below are the firm lines of the lips, and between them the opening. Starting with the mouth, through which we take food for nourishment, the thought leads to nourishment itself. Nourishment of oneself, specifically of the body, is represented in the three lower lines, while the three upper lines represent nourishment and care of others, in a higher spiritual sense.

The rulers of the hexagram are the six in the fifth place and the nine at the top. These are the lines referred to in the Commentay on the Decision: "He provides nourishment for men ot worth and thus reaches the whole people.

The Sequence
When things are held fast, there is provision of
nourishment. Hense there follows the hexagram of
THE CORNERS OF THE MOUTH. "The corners of the
mouth" means the providing of nourishment.

Miscellaneous Notes
THE CORNERS OF THE MOUTH means providing nour-
ishment for what is right.

The two primary trigrams are opposed in movement. Ken, the upper, stands still; Chen, the lower, moves upward. This suggests the jaws and teeth. The upper jaw is immobile, the lower moves; hence the designation of the hexagram as THE CORNERS OF THE MOUTH. In contrast Hsu, WAITING (5), which also deals with provision of nourishment but emphasizes man's dependance on nourishment, the theme of the hexagram I is rather the human role in the providing of nourishment. A secondary meaning is that of providing nourishment first for men of worth, in order that thereby the people also may be nourished. The two hexagrams therefore present provision of nourishment as a natural process (Hsu, WAITING) and as a social problem (I, THE CORNERS OF THE MOUTH). A similar contrast obtains between the two hexagrams denoting nourishment in itself - Ching, THE WELL (48), the water necessary for nourishment, and Ting, THE CALDRON (50), the food necessary for nourishment.

27 The Corners of the Mouth (Providing Nourishment)

Hungering
In a context of enlightenment, a new beginning, we utilise discernment.

"YI : mouth, jaws, cheeks, chin; take in, ingest; feed, nourish, sustain, rear; furnish what is necessary. The ideogram: open jaws" ERANOS p327

Trigrams : enlightenment (bottom), discernment (top) : with/from enlightenment comes discernment. [mountain over thunder]

In the binary sequence hexagram 27 pairs with hexagram 24.
This pairing reflects an overall sense of 'emptyness' which is resolved by (a) hexagram 24 and a return to the 'true' belief (integrating, re-integrating) and (b) by hungering to be filled and so grasping whatever is at hand (differentiating). This pairing also reflects filtration issues (the EARTH phase in five-phase theory) - such that 24 returns to the 'true' path (and so 'with enlightenment comes devotion') and 27 reflects the hungering that can come with this return as it can also reflect the hungering that leads to the return.

In the binary sequence hexagram 27 opposes hexagram 28.
This pairing reflects the differences of being 'empty' and so developing a hungering (27) vs being too full (28). This overall focus is on excess, as in excess of emptyness vs excess of fullness. 28 can be extended to include the concept of doing more than is required to aid in someway, to go the extra distance etc.

At the LOCAL level we are dealing with an octet of hexagrams with the THUNDER trigram as base. In this sequence hexagram 27, the focus upon hungering, 'opposes' hexagram 17, establishing a belief, someone/something to follow. More so, the exaggerated sense of finding a particular belief system (17) is reflected in a more balanced format through a focus on using discernment in ingesting 'brain food' (27).

In the traditional sequence hexagram 27 pairs with hexagram 28.
In this pair the focus is on consequences of excess, be it an excess of being empty (27) or an excess of being full (28).
EXCESS:

27 : excess - through too little, too empty, needs filling, hungering; 27 hungering comes from a context described by hexagram 02 - devoting, trusting others, dualmindedness (potentials)

28 : excess - through too much, to full, needs emptying; 28 exceeding comes from a context described by hexagram 01 - singlemindedness, trust in self


In the traditional sequence hexagram 27 opposes hexagram 38.
The generic properties of hexagram 27 reflect the mixing of the generic properties of hexagram 24 mixed with the generic properties of hexagram 02.
A combination of a sense of 'returning' (24) with a focus on devotion (02) is reflected in the 'hungering' of hexagram 27.

In the variations on a theme sequence, hexagram 27 complements hexagram 23.
This paring reflects issues of devotion through (a) the hungering for 'brain food' in 27 and (b) the pruning of an existing perspective. Both reflect a focus on basics.

From XOR - the infrastructure of 27 is described by XORing 27 with 27 (its 27-ness) - this gives us 02 and so the sense of potentials. The infrastructure focus of 27 is on a skeletal form in need of content and the quality control applied to determining such content.

The source of nourishment of 27 (its 48-ness) is described by analogy to 09 with ITS focus on making small gains upon which to stand and eventually be noticed and so become influencial.

27 begins, or keeps coming back to (24-ness), a state described by analogy to 23 and ITS focus on pruning and so quality control - here applied at the 'beginning' and so of foundational importance.

full spectrum summarised at:

http://members.iimetro.com.au/~lofting/myweb/lofting/x100001.html

Chris.

[size=+3]頤[/size]
yi2

cheeks; jaw; chin; rear; to nourish

Bearing in mind that it is useful to review the sayings of antiquity, what follows is some previous input on the etymology of hex 27, which I'm now calling "Nourishing."

The ideogram used to illustrate hexagram twenty-seven is very specific but has very little use in the modern Chinese language. On the left is the symbol designating the lower part of the Face. The Mouth is the focus point as well as the appending muscles solicited for chewing. On the right is the general symbol for the Head qualifying anew the Mouth and creating a link to the general notion of Nourishment.

Together, these two ideograms simultaneously include the Head put in focus, concerned by its interior requirements (Feeding and Nourishment) as well as its outside expressions. To this double movement also corresponds a double nourishment. In fact, nothing in an ideogram allows the distinction between an active or a passive application; in every day language only the context ends up confirming the action.

Nourishment therefore means what nourishes as well as what is nourished. This ambiguity, impossible to render in a single word of English, is present throughout the text of this ideogram. By extension to one of its meanings, the ideogram Yi.27 has been chosen to identify the Imperial Palace situated in the North-West section of Beijing: the Yi He Yuan (颐和园), which westerners commonly call the Summer Palace, but whose authentic name means:

Yuan Yi He
The Garden of the maintenance of harmony.

I learned from Bradford's list that Yi2 can also mean appetite, hunger. While translating 27, I found that I couldn't make complete sense of the text, taking it to meaning nourishment. These translation problems vanished when I tried hunger, and I think it all makes perfect sense now.

THE IMAGEI see the image that "Under the Mountain there is Thunder" forms, as one of a belly (Mountain), from under which comes a rumbling sound (Thunder), like bellies do when they're empty, indicating hunger.

The picture of the hexagram, an open mouth, also refers to hunger.

I see the image of the hexagram as being a mouth as a perfect representation of Mountain over Thunder. The Thunder trigram below, symbolizes action and movement, just as the lower jaw moves in speaking and eating. The Mountain trigram above stays still, just as the upper jaw doesn't move, it being an integral part of the face and head. This theme of a combination of action/movement below and stopping/stillness above is repeated in the lines of the hexagram, in which the yang lines and yin lines complement each other, imo. So I like "Nourishing" better than "Hunger" as a translation. Put that in your pipe and smoke it.

getojack said:

Put that in your pipe and smoke it.

Click to expand...

I don't smoke.
Smoking is bad for you, you should know that!

Both the images of a jaw moving and a belly rumbling assist in memorizing and understanding this hexagram and I am delighted to have them.

Actually, it appears to me that the one goes with the other. When you're hungry there is the temptation to grab whatever is handy, even a cigarette - thus you can learn alot about a person by noting how he handles hunger: Will he grab the first thing available, or can he live with it till he can get to something nourishing?

Some older versions of the character yi2...

27. Saturn (Mountain) over Mars (Thunder)

Astrology associates Mars-Saturn aspects among other things with realistic and constructive use of energy, restraint of impulses, strong ambitions and a capacity for hard work.
There may be a conflict between Martian desires and impulsivity and Saturnian carefulness, conservatism, sense of responsibility, etcetera.

Other possible manifestations are:
- A certain hardening of feelings, anger, resentment, and so on.
- A sense of being rejected and undervalued by others.
- A feeling that one gets nothing for free, one has to earn it through hard work.
- More or less chronic dissatisfaction, as if there is a hole, a vague emptiness inside that can never be filled. This fits well with the interpretation of this hexagram as 'hunger'.
Reminds me of that song 'I can geeeet no satisfaaaaaaction'.

How to fill the hole? Eat more? That may not help because the prime cause of the hunger is not a lack of filling. It is the hardening of feelings and the overemphasis on 'earning', productivity, 'realism', work and the like.
There is a need to melt, to soften, and to play again, to enjoy.

OK, I've thought about this a bit more... How about "Nourishing Hunger". The double entendre seems to fit well with the repeated meanings in the yi2 ideogram and also with the text of the lines, imo.

The Yi Speaks

Pinyin is a relatively recent invention in China. For thousands of years, there was no standardized pronunciation of the Chinese language. There are hundreds of different Chinese dialects... so many, in fact, that a person in one part of China often can't understand the spoken dialect of a person in another part of China.

Mandarin Chinese has become the standard pronunciation in parts of Northern China, while Cantonese is the standard in parts of Southern China. The characters, however, remain the same no matter how they are pronounced. This is why Chinese films shown in China usually have Chinese subtitles.

Chinese is a tonal language. Pinyin uses the 26 letters of the English alphabet with tone marks or numbers, to show the pronunciation in Mandarin Chinese. There are four tones for every sound in Chinese. The four tones are:

1: a high, flat tone
2: a rising tone
3: a low, falling and rising tone
4: a falling tone

The character 頤 is written "yi2" in pinyin. In Mandarin Chinese, it is pronounced "yi" with a rising tone.

THE JUDGEMENT

THE CORNERS OF THE MOUTH.
Perseverance brings good fortune.
Pay heed to the providing of nourishment
And to what a man seeks
To fill his own mouth with.

In bestowing care and nourishment, it is important that the right people should be taken care of and that we should attend to our own nourishment in the right way. If we wish to know what anyone is like, we have only to observe on whom he bestows his care and what sides of his own nature he cultivates and nourishes. Nature nourishes all creatures. The great man fosters and takes care of superior men, in order to take care of all men through them. Mencius says about this:

If we wish to know whether anyone is superior or not, we need only observe what part of his being he regards as especially important. The body has superior and inferior, important and unimportant parts. We must not injure the superior parts for the sake of the inferior. He who cultivates the inferior parts of his nature is an inferior man. He who cultivates the superior parts of his nature is a superior man. What is your favorite body part? Just wanting to see if anybody actually reads this stuff.

Commentary on the Decision
"THE CORNERS OF THE MOUTH. Perseverance brings good fortune." If one provides nourishment for what is right, good fortune comes.
"Pay heed to the providing of nourishment," that is, pay heed to what a man provides nourishment for.
"To what he seeks to fill his own mouth with," that is, pay heed to what a man nourishes himself with.
Heaven and earth provide nourishment for all beings. The holy man provides nourishment for men of worth amd thus reaches the whole people. Truly great is the time of PROVIDING NOURISHMENT.

getojack said:

The character 頤 is written "yi2" in pinyin. In Mandarin Chinese, it is pronounced "yi" with a rising tone.

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Funny, I was reading in a dictionary that this character also means the "right" cheek. I wonder if it is an ancient way to express the proverbial "tongue-in-cheek" metaphor.

L

rosada said:

We must not injure the superior parts for the sake of the inferior. He who cultivates the inferior parts of his nature is an inferior man. He who cultivates the superior parts of his nature is a superior man. What is your favorite body part? Just wanting to see if anybody actually reads this stuff.

Click to expand...

LMAO!!

rosada said:

If we wish to know whether anyone is superior or not, we need only observe what part of his being he regards as especially important. The body has superior and inferior, important and unimportant parts. We must not injure the superior parts for the sake of the inferior. He who cultivates the inferior parts of his nature is an inferior man. He who cultivates the superior parts of his nature is a superior man. What is your favorite body part? Just wanting to see if anybody actually reads this stuff.

Click to expand...

Ahem... My lower part is showing the consequences of paying too much attention to my upper part...

L

ahem don't you mean the other way round Luis ?

trojan said:

ahem don't you mean the other way round Luis ?

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Hey, that was uncalled for!! I was talking about "food"... The other stuff is how I balance the imbalance. In the end, they cancel each other... LOL!

L

Oh you were talking about food, I thought you meant your lower parts had suffered due to a weighty intellect

A big head doesn't equal a big brain... It is mostly thick bone.

Yours,

Bubblehead

Hexagram Statement (Judgement)

[size=+1]頤 貞吉。觀頤。自求口實。[/size]
yi2 zhen1 ji2 guan1 yi2 zi4 qiu2 kou3 shi2

[size=+1]頤 [/size]
yi2: cheeks; jaw; chin; rear; to nourish

[size=+1]貞[/size]
zhen1: virtuous, chaste, pure; loyal

[size=+1]吉[/size]
ji2: lucky, propitious, good

[size=+1]觀[/size]
guan1: see, observe, view; appearance

[size=+1]頤[/size]
yi2: cheeks; jaw; chin; rear; to nourish

[size=+1]自[/size]
zi4: self, private, personal; from

[size=+1]求[/size]
qiu2: seek; demand, request; beseech

[size=+1]口[/size]
kou3: mouth; open end; entrance, gate

[size=+1]實[/size]
shi2: real, true, solid, honest

Completing what Wilhelm has to say in THE JUDGEMENT...

As an image the hexagram is conceived as a whole - as the image of an open mouth; consequently there is no need of explaining how it came to mean provision of nourishment. But it stresses the idea that as regards the manner of providing nourishment, everything depends on its being in harmony with what is right. In accord with the character of the two trigrams - movement and keeping still - there is no relation of correspondence between the relevant lines of the lower and the upper trigram. The lower trigram seeks nourishment for itself, the upper affords nourishment for others.

Aleister Crowley's attempt to cross-reference the Yijing to the Tarot cards
was hit and miss, but I personally think he succeeded with the sixteen Gua
he tied to the Court Cards on the basis of Ba Gua to Element attributions.
In 27 he sees the Earthy (Gen above) aspect of Fire (Zhen below) as the
Princess of Wands (or Page of Wands). The earthy part of fire would be
its fuel (nourishment). He attributes to this an extreme level of appetite
as the attraction of the combustible substance.

Interesting!
I get value from looking at Martin's contributing astrological significators to the trigrams, and then noting what tarot cards would match the individual trigrams. Thus if we assign Chen to Mars we have The Tower below and if we assign Ken to Saturn we have The Devil above. This combination of The Tower image - a picture of a tower being struck by lightening - the essence of movement shaking up the statis quo - next to The Devil - a picture of two people chained together representing an undeniable fixed situation, i.e. reality - suggests to me the feeling of a warning that words can distroy the old reality and also create a new one.

What does "extreme level of appetite as the attraction of the combustible substance" mean in simple English? "Appetite attracts nourishment"?

rosada said:

What does "extreme level of appetite as the attraction of the combustible substance" mean in simple English? "Appetite attracts nourishment"?

Click to expand...

Missed a comma in a most confusing way
He attributes to this an extreme level of appetite,
as the attraction of the combustible substance.

Ever watch flames lick at a log. Yummy.

Ah! Yummy indeed!

I woke up with the phrase, "Fire in the belly" on my mind, no doubt triggered by our talk on the other thread about ambition and what Brad has posted here about fuel.

rosada said:

I woke up with the phrase, "Fire in the belly" on my mind, no doubt triggered by our talk on the other thread about ambition and what Brad has posted here about fuel.

Click to expand...

Nah, that was triggered by the spicy burrito you ate the night before...

L

Very funny, Luis. But you have a point here too. What we eat can and does determine the character of our thoughts. Hmmm...