Hilary Barrett, I Ching

Archive for May, 2005

I Ching Community: Yes - No answers

Tuesday, May 31st, 2005

A very interesting question, this: can Yi answer ‘yes’ or ‘no’? Is it a good idea to ask ‘yes’/’no’ questions? If not, why not?
I Ching Community: Yes - No answers

Richard Kunst’s Yijing dissertation

Sunday, May 29th, 2005

I’ve finally bought myself a copy of Richard Kunst’s 1985 dissertation, The Original Yijing: a text, phonetic transcription, and indexes, with sample glosses, and I’ve been seizing every spare moment to read it. I wish I’d got it years ago!
Anyone with a strong interest in the early Yi will find this utterly fascinating. [...]

Chu Hsi and Divination

Friday, May 27th, 2005

Joseph Adler’s fascinating article, Chu Hsi and Divination, is available free online. This small excerpt will show why I’m recommending it:
After one had ascertained the intended meaning, according to Chu, a certain subjective involvement with the text is necessary for full understanding. One must extend one’s mind into the thing, responding to its pattern [...]

So the tarot has a sense of humour, too!

Friday, May 27th, 2005

Trying to print out a great big German treatise on the Yijing - first all odd-numbered pages, then all-even numbered ones on the back. Except of course the printer picks up several pages at once on the second time through, prints on the back of the wrong sheet, and generally creates chaos to the [...]

I Ching Community : Hexagram 57 ~ What’s it all about?

Wednesday, May 25th, 2005

I Ching Community Discussion Forum: Hex 57 ~ What’s it all about?
A good variety of insights into a very elusive hexagram.

Divination in sub-Saharan Africa

Sunday, May 22nd, 2005

John Pemberton: Divination in sub-Saharan Africa
Fascinating reading on a range of ancient, living forms of divination - and clear insights, too, into what divination is all about. This is from the first page:
Whatever the form, all divinatory practices reveal the human quest for a larger context of meaning, a means by which to understand [...]

The non-people of Hexagram 12

Sunday, May 22nd, 2005

‘Obstructing it, non-people.
No harvest in noble one’s constancy.
Great goes, small comes.’

The ‘usual’ interpretation of the Judgement of Hexagram 12 is that there are bad people at work, dominating the environment, sabotaging the noble one’s good efforts. And sometimes, indeed, it can mean exactly that - in particular, that someone is promoting malicious rumours. But in my experience of hexagram 12, this isn’t always - or even usually - the case.

Some translations offer an alternative perspective. James Legge writes of ‘the want of good understanding between men’; Thomas Cleary, in his Taoist I Ching, has ‘denial of humanity’. The Obstruction isn’t necessarily caused by the presence of bad people, but by people denying one anothers’ humanity.