The Useless Tree

Friday Yi Jing Blogging: Yankees will win Wild Card playoff game next week!

Using the Yi Jing to predict the outcome of sporting events is a tricky enterprise, as my Super Bowl forecast demonstrated this year.  But the Yi always leaves open the possibility of human folly and contingency, and, thus, is not itself responsible for our inability to either understand or correctly act upon the wisdom of the oracle.  In other words, it's always appropriate to ask the Yi Jing whether the New York Yankees will win.  And when I asked today about next week's wild card playoff game, the Yi came back with a generally favorable response.  As that profound Yi Jing interpreter, John Sterling, might say: "Yankees win!  Th-th-th-th-the Yankess!  Win!"

For those keeping score at home, the Yi presented me with Hexagram 59, "Dispersion," with moving lines in the first two positions, thus tending toward Hexagram 42, "Increase."

                                                    

"Dispersion"                                                   "Increase"

The Judgment of "Dispersion" gets off to a good start: "Success. The king approaches his temple. It furthers one to cross the great water. Perseverance furthers."  Success!  It is tempting to interpret "temple" here as the hallowed ground of Yankee Stadium, but perhaps that is too literal a take.  "Crossing the great water," too, should not be taken literally: it usually implies that undertaking some significant task - like playing a single win-or-go-home playoff game - is auspicious.  The Yi tells us how the Yankees should approach these favorable circumstances, since nothing is automatic either in baseball or prophecy.  They need to maintain their team unity and follow the guidance of their leader, manager Joe Girardi.

The line statements make this even clearer.  The moving line in the first position of Hexagram 59 tells us: "He brings help with the strength of a horse. Good fortune."  The Wilhelm commentary continues: "...when hidden divergences in temper make themselves felt and lead to mutual misunderstandings, we must take quick and vigorous action to dissolve misunderstandings and mutual distrust."  So, who is the "horse" here?  It could be Tanaka, who has been a stalwart as starting pitcher this season and will take the mound on Tuesday.  But the suggestion that "vigorous action" might be necessary could imply that Girardi will need to step in quickly should Tanaka falter and bring one of his other horses, most notably Betances.  And should that have to happen early in the game, the team should accept it and stay united in their efforts.

Indeed, the nine in the second place points to some difficulty in the game: "He hurries to that which supports him. Remorse disappears."  The mention of momentary remorse here is ominous.  It could be that the Yankees fall behind early, that Tanaka is not as effective as hoped, and that Girardi might need to go to the bullpen early.  But don't fear Yankee fans, clear leadership should yield good results.  As the Minford translation states (and I am drawing on that text more and more as a supplement to the standard Wilhelm volume): "seize the moment. Regret goes away."  

The tendency toward "Increase" is also favorable.  Certainly, the modern connotations of the character 益, yi - "profit, benefit, advantage" - bode well for the pinstripes.  And the Judgment of this hexagram also encourages playing the game: "It furthers one to undertake something.  It furthers on to cross the great water."  All of this furthering suggests the Yanks will get through to the next stage of the playoffs.

It should be noted, however, that weather could be a problem.  Hexagram 59 is the combination of wind above and water below, and Hexagram 42 is wind above and thunder below; all of which suggests inclemency.  

But, whatever the weather, it looks like good fortune ahead for the Bronx Bombers. 

Go Yankees!                 

 

An Yi Jing Super Bowl Prediction: Seahawks Win!

Following up on my Sunzi Super Bowl analysis, I thought it might be good to consult the Yi Jing about the outcome of tomorrow's big game. This was made easier last evening by a group of friends who urged me to ask the oracle: "Will the Seahawks win?"  We were all at a local bar and the atmosphere was a bit boisterous.  But through the talk and laughter, an answer came into view: the Seahawks will, indeed, win.

I realize, since this is also the conclusion of my Sunzi analysis, that a Seahawks victory now appears overdetermined.  But, as the commentary below illustrates, things could go wrong for Seattle.  It will be a battle.  If, however, they do what the Yi Jing suggests, they will prevail.

The first hexagram I received from the Yi was 44, Kou, "Coming to Meet," with four - yes, count them, four! - moving lines, in the first, second, third, and ninth places, thus tending in the direction of, Sui, hexagram 17, "Following::

                                                         

                                   ====> 

 

 

Let's start with 44.  The broken yin line at the bottom is a key: it suggests a principle of darkness or weakness or inferiority rising up into a time of light and strength and superiority.  A kind of conflict or contention, or dare we say football game, is implied: strong v. weak.  Since I asked directly about the Seahawks, we could assume that the "strong," "light," "superior" force here is the Seattle team.  If that is the case, a struggle is foreseen. The Judgment ("Coming to meet. The maiden is powerful. One should not marry such a maiden") gets at the inherent danger when yang meets yin.  And the Image ("Under heaven, wind: The image of Coming to Meet.  Thus does the prince act when disseminating his command and proclaiming them to the four quarters of heaven") suggests that a leader (a quarterback calling plays?) must take command to manage the dangers of the opposing force.  And notice: the leader must be on his game for "four quarters."

Some more interesting points come in the line statements.  The six in the first place implies that the Seattle defense must play strong:

It [Pats offense?] must be checked with a brake of bronze.  Perseverance brings good fortune.  If one lets it [Pats offense] take its course, one experiences misfortune.  Even a lean pig has it in him to rage around.

The course of the Pats offense cannot be allowed to proceed unchecked.  The Hawks D has to persevere.  It is tempting to see the "lean pig" as a deflated football(!!!).  But maybe it is a warning not to take the Pats too lightly, which Seattle certainly will not do.

The rather gruesome image in the third line could point to an injury that might disrupt the Seahawks plans:

There is no skin on his thighs, and walking comes hard.  If one is mindful of the danger, no great mistake is made.

Whatever happens, they have to keep their heads, stick to the game plan, persevere through it all, even if an apparently significant injury takes a player out of the game.

The sixth line is rather foreboding:

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

Wilhelm's commentary gives us this insight into this line: "There are many people who in a noble pride hold themselves aloof from all that is low and rebuff it brusquely wherever it comes to meet them.  Such persons are reproached for being proud and distant..."   Sounds like Marshawn Lynch and his dealings with the press... But, seriously, the invocation of humiliation could point a bad situation for the Seahawks.  The reason why I think that something better is in the offing for them is hexagram 17, the condition toward which things are tending.

The Judgment for "Following" is very favorable:

Following has supreme success. Perseverance furthers. No blame.

It is all about adaptation. If the Hawks do not try to force things, if they take what circumstances allow, if they follow the natural unfolding of the game, they will prevail.  

Here's what all of this suggests:  the game will be a close struggle, the forces of dark and light fighting it out.  The Pats might gain the upper hand early; the Hawks may suffer a significant injury and be trailing at halftime.  To win, the Seahawks will have to keep their heads, maintain their defensive strength, and adjust offensively at halftime.  If they are able to stay within the particular dynamics of the game and exploit their inherent strengths, they are going to come out on top: "supreme success."  And then Russell Wilson will be able to walk off the field toward a restful night, just as hexagram 17 says:

Thus the superior man at nightfall goes indoors for rest and recuperation.

Go Hawks!

New Year's Yi Jing Blogging: Be Careful of that Tiger's Tail!

Happy New Year!

2012 ended, as far as blogging was concerned, in a rather desultory manner: only two posts in all of December!  So, here's a resolution: more and better blogging in the new year (which would seem to contradict my Daoist leanings, which would tend toward less and murkier...).  In any event, we'll start things off in style with a question for the Yi Jing (I have be get back into practice since I will be teaching this text next month): what is the general outlook for the year ahead?

The coin toss yield Hexagram 10, Treading, with no moving lines:

The first thing to notice is the absence of moving lines.  What might that suggest?  Perhaps the year will be relatively stable, with little in the way of dramatic changes.  Or maybe it is meant to call greater attention to the basic Image and Judgment of the hexagram.  The latter might well be the better interpretation, since the course of twelve months is certain to produce at least a few significant changes.

The Judgment here points to the possibility of difficult times and the necessity of facing them with caution and decorum:

Treading.  Treading upon the tail of the tiger.  It does not bite the man.  Success.

履虎尾，不咥人，亨。

Always like to see "success" (or "prosperity") in the text.   That seems good.  But that tiger tail: watch out.  Wilhelm comments:

In terms of a human situation, one is handling wild, intractable people.  In such a case one's purpose will be achieved if one behaves with decorum.  Pleasant manners succeed even with irritable people.

There is something to keep in mind in the coming year.  We will all - in our work, in our personal lives, wherever - encounter people who are acting unreasonably, or worse.  And our challenge is to find the best way to interact with them.  The Yi is telling us not be get drawn into petty quarrels but to keep things respectful.  That can be hard at times (I am thinking of some "wild, intractable people" in my professional life just now...) but it will pay off in the end. 

The Judgment notes, in a rather Confucian tone, that if we can keep interpersonal relationships proper and constructive, broader social and political goods will follow:

Heaven above, the lake below: The image of Treading.  Thus the superior man discriminates between high and low, and thereby fortifies the thinking of the people.

The appeal to hierarchy here - high and low - might best be understood in Confucian terms, not as a hereditary privilege but as an earned moral status.   We should treat good people - those who are conscientiously working to do the right thing in the world - with the respect they are due; while treating bad people with caution and circumspection.  Those bad people, like tigers, can hurt you.  But you can't fight them on their own terms; to do so is to both debase your own moral action and to engage with the strength of the adversary, as opposed to exploiting weaknesses (yes, I'm reading Sunzi just now...).  If the goal is to come out of the encounter with the best possible result we have to be willing to challenge the bad (step on the tiger's tail) but to do so with care and foresight.

So, the first two questions for the new year are: who are the tigers I will like be facing in the near future; and how, specifically, should I go about engaging them?

Baseball Yi Jing Wisdom

On Friday night I had the pleasure of talking with Jim Bouton, a former pitcher for the New York Yankees.  Regular readers will remember that I am a Yankees fan, a Daoist Yankees fan at that.  So, it was quite fun to be able to sit and talk with a guy who played with Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris and had some very successful years in his own right (he went 21-7 in 1963 and won two World Series games in 1964).  I should add that Bouton was in town for the Williamstown Film Festival, which screened the new movie, "Knuckleball," that Bouton discussed for the crowd afterward.  It was a fun night (thanks Sandra!).

I had to think a bit about what questions to ask Bouton.  Fawning queries about what it was like to play with Mantle seemed rather juvenile.  So I did a bit of research and, when the chance emerged, asked him: what happened to the Yankees in 1965?

Baseball fans know that the Yanks were a powerful team in the 1950s-early 1960s.  From 1950-1959 they played in eight of the ten World Series, winning six of them.  From 1960-1964, they played in all five World Series, winning two, in 1961 and 1962.  But then it all came to a crashing end in 1965.  That yes, their regular season record fell to 77-85 for a lowly sixth place in the American League.  A disaster.

Bouton joined the team in 1962, just in time for what would turn out to be their last World Series victory for fifteen years (1977 was the next).  For several years, he was a stalwart of the regular rotation.  He was arguably the best pitcher in the 1964 Series (his ERA was 1.56; Bob Gibson's was 3.00).  And then he was there for the 1965 meltdown.

His answer to my question - what happened to team in 1965; why did they fall so far? - was simple and direct:

We all got old at the same time.

There is an obvious truth there - both in general and in particular. In partiuclar, the 1965 Yankees were plagued by injuries.  Mantle and Maris and Howard were all out for prolonged periods.  Whitey Ford, and Bouton himself, had arm problems.  There were other issues as well.  After the 1964 season they fired the manager, Yogi Berra, and the team ownership changed hands. 

But Bouton did not explicitly raise these particulars, things he knows so well.  What he said, of course, is a much larger statement: we are all getting older simultaneously always.  That is what time and age are all about.  We often don't notice the gradual transformations that accompany the ineluctable movement of time.  Yet there are moments when the accumlated changes suddenly add up to a qualitative shift: we are not now what we were then.  It is at moments like those that it is also good to remember that what we are now is not what we will be.

1965 was one of those moments for the New York Yankees.  They had been a dominant team, a team for the ages, but then, all of a sudden, but not really, they were something else again.  It is reminiscent of the Yi Jing, hexagram 55, "Abundance," the Judgment of which is:

Abudnace has success. The King attains abudance.  Be not sad. Be like the sun at midday.

It is describing a moment of accomplishment and power, of fullness, rather like the 1964 Yankees.  But then is says: "Be not sad."  Why would one be sad at the very moment of maximum gain?  Because it cannot last.  It must decline, like the sun at midday.  One of the commentaries on this hexgram goes on:

When the sun stands at midday, it begins to set; when the moon is full, it begins to wane.  The fullness and emptiness of heaven and earth wane and wax in the course of time.  How much truer is this of men, or of spirits and gods!

Jonathan Spence quotes this passage in a discussion of the great Chinese emperor Qianlong (101-102).  And it seems to capture what Bouton experienced in 1965.  We all get old at the same time and, before you know it, the moment of our greatest triumph has slipped away. 

I wonder if Bouton has ever consulted the Yi Jing?

The I Ching: A Biography

Read a good book recently: Richard J. Smith's The I Ching: A Biography.  Composed by an accomplished academic, it is written for a general audience.  Smith provides a concise and clear background to the text and how it emerged into "classic" status in China.  He goes into some of the numerology that various Chinese commentators have applied to the text, and he shows how the book's influence spread throughout East Asia and, eventually, to the West.  I had known that John Cage used it in some of his music, but had been unaware of I Ching's significance in Mexico.  Interesting stuff.

In a larger sense, Smith's study feeds into my expanding interest in the movement of ideas, concepts, theories from one historical-cultural context to another.  This is important to me because, well..., I just did that in my forthcoming book.  How can we take ideas from Confucius or the I Ching and apply them to contemporary issues?  Meanings change. But translation, and cultural transposition, is, I believe, possible; indeed, it happens all the time.  But some meanings are lost in translation, while new meanings are created. Which meanings persist and how do new ones take hold?

Big questions, I know.  But Smith's survey of the I Ching's historical development reminds us that we should not assume that there was, somewhere in the mists of the past, a singular, coherent and authentic source of ancient texts.  We like to invent mythic progenitors, like Fuxi in the case of the I Ching.  But reality, Smith shows us, is always more complex:

Recent archaeological discoveries have shown, however, that there were several different traditions of Yijing-related divination in the latter part of the Zhou period, and that hexagram pictures and divinatory procedures took a variety of forms in different localities and at different times. (22-23)

Is one of these early forms more genuine or real than the others?  It hardly seems worth it to ask the question.  Better to assume and accept a plurality of practices and meanings.  And that has always been the case historically. Yes, certain forms of the classic texts were standardized as literary canons were defined and reproduced.  Yet even in those conditions, variation in interpretation and understanding continued. 

David R. Knechtges gives us a very good sense of this variability in his article, "The Perils and Pleasures of Translation: The Case of the Chinese Classics."   He analyzes translations of the Yijing into Western languages, beginning with what appears to be the first such effort by Philippe Couplet, a Jesuit, in the late 17th century.  But Knechtges also reminds us of the vast commentarial tradition in China.  For each classic text there has developed, over the centuries, various schools of interpretation and understanding.  Should we use Wang Bi's or Zhu Xi's edition when translating the Yijing into English?  Knechtges quotes Richard John Lynn:

In my view, however, there is no one single Classic of Changes but rather as many version of it as there are different commentaries on it.  The text of the classic is so dense and opaque in so many places that its meaning depends entirely on how any particular commentary interprets it.  (8)

Much the same can be said of most other pre-Qin texts.  Thus, there is no one "Confucian" point of view but, rather, a range of possibiities within a "Confucian" field of meaning.

Things get more complex when moving from one language to another.  Knechtges makes a good point along these lines:

Translation is in effect another commentary on the text.

When we translate we bring a text from one historical-cultural context into another historical-cultural context.  Though the distance from pre-Qin China to, say, contemporary American may be further than that between pre-Qin China and Song China, the problematique is fundamentally the same.  Zhu Xi lived in a very different political and cultural environment than did Confucius; he had to adapt the thought of his predecessor to the context of his own times.  Even though the linguistic medium provided a certain continuity, Zhu still faced problems of meaning and interpretation given the commentaries that had already amassed before him and the intellectual demands of his own intellectual millieu.

Don't get me wrong.  I absolutely recognize that translation can distort meanings.  Interpreters can make mistakes.  But that problem is not limited to the interpretation of texts across wider periods of history and culture.  Distortion and error and manipulation can occur with cultures as well as across them.  My contemporary adaptations of Confucius and Zhaungzi might be challenged by others who hold different views.  I excpet and welcome that.  But I do not offer my interpretations as ultimately and unalterably "true" or "authentic."  They are, as  Knechtges might suggest, simply another form of commentary on the texts. 

Friday Yi Jing Blogging: Predicting a Williams College Football Victory

It's been a long time since my last Friday Yi Jing blogging.  I return to it today with a local focus.  In my tutorial on ancient Chinese philosophy today I was referring to the Yi Jing and decided to consult it to demonstrate to the students how we might apprend a particular moment in Way.  To make it more relevant to the assembled students I asked the Yi if our college team, the Ephs, would win their first regular season game.  The response was generally positive.  

A bit of background: Williams College is a football powerhouse in the world of Division III athletics in the US.  Last year the team went undefeated.   Thus, there is every expectation that Williams should defeat Bowdoin in the opening game of the 2011 season.  The Yi concurs, with some reservations.

The oracle returned Hexagram 30, "Fire," with a moving line in the third position, thus tending in the direction of Hexagram 21, "Biting Through."

"Fire" or "The Clinging" (as fire clings to wood) is a doubled trigram, suggeting a certain significance in this reading:

The Judgment points to a positive outcome and offers an apt analogy:

The Clinging.  Perseverance furthers. It brings success.  Care of the cow brings good fortune.

In the context of a football team, perseverance would suggest that focused training and practice will bring victory.  But "care of the cow" tells us even more, especially when you know that the mascot of the Williams team is the Purple Cow:

Clearly, then, it would seem that "caring for the cow," in this regard, is a reminder to the players to focus on the team: if each member does his duty to the team and carries through conscientiously, a win will be secured.  The commentary on the Judgment makes this point more starkly:

Human life on earth is conditioned and unfree, and when man recognizes this limitation and makes himself dependent upon the harmonious and beneficent forces of the cosmos, he achieves success.

Not quite a stirring half-time pep talk, but the point is pretty much what football coaches have been saying from time immemorial: the whole is greater than any one part; the team must come before the individual; and when the individuals understand this and subordinate themselves to the needs and purposes of the team, victory can be achieved.

So, it looks good for th Ephs.  But wait... that moving line in the third place sounds a cautionary note:

In the light of the setting sun, men either beat the pot and sing or loudly bewail the approach of old age.  Misfortune.

The commentary explains that the "setting sun" implies mortality and people, as they contemplate death, can lose their focus and fall into excessive recklessness (live wildly until death comes) or depression.  

For our football players the "light of the setting sun" captures an image of their practices, down on Cole Field, ending in the evenings.  The warning not to "beat the pot and sing" warns against overconfidence.  They have defeated Bowdoin in nine out of the last ten meetings.  This should be an easy one.  And that is precisely the kind of attitude that can bring "misfortune."

The Yi is telling the team to take care of business.  Do the hard work of practice. Don't underestimate the adversary.  And then things will likely turn out for the better.

That message is echoed in Hexagram 21, "Biting Through:"

The description of the Hexagram reads:

This hexagram represents an open mouth with an obstruction (in the fourth place) between the teeth.  As a result the lips cannot meet.  To bring them together one must bite energetically through the obstacle.  Since the hexagram is made up of the trigrams for thunder and lightening, it indicates how obstacles are forcibly removed in nature.  Energetic biting through overcomes the obstacle that prevents joining of the lips; the storm with its thunder and lightening overcomes the disturbing tension in nature.

Sometimes, under certain circumstances, to prevail requires energetic activity, biting through.  If sufficient effort is expended in the proper manner, success will follow - the Judgment reads: "Biting Through has success."  So, if the football players do the hard work required of the task ahead of them, a Williams victory can be secured.

Go Ephs!

The Return of the Light

Happy Winter Solstice!  Instead of reposting my annual reflection on our fear of the dark (which can be found here), I thought it might be better to throw the Yi Jing (I Ching), which I have not done for some time.  Of course, it would have been more fun to be at Newgrange, but that wasn't in the cards this year...

I asked a very general question of the Yi, something appropriate, I thought, to the transformational quality of the day, when the pattern of our ebbing sunlight shifts and the days now get steadily longer.  What will the return of the light bring?  And, as usual, the Yi provided a fitting response, which, on my reading, suggests a generally favorable outlook for the coming months, as long as certain pitfalls are avoided: Duration (hexagram 32), with three moving lines, tending toward The Joyous (hexagram 58).  The bottom line: "...the independence of the superior man is not based on rigidity and immobility of character.  He always keeps abreast of the time and changes with it.  What endures is the unswerving directive, the inner law of his being, which determines all his actions."

Full explication below the jump:

Randomness

In class today, talking about the YIjing, I found myself suggesting that using the text as a divination manual, as it was designed to be used, confronts us with randomness and chance.  We throw the coins to generate a hexagram that captures our moment in Way.  If one coin fell differently, we would get a different reading, the description of the moment and the advice for how to act would be altered.  The text thus demands that we subject ourselves to a kind of random procedure to gain access to its description of our circumstances.  It defies reason.  It is something akin to ziran, which I like to translate, following Hinton, as "occurrence appearing of itself."  Way reveals itself to us on its own terms, not according to our prior expectations or theories.  Thus, a random process is a better method for peeking into Way than any rationally calculated method, or so believe the practitioners of the Yi.

One student pressed back a bit, wondering about "randomness."  It suggests disorder, and thus may at times have a mildly negative connotation in English, something beyond our ability to control or predict.  Of course, in the social sciences there is an understanding that randomness will fall into a regular patter, a standard distribution.  But that is not the randomness of the Yijing.

Even though the text of the Yijing is derived from careful observation of the regular patterns of nature, the randomness employed to gain access to the text - throwing the coins - is meant to exist as a unique and singular event.  It is not one in a series of events that can be measured but, rather, it happens in a moment and it belongs only to that moment. Indeed, it identifies a discreet moment of Way, which by definition (because of the randomly generated coin tosses) cannot be replicated (each moment of Way has some element that is different than any other moment of Way). 

Thus it is a randomness merged with singularity.  And it is a randomness that creates a  self-reflexivity. The person throwing the coins and consulting the oracle is participating in the fortuitous definition of a moment of Way.   It is his or her randomness, his or her experience and question that are drawn into that precise moment and that act upon his or her vision and understanding of that moment.

So, it's not quite what we mean when we say "randomness."  And maybe that's what makes it something closer to ziran.

Teaching the Yi Jing (I Ching)

We're getting serious in my ancient Chinese thought class this week, turning to the texts themselves.  I may be a bit unconventional because the first text I have the class read is the Yi Jing (I Ching).  Manyul mentioned (on Facebook) that this is a difficult book to teach,and he wondered about my experience; so, I thought I would blog it.

First, let me mention the order of the texts as I teach them.  I start with the Yi Jing, then move to the Dao De Jing.  The Analects is third, followed by Zhuang Zi and then Mencius.  And we finish up with Han Feizi.  The weakness of the class is that we do not read Mo Zi or Xun Zi (can't do everything!).  But I think this line up works as a first class in ancient Chinese philosophy.

I start with the Yi Jing and the Dao De Jing (I am assuming it is more common to start with The Analects) because I want to get the students engaged with a broad notion of Dao (Way).  Of course, the Dao De Jing provides such a notion, but I start with the Yi Jing because it opens the door to a broad notion of Dao, one that is shared by Daoists and Confucians alike, and it also provides some insight into the importance of contextuality in both Daoism and Confucianism. 

Truth in advertising: I come at Confucianism by and large from a Hall and Ames perspective (I know some will find fault in this); that is, I think their notion of Ars Contextualis gets at something important in Confucius and Mencius.  And even if the concept (at least the ars part of it - might be too active for an wu-wei mindset) may not be quite as applicable to Daoism , contextuality is certainly important in both the Dao De Jing and Zhuang Zi.

But contextuality I simply mean the orientation of understanding things in context.  As Hall and Ames define ars contextualis, the "art of contextualizing":

The art of contextualizing seeks to understand and appreciate the manner in which particular things present-to-hand are, or may be, most harmoniously correlated. Classical Chinese thinkers located the energy of transformation and change within a world that is ziran, autogenerative or literally ‘so-of-itself’, and found the more or less harmonious interrelations among the particular things around them to be the natural condition of things, requiring no appeal to an ordering principle or agency for explanation.

I don't want to go into all the implications of this idea here.  But if one is taking this perspective on Chinese thought, the the Yi Jing makes for a sensible starting point because it is, essentially, a tool that illuminates the immediate context the questioner finds himself in. It is a way of apprehending where in Way we are at a particular moment.

So, how to teach it?  I use the Wilhelm/Baynes edition.  I first have the students read the Jung Forward and the Wilhelm Introduction as well as the complete texts of the first two hexagrams.  I then teach them how to consult the oracle - it is a divination manual, after all - and then we engage the text through questions.  We also read the Shuo Kua and the Ta Chuan commentaries.  I realize that actually using the text as an oracle risks trivializing it.  But I emphasize to the students that my point is not to have them believe in some sort of supernatural powers of the text (though they can so believe if they want) but, rather, to use the text as it was designed to be used. 

My purpose is to use the Yi Jing to get at a general sensibility (as opposed to an explicated argument) about Dao.  The randomness and coincidence that attends to any use of the text as oracle is a direct experience of the complexity and fragility and spontaneity (ziran) of context.  I like Jung's Forward for this reason (even if it is dated with a few "Chinese mind" references).  His notion of "synchronicity" unfortunately has been appropriated by silly New Age types, but it is helpful in distinguishing correlative from causal thinking.  

But there are problems with the Wilhelm edition. Two stand out in particular

At several points Wilhelm brings "God" into the translation.  Now it may be true that the divination practices associated with the Yi Jing stretch far enough back into history that the Shang dynasty notion of a supreme ancestor-god (shangdi) is a relevant reference.  But Wilhelm's use of "God" comes a bit too close to a Christian monotheistic notion, which I take to be something unnecessary for reading and understanding the text. 

A second problem (and perhaps any of you who have read this far can help me out with this) is Wilhelm's seemingly veiled Platonism.  Take this passage (lvi):

The second theme fundamental to the Book of Changes is its theory of ideas.  The eight trigrams are images not so much of objects as of states of change.  This view is associated with the concept expressed in the teachings of Lao-tse, as also in those of Confucius, that every event in the visible world is the effect of an "image," that is, of an idea in the unseen world.  Accordingly, everything that happens on earth is only a reproduction, as it were, of an event in a world beyond our sense perception; as regards its occurrence in time, it is later than the suprasensible event...

This seems rather close to a notion of Platonic forms to me. It is not at all my sense of the Dao De Jing (all things in Way, being and nonbeing, are always present; there is no other world). I am not good on neo-Confucianism, so perhaps someone can enlighten me as to whether Wilhelm is here drawing on some Song revision.  In any event, the above assertion is not one that squares with my reading of The Analects or Mencius either. 

But, beyond those shortcomings, Wilhelm is useful as a first book (I find his translation a bit more accessible and easier to use for divination than Lynn's; and I keep Shaughnessy on hand as a historical reference).  This week my students should be getting some sense of Dao and Ziran through it.  I'll let you know how it goes.....

UPDATE: Fung Yu-Lan makes the connection between Plato and Neo-Confucianism, here: "Neo-Confucianism: School of Platonic Ideas."

Heavenly Balance

Roland translates a Chinese blog post, "Is the CCTV fire an act of God?" (I would quibble here, preferring a translation: "Is the CCTV fire an act of Heaven" - original Chinese here).  The post speaks to the horrible fire that engulfed one of the buildings at the CCTV site in Beijing on Monday (and thank goodness the building was empty at the time, or the human toll would have been much worse...).  The blogger raises several issues, including the worries of some Chinese people that the fire is an inauspicious beginning to the new year as well as some subtle criticism of the PRC's political system:

...There are many possible explanations about any emergency disaster, each with its own reasons.  For example, different people have different explanations about the CCTV fire.  Some people say that it was negligence in safety management, some say that the fengshui of the place was bad, and some say that CCTV has aroused too much anger.  These explanations are each reasonable in their own way, but ultimately I believe that this fire was an act of of the Heavens.  Why do I think that this was not a man made error in which safety rules were broken and the advice from the Public Security Bureau was ignored?  Why do I say that this is an act of the Heavens?

When a person, or a group, or a political party, or a people arrives at a stage that nobody can warn or stop them, the only thing left is for the Heavens to punish them.  That would be an act of the Heavens.  CCTV is such a group.  For certain artificial reasons, the position of this group was elevated above others because it can help the survival of a certain political party.  As a result, CCTV can have or do anything that it wants.  Nobody can restrain it.  Many people know this for a fact, including former CCTV employees who know what goes on inside.

The idea of punishment from Heaven is an old one in Chinese philosophy.  Mo Zi (I am in a Mohist state of mind this week) is especially focused on this idea.  This is from the internet encyclopedia of philosophy's entry on Mo Zi:

Within the core chapters, the Mohists consistently portray Heaven as if it possesses personal characteristics and exists separately from human beings, though intervening in their affairs. In particular, they present Heaven if it is an entity having will and desire, and concerned about the welfare of the people of the world, even a providential agent that rewards the just and punishes the wicked through its control of natural phenomena or by means of its superhuman intermediaries, the spirits (guishen). Finally, Heaven and the spirits are also portrayed as the objects of reverence, sacrificial offerings and supplication ("Heaven's Will" B).

This notion of Heaven is not the same as the Christian idea of Heaven: there need not be a singular God figure who is the ruler or orchestrator of Heaven.  Rather, Heaven can be a rather more diffuse sense of fate and destiny, though in the Mohist view a more specific will of Heaven (something more concrete or particular than the "Mandate of Heaven"?) is certainly in play. 

The blogger, then, is giving modern expression to an ancient Chinese sensibility of Heaven as a regulator or legitimizing director of the human world.  And he (or she?) goes further by incorporating a yin-yang notion of balance, something that I associate most closely with the I Ching but which is infused throughout just about all pre-Qin thinking:

A sign from the Heavens or an act of the Heavens conveys a message.  The message may not be understood unless one is respectful and humble.  Although I don't fully understand it, I have figured out that one of the aspects is "balance."  This is the minimum demand by the Heavens for humans: balance.  This may sound profound, but it is actually very easy to explain.

The existence of everything is premised upon a certain balance that exists from the smallest atoms to the microbes to the solar system to the galaxy to the universe.  In humans, the balance is for the yin-yang, the bones, the muscles, the brains and the limbs.  In a society, the balance is for equality of wealth and political fairness.  In economics, the balance is between income and expenses and also asset structures.  There is no need to say more about the balance in nature.

CCTV, and the CCP that stands behind it, has gone too far in amassing and controlling power.  The political system is out of balance, and the fire is a act of Heaven that is pointing to that imbalance.  Interestingly, my friend Allan all but anticipated something like this in a post from February 7th, "Ominous Signs from Heaven?". 

It seems that Heaven is trying to tell us something.  It may be something more than China and CCTV and the CCP.  It might be a message to all of us, everywhere, to think about how we might be out of balance with one another and with the environment that surrounds us.  I think it may be time to consult the I Ching...