Key Concepts of Fate and Prediction in the Yijing - Chao Center for ...

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24of things, predict the future, and comprehend vast quantities of space and time.” InShao’s complex system of reckoning, numbers in one sequence described aspects of thepresent or the past, and in a different sequence they revealed the future.Scholars of the School of Principle such as Cheng Yi resisted this sort of numerologicalsystem building. For them, the Yijing was above all a moral document, to be used solelyfor cultivating sageliness within and then manifesting it in service to society. In hishighly influential commentaries, Cheng steadfastly refused to see the Changes asanything more than a text encouraging right behavior, although in his privateconversations he was somewhat ambivalent about the numerology of scholars such asShao Yong.Zhu Xi (; 1130-1200), a towering figure in traditional Chinese thought, tried tonegotiate a path to understanding the Yijing that would avoid the moralistic extremes ofCheng Yi as well as the numerological excesses of Shao Yong, feeling that “Confucianswho talk about images and numbers give strained interpretations and draw far-fetchedanalogies, while those who preach [only] meanings and principles stray far from thesubject.” Fundamentally Zhu considered the Changes to be a book of divination; “what isdescribed in it,” he wrote, “is simply images and numbers by which to foretell one’s goodor evil fortune.” But he also believed that the ultimate purpose of the Yijing was selfcultivation,and that without sincerity and the rectification of character the work would beof no use as a divinatory device. Zhu’s understanding of the classic was thusfundamentally within the framework of the School of Principle. Indeed, this branch oflearning would later be identified as the Cheng [Yi]-Zhu [Xi] School ().Because of his interest in divination, Zhu Xi was more open than some of his colleaguesto certain ideas of Han thinkers such as Jing Fang and Yu Fan. For example, he usedJing’s so-called Eight Palaces (bagong ) system to explain how the eight trigramschanged systematically into the sixty-four hexagrams. And in an even more radical move,Zhu incorporated the Yellow River Chart and Luo River Writing into both hisIntroduction to Changes Studies (Yixue qimeng 啓 ) and his Fundamental Meaningof the Zhou Changes (Zhouyi benyi ) arguing that the culture hero Fuxi haddrawn upon the numerology of these two diagrams in laying the foundations of theYijing.Zhu Xi’s instructions for examining the result of a divination, like the rituals he devised forthe process, proved to be extremely influential over time. According to Zhu: “Any hexagrammay have all unchanging lines. In that case we prognosticate on the basis of the originalhexagram’s judgment, taking the inner trigram as the question, or present situation, and theouter trigram as the prognostication.” When only one line changes, “we take the statement ofthe original hexagram’s changing line as the prognostication.” When two lines change, “wetake the statements of the two changing lines of the original hexagram as the prognostication,but we take the uppermost line as ruler.” When three lines change, “the prognosticationinvolves the judgment of the original hexagram and that of the resulting hexagram, using theoriginal hexagram as the question or general situation and the resulting hexagram as theprognostication.” When four lines change, “we use the two unchanging lines in the resulting
25hexagram as the prognostication, but we take the lower line as the ruler.” When five lineschange, “we use the unchanging line of the resulting hexagram as the prognostication.”When all six lines change, if the hexagrams are Qian (number 1) and Kun (number 2), theprognostications of both are used. For other hexagrams, “the prognostication is the judgmentof the resulting hexagram.”Despite Zhu Xi’s extraordinary influence in so many realms of Chinese thought andbehavior, it is clear that there was never (nor could there ever be) any general agreement onhow to interpret the results of an Yijing divination. For instance, a number of commentatorsmaintain that if a hexagram has no changing lines, the diviner need take into account not onlythe judgment but also the Commentary on the Judgment and the overall Commentary on theImages. If any lines are changing, special attention should be given to the line statements andthe Commentary on the Images pertaining to those lines, as well as to the judgment, theCommentary on the Judgment and the overall Commentary on the Images of the derivativehexagram. Some Yijing specialists argue that regardless of how many lines of a hexagramhave changed, the derivative hexagram should be taken into account, but others maintain thata hexagram cannot be considered “transformed” unless three or more of its lines are either“old yang” (nine) or “old yin” (six).Furthermore, we know that some diviners emphasized judgments exclusively, whileothers placed primary emphasis on trigrams and trigram relationships, including nucleartrigrams. Still others focused primarily on lines and line statements, sometimes in highlyidiosyncratic ways (for example, the late Qing diviner Chen Maohou alwaysemphasized the fifth line in any given hexagram). A number of diviners paid specialattention to laterally linked lines in both trigrams and hexagrams; and some naturallyused a combination of techniques.Zhu Xi’s understanding of the Changes became state orthodoxy for much of the Yuandynasty (1279-1368) and for virtually all of the Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1644-1912)dynasties; thus, his opinions on the classic were powerfully reinforced by the civil serviceexamination system. Nonetheless, as had been the case with the state’s sponsorship ofWang Bi’s interpretations during the Tang and Song periods, Zhu’s views did not gounchallenged. Although many scholars naturally followed the School of Principle, somedid not. Once such individual, Yang Jian (; 1141-1226), who approached theChanges from the standpoint of the School of the Mind, was so hostile to the ideas ofCheng Yi and Zhu Xi that that he reportedly avoided entirely the term “principle” in hiswritings.Another Yuan dynasty scholar, Xu Heng (; 1209–81), was one of the most famousChinese supporters of the Mongols and a particularly prominent advocate of Zhu Xi’sthought. His Du Yi siyan (Private Words on Reading the Changes) is not,however, an overtly political tract. Rather, it focuses narrowly on the interpretivequalities or capacities (de ) of the six hexagram lines. In general, Xu’s approach is toelaborate on certain ideas suggested by the “Great Commentary,” such as the way linesthat occupy different positions can have a similar function (tonggong yiwei )and the conditions under which yin lines will fail and yang lines will succeed (rouwei
Page 2 and 3: 2repository of what has happened.
Page 4 and 5: 4GenJudgment: If one cleaves the ba
Page 6 and 7: 6divinations recorded in the Change
Page 8 and 9: 8immortality; Confucians, for their
Page 10 and 11: 10these commentaries are quite hete
Page 12 and 13: 12instance, the Great Commentary st
Page 14 and 15: 14GenJudgment: Restraint [or Stilli
Page 16 and 17: 16The so-called New Text (jinwen )
Page 18 and 19: 18these, Opening Up the Regularitie
Page 20 and 21: 20Thus, in virtually all of his com
Page 22 and 23: 22came to be attributed to a Daoist
Page 26 and 27: 26gangsheng ). Xu examines in parti
Page 28 and 29: 28Let us now look at an example of
Page 30 and 31: 30contemporary Chinese scholars, as
Page 32: 32offers us additional interpretati

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