Decoding the "I Ching"

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The I Ching is many things - and source of wisdom and strength to many people. As it should be.

But here and now, the first goal is to create a simple animated "clock-calendar." Interpreting the thing comes later.

I have rough grafix of the first two configurations, with attendant 64-hexagram table rearranged as binary table.

Now, I am trying to figure out how to copy and paste (can't) or export/import.


BRB

sofi

i am really curious about the book of changes or i ching does anyone knows how to get it?

thanks

"where to get the i-ching"

Any book store should carry a copy in some form or another...they even sell pocket versions for around 5-7$.

- - - testing - - -


Here is the clock-calendar - first configuration:




[edit on 2-10-2006 by soficrow]

Here is the Clock-calendar Second Configuration.

NOTE: Not all hexagrams are included, only those that correspond to the directional points indicated.

Here is the binary table of hexagrams:

Some quick NOTES:


1. The kua/trigrams/hexagrams are read from the inside looking out.

2. The inner circles move: lower to the right, upper to the left; each point on the inner circle "connects" with a specific point on the outer circle.

3. The upper circle (or "B" circle) is dark - and should be presented visually as white text on black.

4. The first configuration goes inside the second - and a third configuration (at least) is implied.


Once we have good visuals, interpretation likely should start with the inner, upper, and lower trigrams that are formed through the various alignments:

ie., First configuration, second position, inner circle (A), the alignment occurs W (inner) to N.W. (outer):

Lower trigram - Li
Inner trigram - K'an
Upper trigram - Chen


MORE to follow.


...Sorry - I got distracted with the technology and learning/taking new steps. Wanting to get past that to focus on the substance, but it may take a bit.


sofi

You're probably going to get to this, but I'll ask just incase. Why go counter clockwise and not clockwise? Is the starting position always the same or will it depend on the date, making it more like a calendar...to check the days "substance" so to speak?

After the beginning - there really is no other starting place, only movement.

But note:

Yin is always zero, and always the 'beginning' which allows/accommodates everything; equivalent to an 'even' number. The quintessential receptive.

Yang is always the highest/last number in a given sequence; always odd (ie., 1, 3, 7, 15, 63); encompasses everything that preceded it; implies growing and multiplying (to the next sequence). The quinessential creative.


The circles roll counterclockwise for the same reason that South is at the top of the "compass" and North is at the bottom.

BUT - The directional points change once everything starts rolling. Ie., As the inner circles roll along, South becomes West, North, East etc., relative to the outer circle.

...The question becomes, "How many 'circles' are there, and is the outer one stationary (if there is one)?"

The trick is to figure out where we're at now.

Thanks for all your help LordB.





[edit on 2-10-2006 by soficrow]

FYI - here is a meld of configuration 1 and 2, (showing key directions only) to indicate the revolutions. Note that only the outside circle appears stable - the two PAIRS of inner circles both move, altho at different speeds.

Can you tell how many revolutions is required for each circle to complete its cycle?






[edit on 2-10-2006 by soficrow]

This animation demonstrates a 64 count. 1st wheel completes one revolution before the 2nd wheel moves a single position. (8 revolutions of the first wheel equates to 1 revolution of the second wheel.)




Add in a 64 hexagram wheel that clicks once for every revolution of the second wheel (above) and then the count can go to 4096 or add in two more 8 count wheels.



Happy pondering

Yeah Regenmacher!

But, but...

Can you insert the circles (with kua) into each other, so that we can SEE the revolutions and alignments as they occur? ...The alignments are important.

My drawings really do follow directions given in the Ching - they are not arbitrary. A mechanical model would be built using circles inset into sunken shallow "wells," with raised lips on the larger circles to show the kua.



Each circle/face would need a bar enclosing the kua (pictograms,trigrams, hexagrams). I didn't try to draw an enclosure - can't do computer grafix, don't have a compass, have a 16 year-old who thinks she is free to take and lose everything - and had to use bottles, glasses, bowls to make my circles. Kind of a stone age thing.


Also:
1. The smallest circle with 4 kua completes 2 revolutions per cycle (touching the 8 points on the next configuration).
2. The mid-sized circle completes 8 revolutions per cycle (touching the 64 points on the next configuration).
3. The largest circle illustrated has 64 points, and the next would have 4,096 - as you say - and would take 64 revolutions to complete its cycle.

AND - I just noticed that your hexagram configuration is NOT a linear binary model. ...To "start" the clock, each of the 3 circle pairs need to be inset as shown, with the number progressions as shown ie., 0, N at the bottom; top being reversed, and aligned by 0, N bottom.



Am I being clear, or just making things more confused?



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[edit on 2-10-2006 by soficrow]

This I Ching clock-calendar is an old project of mine - most often set aside over the past 15-odd years. I came back to it (this time) because of a dialogue I was having here on ATS with 23432. That conversation was moving from a discussion about Sumeria's Gilgamesh towards I Ching alchemy.

Alchemy is not at all my main interest in the I Ching or Daoism, but certain elements of the Gilgamesh tale reminded me of Fu Hsi, the I Ching's creator. Firstly, alchemists probe both the Gilgamesh Epic and I Ching for 'secrets.' Also...


Gilgamesh and Fu Hsi: Similarities

1. Both were human-God hybrids according to the myths, and kings in their time.

2. Both ruled after a deluge-flood.

3. Both were responsible for re-building human civilization.

Gilgamesh was 'designed' by Aruru: Two-thirds of him is god, one-third of him is human. The Great Goddess [Aruru] designed(?) the model for his body.

***

Both Fuxi (Fu Hsi), and also Nüwa, are the god and goddess husband and wife credited with being the ancestors of humankind after a devastating flood. ...
A stone tablet, dated 160 CE shows Fu Xi with Nüwa, who was both his wife and his sister.

***


Gilgamesh is awesome to perfection. It was he who opened the mountain passes, who dug wells on the flank of the mountain.
It was he who crossed the ocean, the vast seas, to the rising sun, who explored the world regions, seeking life. It was he who reached by his own sheer strength Utanapishtim, the Faraway, who restored the sanctuaries (or: cities) that the Flood had destroyed! ... for teeming mankind.

***

...Fu Hsi was not a man but a god coupled with the Universal Muse, the Goddess of Creation, Nu Kua (Nuwa). Chinese traditions, according to Walter, date tales about Nu Kua back to at least 2500 BCE. The "gua" of the bagua are part of her name, "kua."

***

Details of the Nuwa flood stories clearly share commonalities with other Global Deluge traditions, and are worthy of note:

* global flood or calamity (Gong Gongs destrucion)
* destruction of humanity and animals (explicitly described)
* select pair survives calamity (Fuxi & Nuwa in most Chinese versions)
* select pair survives in a boat or gourd (Zhuang version)
* similarity of names (Nuwa, Noah, Nu, Manu, Oannes, etc.)
* rebuilding humanity after devastation(explicitly described)
* colorful heavenly object (5 colored pillar)

Gilgamesh and Fu Hsi: Differences

Gilgamesh ruled hard over his subjects, pushed them to produce and serve an 'industrial-economic' system, and left behind a lapis lazuli tablet celebrating himself and his life.

Fu Hsi shared knowledge that made his subjects economically and spiritually independent, and left behind the I Ching, the repository of his knowledge and wisdom, for human posterity.



I have been convinced for some time that the I Ching is a simple and elegant system for transmitting complex information, and that the 'key' to unlocking the door involves not just a return to the binary sequences, but also the clock-calendar configurations.

The 'circular-clock-calendar' presentation of the I Ching is seen commonly in the octagonal Bagua, and the 'dark side' and 'backward movment' is implied and illustrated most commonly by bagua mirrors:

The bagua (Pinyin: bā guà; Wade-Giles: pa kua; literally "eight trigrams") is a fundamental philosophical concept in ancient China. It is an octagonal diagram with one trigram on each side. The concept of bagua is applied not only to Chinese Taoist thought and the I Ching, but is also used in other domains of Chinese culture, such as fengshui, martial arts, navigation, and so on.

There are two possible sources of bagua... The first is from traditional Yin and Yang philosophy. The interrelationships of this philosophy were described by Fuxi (Fu Hsi) in the following way:
* The Limitless (Wuji) produces the delimited, and this is the Absolute (Taiji)
* The Taiji produces two forms, named yin and yang
* The two forms produce four phenomena, named lesser yang, great yang (Taiyang also means the Sun), lesser yin, great yin (Taiyin also means the Moon).
* The four phenomena act on the eight trigrams (ba gua), eight eights are sixty-four hexagrams.

[Granted, the octagon implies a star formation as well as a circle - but I can't go there right now. ]


...This all is not to say that other disciplines associated with the I Ching - like Daoism - are not important. Just that i want to work on the clock-calendar(s). [Calendars-plural because appendices to the I Ching indicate directions for making different 'clocks,' notably one involving only 60 hexagrams, with reference to 24 rotations.]

IMO, The idea of 'unwrapping' the I Ching as a clock-calendar need not detract from its esoteric functions - rather, the approach simply adds another dimension to the work.

It is the oldest book on earth and still enjoys astounding popularity today.
It is actually a 3000 year old digital computer.
Confucious the Chinese Sage used it.
It was the worlds first Psychic Hot Line.
One researcher believes that it predicts the end of civilization, in the year 2012.
It was the worlds first communist doctrine.
I believe that the Yin, Yang concept was developed from it.
I believe it works because it contains posthypnotic suggestions.
It's 64 ancient symbols are written in modern day computer language.
Many believe that this ancient oracle is actually a bridge to the spirit world.
The I Ching code may be a link to our extraterrestrial ancestors
The I Ching concept was 4000 years old when it was first printed, 3000 years ago

However, for those most interested in Daoism/esoterica and the I Ching, here's a quick (and dense) overview. It's long, but worth the read.

Daoist Alchemy in the West: The Esoteric Paradigms

In Germany, Daoist alchemy was first introduced through the publication of Richard Wilhelm’s The Secret of the Golden Flower (1920’s in German, 1931 in English), a small esoteric Daoist text selected from the Daozang canon, with a commentary by C. G. Jung. Wilhelm also published early German translations of the Yijing (with Daoist influenced commentary) and the Daodejing (1924). Wilhelm’s translation of the Yijing was extremely popular in its English translation (1950) in both Britain and America. [23] In 1910, Martin Buber published a German translation, with commentary, on the Zhuangzi (the other classic work of Daoist philosophy). Buber drew parallels between Daoism and Hasidic Kabbalah as shown in a common use of tales and parables of spiritual masters, religion as social protest, an ethic of unconventionality, common meditation-visualization techniques with a goal of mystical union. [24] From the 1920s to the 1970s, Martin Heidegger drew on German translations of the Zhuangzi and the Daodejing (as well as Zen Buddhist texts) as primary sources for his philosophical reflections after writing Being and Time. In fact, Heidegger made his own translation of the Daodejing. Concepts such as being-in-the-world, releasement, letting-be, his affirmation of worldliness and “openness to Being” all seem resonant with primary Daoist teachings. [25]

...Chinese teachers, like Master Hua Jing Ni, have continued to write and publish prolifically and many have started Daoist organizations in the West in the form of training programs, schools, universities, and institutions for advanced training in Daoist medical and martial arts. In turn this is complimented by a growing American interests in martial arts, internal alchemy, and Daoist techniques of healing and self-development. Students of these Chinese teachers have written works that explicitly tie Daoism to Western esoteric traditions, in areas such as esoteric cosmology, Kabbalah, magic, occultism, and the teachings of specific Western masters, such as Gurdjieff. Increasingly, Daoist esotericism is resonant with Western esotericism in “matching terms” to form a basic vocabulary that is not strictly Eastern or Western, but a bit of both. At this stage, the comparative synthesis is far from fully developed but shows a deepening integration by those who are practioners of both traditions. However, the emphasis for contemporary practitioners is far more on “embodied spirituality” than on any particular essentialist ideology; the goal of actualizing energies latent within the body seems to be the normative goal. The esoteric alchemical texts of physical transformation are far more influential in this period than the early classic philosophical texts because the latter texts are tied to spiritual practices inseparable from a concern with alternate perceptions at the somatic, sensate level. Daoism in the context of esotericism offers an entrance into energy practices, meditation, visualization, and martial arts that is far more grounded in body work and self-development than earlier Western interests. The “internal alchemy” practices written about by Western students of Chinese teachers are particularly tied to visualization and magical techniques highly congruent with many of the practices in Western esoteric magical societies.

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LordBasket u2u'd me with questions about the clock-calendar, related to illustrating/constructing a model. Here is my reply, which might help others too.



The starting point involves the "A" of each pair at the bottom, in the North position, and with the 'kua' in the sequences shown in the diagrams (altho I did leave out kua in some of the diagrams that should not be left out in the final piece).

...The starting point involves the 3 pairs of circles shown set inside a larger circle, aligned vertically, with the 'A' of each pair on the bottom, set at 0:

1. The first pair is 0-1;
2. 2nd pair 0-7;
3. 3rd pair 0-63.

The larger circle is 64 squared, has 4096 points: 0-4095. Maybe just the main cardinal points to be illustrated?

The "kua" (pictograms/trigrams/hexagrams) with their directions MUST be illustrated. ...The (relative) 'changing directions' are important to see.

Once this calendar is made - there are no calculations. The inner circles revolve, the outer remains static (for now). We will SEE the alignments, positions and 'changes.'

The seasons/cycles/relationships/(astronomical) future is evident in the alignments. Altho the 'cosmic cycles' do not preclude radical change. lol ...I know this is only ONE use/representation of the I Ching - but imo, it's important.


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I used inconsistent terms to label the configuration diagrams above.

Please note:


1st Configuration, 1st Position SHOULD read:

1st Configuration, 1st Position, before movement.

1st Configuration, 5th Position SHOULD read:

1st Configuration, 5th Position, 4th movement.



2nd Configuration, 1st Position SHOULD read:

2nd Configuration, 1st Position, before movement.

2nd Configuration, 8th Position SHOULD read:

2nd Configuration, 9th Position, 8th movement.


Sorry.

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...and justify her turfing this thread out of "Ancient and Lost." lol

I now suspect that if we follow the original specs, we might have the schematic and directions for building a Stargate.

Besides being a 'clock-calendar,' the circles-within-circles configuration also appears to be an astronomical map that describes space and time as a 'system' - and provides coordinates "to" and "from."

...Actually building a physical model is another task - but going back to the notion that the kua (also) describe alchemical formulae, the materials needed to build the thing are clearly described in the visual model. Each kua has a negative or positive electromagnetic charge, and when aligned will either attract, repulse, or be neutral. Once we have an animated graphic that integrates all the kua, and allows us to see their alignment and relationships, then we can analyse the materials.


Although the I Ching has been re-written and re-arranged frequently over time, like the Bible, I believe my work here is based on uncontaminated information that originated with Fu Hsi (Fuxi), the I Ching creator. The diagrams I posted above are based on directions in the I Ching. They are specific, and simple.


Okay. I admit I might regret posting this tomorrow, but I will blame the undeniable synchronicity that led me here. And get Jung to back me up.



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Well now that's pretty interesting, historically-speaking. I will have to check out your Gilgamesh references. I wouldn't want to open the gate, though. Is the point of studying it mathematically so that you can assist in reconstructing a gate?

Originally posted by undo

I wouldn't want to open the gate, though.

Now there's a topic for discussion.

Is the point of studying it mathematically so that you can assist in reconstructing a gate?

The study isn't mathematical - the binary involves very basic arithmetic. Beyond that are the kua as symbols suggesting different meanings and directions.

As far as my goal - I realized some time ago that the Ching contains directions for a schematic/construct, and since then have intended to 'build' it, just to see what it is, or where it might lead (philosophically speaking). Originally, I assumed it was a clock-calendar, based on some level of astronomy.

I made the Stargate leap only today, after 3-4 months of strange exposures to Stargate-ideas - ie., I wrote this off the top of my head in August, as a writing exercise - culminating in reading your thread here.


...So the recognition that the Ching contains a schematic is old to me, the notion that the schematic might be for a Stargate is a new idea.


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Well, if you don't mind, I have several concepts to share with you on this topic?

Also, I will try to explain how opening one wouldn't be a good idea, although what you are referring to may be different than what I'm referring to, at some level. Nothing is ever totally black and white - there's always the shades of grey inbetween and variations of degree. So you could be referring to one type of device that serves a similar purpose, and I could be referring to another type of device that serves a similar purpose but has a different outcome. One thing I learned about ancient history is, although some things may be quite similar, that doesn't always mean they are identical in every way and those differences can be the difference of decades, centuries and in some cases, millenia or even totally different in function, result, and so on.

Anyway, I had been studying the chinese connection to ancient Egypt, as I had found what I believed to be pretty conclusive visual evidence that the pharaohs had some chinese ancestory at one point (and maybe many points). As a result, I started looking for some textual evidence of this and found that Cush (the father of Nimrod) had been to China, and in fact, was the first king of China, following some type of environmental disaster that wiped out whole cities (typically thought to be the flood). I had also located textual evidence that Nimrod and his ancestors followed in the tradition of Enki, as gods of fertility, which incorporated Gilgamesh but didn't identify him as Nimrod - merely another of the deified hybrids who had taken on the role of the new god of fertility for his generation.

Nimrod, on the other hand, appears to be the akkadian Enmerkar, so if you can trace Enmerkar's lineage to Gilgamesh and the amount of years between them, you got yourself some timeline evidence and a working foundation for your Gilgamesh theory.

Btw, have you ever figured out what/who the President of the Four Mountains was? Besides the obvious "NSEW" reference and the polar star concept, that is. I think I know but its just a theory. And the answer to the question solves the riddle of what in the sam hill Cush would be doing in China when he is traditionally known as a post flood settler of Ethiopia.

Thank you much for this post!!! I have learned much! I didnt know much about this until I found all the very helpful links and information leading to even more information!! All I can say is Im glad I am open to learning about this