Character analysis

There are a lot of things you have to keep in mind when you investigate the character qian 乾 from hexagram 1. First, there is the problem of finding the right components which form the character. Your first impression would probably be that the character consists of the component on the left side, and 乞 on the right side. This idea would probably be strengthened by the fact that there are more characters with as a component, like 朝 or . The last character was written in bronze inscriptions like this (金文大字典, p. 2517):

And if you link this old form to 乾 you might be inclined to think that is the sun among trees or something similar and use this finding in your interpretation of 乾. But is not a component in 乾, we have to add the top-right part of the character as well, which makes the complete component (full form 倝). This is the true, and most meaningful part of the character 乾.

is often recognized as the earliest form of 乾. The online Dictionary of Character Variants gives variants of , including , which according to the 漢語大字典 (p. 1529-1) is similar to (p. 2222-10), which is the same as 乾. Of course you have to be careful with using such detours, but it shows that is the significant part in 乾.

To find some meanings of this component the Shuowen 說文 surprisingly put me on the right track. I usually hesitate to use the Shuowen dictionary, because it often gives fancy descriptions that have nothing to do with the oldest form of a character. [27-05-2005 See about the reliability of the Shuowen (and Wieger's Chinese Characters) the entries by kentsuarez in this thread.] But in this case the Shuowen proved helpful. It says about 倝:

倝，日始出，光倝倝也。從旦，聲.
'Qian, the sun starting to appear, its rays qianqian 倝倝. From 旦 'daybreak', as phonetic.'

The first part, 'the sun starting to appear, its rays qianqian' is an odd description of a character, and a Western dictionary would never get away with this. It is like defining the word 'walking' like "walking, the feet walkingwalking". But it should put you in the right direction: when the sun comes up the rays of the sun qianqian. Possibly this means that the rays of the sun get brighter and brighter, increasing its intensity while the sun is climbing higher.

At least two things in this sentence from the Shuowen are fascinating. First, the Shuowen speaks of qianqian 倝倝, and this reminds me of the only text in hexagram 1 where the character qian 乾 appears, namely line 3. Here it says

君子終日乾乾.

'The junzi all day long qianqian.'

Here we have the character 乾 repeated, just like 倝 in the Shuowen. This doubling of the character, and its place in the sentence, suggests that 乾 is a verb, the doubling also suggests continuity or intensity: it goes on and on. Richard Kunst says about this reduplication:

There is such a pronounced tendency in both the Shijing and the Yijing to describe junzi with one or another reduplicated expression that we may define the pattern "junzi X-X" or "X-X junzi" as a literary device, a kind of an epithet for the nobility.(The original "Yijing", p. 397)

With the description from the Shuowen in mind, we get the picture of a junzi who works on his position all day long, extending the rays of his influence.

A nice interpretation, but there is another interesting fact in the sentence from the Shuowen. It says "聲", meaning " as phonetic". This is odd, because is clearly different from . Is the Shuowen suggesting that is the same as ?

On oracle bones and bronzes is written like this (漢語大字典, p. 2174-1; picture on the right is after 楊英杰, "先秦旗幟考釋", Wenwu, 2 (1986): p. 52-56, as mentioned in James C.H. Hsu, The Written Word in Ancient China, p. 878; Wang Hongyuan 王宏源, The Origins of Chinese Characters ("漢字源入門"), p. 155):

This sundial principle reminds us of the sun 日 part of the component , as already mentioned in the Shuowen. There is a resemblance between and ; we might surmise that they share a common origin which points to banners. [18-05-2005 James Hsu confirms in a personal e-mail that 乾 might be related to a sundial.] Whatever path you choose, the meaning of banners in seems unavoidable. This is even more the case when we look at the old forms of . On bronzes the character is written like this (漢語大字典, p. 169-4):

The big 金文大字典 dictionary gives a lot of interesting information about 倝 (p. 5430). It quotes Xu Zhongshu 徐中舒 （1898—1991）, the late expert on oracle bones inscriptions, who says that 倝 is the original character of 韓 (also written as 𩏑) and 榦. In bronze inscriptions 榦 has the meaning of 'to support' (金文常用字典, p. 615-616). 韓 was the name of a feudal state around 1100 BC. which bordered the Western Zhou region and had to pay tribute to the Zhou. Ode M261 from the 詩經 is devoted to this state. A feudal state brings and receives support. But 韓 and 榦 also share a common meaning, namely that of 'railing of a well'. A railing is some kind of border. I mention this because it comes in handy later.

The 金文大字典 also brings to our attention an oracle bone character which has to do with banners & support:

Three men are supporting a banner. In all instances that are found of this character the pole (in Chinese also described with 榦) has shapes like , , or . These might be the precursors of the component in the bronze form of 倝.

In other words, gone is the meaning of 'The 日 sun rising behind the trees of the jungle', as Karlgren says (Analytic Dictionary of Chinese and Sino-Japanese, 299; quoted in Wenlin). and are pictures of banners, and if we want to find a meaning of 乾 we have to take this into account. This idea of a banner or flag in 乾 is already mentioned by Hellmut Wilhelm, who writes in his Sinn des I Ging:

The primary element in this character appears to be radical 62 (戈), which represents a flag pole. In the old writing it was depicted by a planted halberd with a yak's tail fluttering from it. It was the symbol of the commanding authority in the army. To this primary element two meaning additions ("Bedeutungszusätze") were added. The first is the word for 'sun', but not the sun as a heavenly body but as a light giver, a word we also find in the character yang 陽, one of the main principles in ancient Chinese philosophy. The second meaning addition is the character for 'water'. (p. 40)

In a footnote Hellmut thanks his colleague Erwin Reifler for his help in the analysis of the character. Reifler's studies of Chinese characters are not entirely undisputed, to say the least, but in this case he seems to be quite right, even if he regards as 戈, a character which in its old form is close to the old form of .

But there is another character which has a remarkable resemblance with the bronze form of . The character 岸 looks very similar, in its modern form, but also in its old form. It has several meanings, but the ones that are of interest here are (漢語大字典, p. 766-4)

• raised land that borders a river, lake or see (靠江、河、湖、海等水邊的高地)
• boundary (邊際)
• same as 犴, village prison (鄉間牢獄)
• metaphor for a high position (比喻商位)

These meanings are similar to that of 韓 and 榦, which share the meaning 'railing of a well'. The character 岸 adds to this a high position, as James C. Hsu said, "the banner was often raised high in the air, so that everyone could see it".

There is another thing which connects all the characters I have mentioned so far: they are all close in pronunciation, which might point to their common origin, the component :

乾 倝 㫃 韓 榦 岸

gan/qian gan yan han gan an

I do not have the proper sources to check how the pronunciation was round 1000 BC, and there is a big chance that it was different in that time. Nevertheless it is remarkable that today all the characters have at least the same final (weiyin 尾音).

Having said all this, it is difficult to come to a conclusion about the meaning of 乾 in line 3 of hexagram 1. My personal guess is that line 3 is a lamentation of a junzi: he always has to be worried about his position and how he can be of support to the king, and can get support in return. This explanation will probably not satisfy you and might even be dissapointing after this detailed exposé, but it is not my style to come with elaborated wild assumptions which are not 100% percent backed up by facts. And facts, well, they are hard to get in this field.

The Chinese character of hexagram 20, guān 觀, is most of the time translated as 'contemplation', 'observing' or something similar. There is nothing wrong with that, and even though 觀 has more meanings it is likely that in the Yi 觀 also means 'observe'. But a little scrutiny can add some valuable background information.

Guān 觀 consists of two parts: 雚 and 見. Most etymological dictionaries quote the Shuo Wen 說文 which says that 雚 represents the pronunciation 'guan', and that 見 gives the meaning 'look'. But according to the 甲骨文字典, 雚 is the precursor of 觀 (p. 979 and 408-409). It is more than a phonetic component, it definitely adds meaning to 觀.

雚 is rarely mentioned in Chinese texts, it mostly occurs as a component in other characters (觀, 權, 歡, 灌, 勸, 罐,顴 etc.). The Shuo Wen 說文 says that 雚 is a "小爵" (漢語大字典 4104.2), an ancient wine vessel with three legs and a loop handle. This seems to be correct, as Karlgren says about 爵: "Cup for libations or feasts; noble, nobility, dignity, rank -- cf. 尊; originally a picture, in the small seal altered so as to contain 鬯 aromatic herbs and 又 hand; now still more deformed; the cup had the form of a bird; 爵 and 雀 'small bird' are etymologically the same word, hence 爵 is sometimes used for 雀" (quoted in Wenlin). The fact that a 爵 had the shape of a bird, more specifically a heron, is significant here, because 雚 contains the component 隹 'bird'. (But I don't understand why Karlgren says that 爵 and 雀 are etymologically the same word, because according to the 甲骨文字典 their shapes are entirely different. But we will take that for granted.) The 吅 component in the character might represent the two knobs which are used to carry the vessel after the wine has been warmed. That 吅 can represent these knobs can be seen in the character 斝, which is also an ancient type of vessel which has these knobs (see here).

The 甲骨文字典 says that 雚 and 雈 (not to be confused with 萑) are exchangable. In oracle bone inscriptions 雈 can be the name of a sacrifice, the name of a place, of a person, or synonym to 觀 'look', or the same as 舊 'old'. Tsung Tung-Chang adds: " (variants ) is identical to 雈 = an owl with feather horns (according to the Shuo Wen HM), (...) 雚 = 鸛 = 'ciconia boyciana'. In oracle bone inscriptions it is used for the homophone verbs 灌 = 'pour wine' and 觀 = 'look at'." (Der Kult der Shang-dynastie im Spiegel der Orakelinschriften, p. 65).

The chance that 觀 has something to do with offerings is enlarged by the Judgment of hexagram 20: 盥而不薦.有孚顒若. "Washing the hands yet not sacrificing. Having captives (of war) looking up, which is in order". This text deals with offerings and sacrifices.

But what is then the meaning of the component 見? If 雚 represents the wine vessel (covered up 艹 because it is not yet used?) for the libation or the libation itself (灌), then what does 見 add to it? It seems as if it refers to the persons who are not carrying out the sacrifice, but are viewing (見) it. They are observers, and maybe their job was to look for omens which might occur during the service, as a sign of the gods. They 'wash their hands but do not sacrifice'. They only observe.

Hexagram 20 could describe different kinds of looking at the sacrifice, for instance, 童觀 in the first line could denote viewing the sacrifice from within a barren field, or from the top of a mountain which has all the vegetation cut down for a better view (for this meaning of 童 see 漢語大字典 2711.9).

In the Yi the character you 攸 often occurs, 32 times to be exact (2-0, 3-0, 4-3, 14-2, 19-3, 22-0, 23-0, 24-0, 25-0, 25-2, 25-6, 26-3, 27-3, 28-0, 32-0, 32-1, 33-1, 34-6, 36-1, 37-2, 40-0, 41-0, 41-6, 42-0, 43-0, 44-1, 45-0, 45-3, 54-0, 54-6, 57-0, 64-6). Most often it is translated as 'place', or interpreted as 'goal', 'do something' or another vague expression. That has always annoyed me in most translations: something mysterious is made of this you 攸. Wilhelm says for instance "It is favourable to undertake something". What is this 'something'? I assume more can be said about it.

The character you 攸 already appears on the oracle bones from the Shang-dynasty (ca. 1750 - 1122 v. Chr.). As we see it know it referred to a specific place, city or area (Jiaguwen Zidian 甲骨文字典, p. 336). According to my historical Atlas it was a area in the current region of the Fei Huang river, in the North of the province Jiangsu (see map). However, when it comes to the Shang dynasty historical atlases are not always reliable, after all there is no material at hand which says 'this place was there', which makes filling in the Shang map a bunch of guesses.

On bronze inscriptions from the Zhou-dynasty (ca. 1122 - 221 BC) the character also often occurs, mostly in two meanings. One meaning doesn't seem to be of interest to us, because in this case it is always used in combination with le 勒. It seems to refer to the bronze ring which kept the reigns of horses together. But this meaning only goes for this specific combination of characters, and we don't find this in the Yi. The meaning which is of interest to us is that of 'long (ago)', or 'far (in distance)'. On bronze inscriptions the character is often a synonym for xiu 修 or you 悠, and if you look closely you will see resemblances between the characters. If a character got more meanings in the course of time, making it difficult to understand which meaning was meant in a text, to add an extra component which pointed to the meaning the writer intended. On the Zhongshan Wang Ding 中山王鼎 tripod from the Zhanguo-period (481 - 221 BC), which was found in 1977, we find the character with the meaning of 'far'. We also know texts where you 悠 with the meaning of 'far' is written as you 攸 (Jinwen Da Zidian 金文大字典 p. 430).

I suspect there is a connection between the Shang meaning of you 攸 and the Zhou meaning of you 攸. During the Shang dynasty it was a specific location, somewhat far from the (last) capital (see map, no. 1 is the last Shang capital), but not too far (about 300 kilometres). The Zhou capital however was far more to the West (no. 2), and much further from the You 攸 area - about 700 kilometres, assuming the historical atlas is right. Maybe you 攸 in the time of the Zhou did not refer to the location You anymore, but was used more general in the sense of 'far away'. The Yi is supposed to be written during the Zhou dynasty, so maybe in the Yi you 攸 also means 'far'. Let's see what this gives us.

In the Judgment of hexagram 2 we read: 君子有攸往. Wilhelm says "If the superior man undertakes something...", Huang says, "Superior person has somewhere to go", Boering says "The student can undertake something". But if we translate you 攸 as 'far', then a (somewhat literal) translation would be: "The Junzi has far to go", in which we can see you 有 with a little enforcement, like 'must' or 'sensible, good to'. You 攸 seems to refer to the areas far from the capital, the outer regions at the border of the land that was under control of the Zhou. This assumption seems to be confimred by The Judgment of hexagram 3, where it says 勿用有攸往. 利建侯: "not execute/use far travels, (more) favourable (is it) to appoint feudal lords". In this case it seems better for the king to leave the far regions to helpers who do the work for him.

As said the character you 攸 appears 32 times in the Yi. Within these 32 instances we can discern 5 patterns:

1. 利有攸往: 24-0, (25-2,) 26-3, 28-0, 32-0, 41-0, 41-6, 42-0, 43-0, 45-0, 57-0, 22-0
2. 無攸利: 4-3, 19-3, 25-6, 27-3, 32-1, 34-6, (37-2,) 45-3, 54-0, 54-6, 64-0
3. 有攸往: (2-0,) 14-2, 36-1, 40-0, 44-1
4. 不利有攸往: 23-0, 25-0
5. 勿用有攸往: 3-0, 33-1

I see youwang 攸往 here as a journey to the borders of the empire. Wang means as much as "commence a journey" (Jinwen Changyong Zidian 金文常用字典; p. 197). In the bronze version of this character we find the component wang 王, 'king'. Normally it is said that this component represents the pronunciation, but in my view it could also point to the meaning: it is the king who goes.

The examples below give the idea that it is only good to undertake a youwang when at the home front everything is in order.

Pattern 1: 利有攸往
"Favourable to have a youwang".

For example

26-3: 良馬逐。利艱貞。曰閑輿衛。利有攸往。"A chase with good horses. Favourable to have a hard times divination. It is said, use chariots as blockade for defence. Favourable to have a youwang."

Jian 艱 means 'hard, difficult times' (金文常用字典; p. 1097, Jiaguwen Zidian 甲骨文字典; p. 1464). A divination was not only done to know what would happen, but mainly to decide what would happen. It was an arrangements with your forefathers. You take care of their wellbeing by bringing offerings, they make sure there will not take place any calamities. This is also found in an additional meaning of jian 艱: mourning about the death of (one of) your parents (Hanyu Da Zidian 漢語大字典; p. 3171). After their death your parents are capable of sending you luck or disaster, therefore you have to be assured of their support.

A 'hard times divination' could be used in difficult times (or after the death of a parent) to get the support of the ancestors. With that support, and with good material, it can be favourable to have a youwang.

Pattern 2: 無攸利
"No profit from the you". From the border regions comes no profit.

For example

4-3: 勿用取女。見金夫。不有躬。無攸利。"Do not use 'taking the woman'. The bronze worker has to be seen. Do nothing personal. From the border regions comes no profit."

Qu 取 mostly means 'take, appropriate'. In Shang it was probably also the name of a offer ritual (甲骨文字典; p. 292). That would make a 取女 a woman who is being offered, probably to get something. In bronze inscriptions was qu 取 Also een shortening for zou 郰, the name of a city (金文常用字典; p. 292). This would make 取女 'a woman from Zou', but this is unlikely.

Tsung-Tung Chang says in Der Kult der Shang-Dynastie im Spiegel der Orakelinschriften about qu 取: " ist identisch mit dem heutigen Zeichen 取. In Orakelinschriften hat es, außer der heute üblichen Bedeuting "nehmen", auch die Bedeutung "Kulthandlung". Hsü Shen erklärte die Struktuur dieses Zeichens met dem alten Brauch, das linke Ohr des erlegten Wildes oder des erschlagenen Feindes als Trophäe abzuschneiden. Daher bin ich der Ansicht, daß dieses Zeichen die Darbringung eines Ohrs als Symbopfer bedeutet." (p. 171)

勿用取女 also occurs in the Judgment of 44. It says there that the woman is zhuang 壯. Zhuang 壯 means 'strong, powerful', but earlier it also stood for the age of 30 years (漢語大字典; p. 428 ) . In the Li Ji 禮記 we read: "人生十年曰幼學，二十日弱冠，三十曰壯，有室." "In a human life the ago from 10 years on is called 'studying child', from 20 years 'young (but) with hat' (=adult HM), from 30 years zhuang 壯, this is 'marry'." An man was expected to marry when he was about thirty, a woman when she was about twenty or preferably sooner. A woman who was zhuang 壯 was too old to 'take', to marry.

見金夫: jin 金 is metal, but was in Zhou time mostly used for 'bronze' (金文常用字典; p. 1111). Fu 夫 is a craftsman, a soldier, a bureaucrat, or someone who does manual labour (漢語大字典; p. 521).

不有躬: bu you 不有 literally means 'not have', but in the Yi this is expressed with wu 無. Bu you 不 seems te be a verb, a action, instead of a condition: 'not be there'. Gong 躬 is 'body', but also 'personally', 'from/for yourself' (漢語大字典; p. 3808 ). Bu you gong 不有躬 could mean 'without body', but to me this sounds too weird.

The situation is here in such a way that there can not be taken a wife. This puts the survival of the family at risk. That is why first the bronze works have to be in order (ritual objects, gifts for the ancenstors). When this is not arranged you can not undertake anything. The outer regions cannot be of service to you (for instance they cannot serve you a wife).

Patroon 3: 有攸往
"Have a youwang". Have a journey to the border regions.

For instance

14-2: 大車以載。有攸往。無咎。
"A large wagon for transportation. Have a journey to the border regions. No misfortune (is being sent)."

Jiu 咎 means 'misfortune', 'blame', or 'punish the guilty' (漢語大字典; p. 608 ), but in Shang time it stood for 'misfortune sent from above' (甲骨文字典; p. 896). I found this adds a nice ring to it, that's why I kept it here. Beauty also has its merits.

Patroon 4: 不利有攸往
"No fortune in having a youwang". It is of no use to have a journey to the outer regions.

For instance

23-0: 剝.不利有攸往。"Stripped. No fortune in having a youwang".

Bo 剝 is 'too strip', 'cut in pieces', 'wear out', 'flake off', 'break down'. These meanings have something of decay in them. Also: 'remove with violent force' (漢語大字典; p. 346). In times of bo 剝 it is not profitable to have far travels. A youwang was used for inspections, but also to impress, to show who is still in power and control. But a king can only safely leave the home front when all is in order there. In times of bo 剝 that is not the case.

Patroon 5: 勿用有攸往
"Do not use having a youwang". A youwang is not the right means here.

For instance

33-1: 遯尾.厲.勿用有攸往。"Withdrawal at the tail. Disaster. Do not use a youwang."

Wei 尾 was in Shang time probably the name of a feudal state ('方國名', 甲骨文字典; p. 945). The character from that time shows a man or animal with a tail, and 'tail' is therefore the common translation. But Wei 尾 also means 'the mating of animals', and that would make the translation 'withdrawal during mating'. Nice thinking, but probably we are dealing here with a military action. Wei 尾 also means 'that which is not yet finished, the last part, that which hangs at the end' (漢語大字典; p. 967). This gives the impression that an army pulls back while the battle is not yet decided or won. Wei 尾 also means 'country border', which would make the translation 'withdrawal at the border'. Of course that is not good in a war. Disaster!

The usual Chinese word for 'friend' is pengyou 朋友. Both characters occur seperately in the Yi, and they both have their own meanings.

The old form of peng 朋 shows two strings of money. In the early days the character was used as a measure word for money, and in this meaning it is still used in 42-2. This character has more a business-like meaning, namely that of donor or money lender. Later on this was broadened to 'friends', but still with a business connotation.

The old form of you 友 depicts two hands which point in the same direction: a symbol of help, bonding, friendship.

Peng 朋 occurs 9 times in the Yi (2-0, 11-2, 16-4, 24-0, 31-4, 39-5, 40-4, 41-5, 42-2). 11-2 is amusing to mention here. It says here:

朋亡。得尚于中行。

Han Boering translates this as "Do not count on comrades. You are being honoured if you keep to the middle". But today 中行 (with 行 in a different pronunciation, I must add) also means 'The People's Bank of China'. If we read peng 朋 as 'money lender', then the translation becomes: "you lose a money lender, but will find esteem at the People's Bank of China'.

You 友 only occurs once in the Yi, namely at 41-3, and the context shows we are dealing with real friends here:

三人行。則損一人。一人行。則得其友。

"Three men walking. Therefore reduction with one person. One person walking. Therefore he gets a friend."

A threesome, it is always difficult. Before you know it you have troubles. Only when you are alone you will find your true friend.

When I was looking at the meanings of pin 牝, the Daodejing came to mind. Pin 牝 occurs in The Judgment of hexagram 2 (and in the Judgment of hexagram 30, but that does not concern us here):

利牝馬之貞.
"Favourable in a consultation for a mare". If the oracle is consulted to know whether a mare (pinma 牝馬 = 'female horse') is carrying a young, then this is a favourable answer: the mare is carrying. In metaphorical sense this means that this hexagram is favourable for all female matters.

Pin 牝 generally means 'female, feminine' (雌性的獸類，引申為雌性的), and this is how it appears in the oracle bone drawing of this character: an animal combined with the sign for  'woman', in other words a female animal. But pin also has another meaning, namely 'gully' or 'valley' (溪谷). Already in ancient times is hexagram 2 linked with the feminine, and it is interesting to see that the meaning 'valley' makes a connection with other texts like the Daodejing 道德經, where we also find 'valley' combined with the feminine. In chapter 6 we read:

谷神不死, 是谓玄牝.

"The valley spirit never dies, it is called 'the mysterious feminine' ".

In old books like the Da Dai Liji 大戴禮記, 'Notes regarding rituals, from Dai Senior', it is said: 丘陵為牡，谿谷為牝 - "hills are mu 牡 masculine, valleys are pin 牝 feminine". A link with the genitals is obvious. Earlier another meaning of pin 牝 was 'the part of a lock that receives the key' (古代鎖具容受鍵的部分). In the Liji 禮記, the Book of Rituals, we therefore read "the key is masculine, the lock is feminine" (鍵，牡; 閉，牝也).

Although the name of hexagram 2, kun 坤, appears for the first time in the Yi en therefore we cannot look at other literature that can give a hint about the meaning of this character, we could speculate that it's original meaning is 'valley'. The character consists of two parts, 土 for 'earth' and 申 for 'streched' (according to Karlgren, GSR 421a). This could refer to a valley, and we can add that valleys are often fertile (= feminine) because of the rain water that flows to it. I am not very fond of speculating so I'd better stop here, nevertheless I found it worth to mention it in my diary.

At 1-6 it says "亢龍有悔". Kang 亢 is often translated as  'pride, arrogance', but this is just one of the many meanings. If we look at some other meanings of this character we can adjust our translation a bit:

- 高 - high
- 舉- rise, go up
- 極，太過 - too (much)
- 強硬; 剛強 - strong, inflexible
- 遮蔽; 庇護- out of sight, hide

If we combine this with our dragon from 1-6 we get the picture of a dragon who without stopping goes up and up, and disappears out of sight (it is nice how sometimes all these meanings can be combined) . This is not an arrogant dragon,but a reckless dragon: a Chinese Icarus who overestimates his own powers and thereby will have hui 悔. Hui 悔 can mean

- 悔恨; 后悔 - regret, repentance
- 悔過; 改過 - correct your mistakes out of repentance
- 災咎; 災禍 - unavoidable misfortune
- 《易》卦有六爻，其上體即上三爻稱 "悔"，又稱外卦 - upper/outside trigram of a hexagram

If we stick to the image of Icarus, then I think the third meaning fits best. If you do not know your limits, or do not accept them, you will have unavoidable misfortune. Not from arrogance, but from recklessness. It are often the kind people, and not the arrogant people, who have to learn their lessons like this.

Some time ago somebody asked me for advice with a Yi Jing interpretation. The hexagram she threw was 63, with the second and fourth line moving. Especially the fourth line bothered me, and bothers is what I would like to share with others.

Difference

There is a world of differences between many Yi translations, and because no one is 100% right (or 100% wrong) I always look at the original Chinese text of the Yi. It is also a way of finding interesting things. This was the case when I looked at the fourth line of 63. The first sentence of this line is translated by Wilhelm as 'The finest clothes turn to rags'. But the Chinese text does not contain 'turn to', it talks about 'have, (there) are'. When I noticed this Wilhelm's translation didn't satisfy anymore. But of course I had to find something else. That's when the Great Search begins.

Coloured silk

The first character, 'xu' or 'ru' has basically just two meanings. The first one is easy: 'coloured silk material'. The second meaning has to be described. In the old days, when you wanted to pass through important mountain passes or gates, you received one half of a metal seal. At the gate or pass was an official with the other half. If the two halves fitted you were allowed to pass through. According to the Hanyu Da Zidian this system was also used during the Han-dynasty (206 BC - 221) with written silk which was cut in two. One such half was called a 'xu/ru'. Stephen Karcher uses this meaning in his (revised) 'I Ching - The Classic Chinese Oracle of Change'. But the use of silk for this purpose, and writing on silk, was not practiced before the Han dynasty, which means that this second meaning of 'xu/ru' is not valid here. After all the Yi is written long before the Han dynasty.

Clothes

The character is often equalled with another character which looks almost the same and is pronounced in the same way. This character means 'short coat' or 'jacket'. This is the meaning which Wilhelm used, and it seems to be the best meaning because it fits the context of the sentence, as we will see below. Combined with the meaning of xu/ru as 'coloured silk material' we get Wilhelm’s ‘the finest clothes'.

Leak?
In his Dutch Yi Jing translation 'De I Tjing voor de 21ste eeuw' ('The Yi Jing for the 21st Century') Han Boering translates the first character of 63-4 with 'leak', which makes the translation 'the leak is plugged with rags' (many more translate it like this - Cleary, Palmer, to name but two) . Han properly states that he is following Wang Bi (226-249) here. But where does Wang get it from? Nowhere in other old books have we found 'xu/ru' used for 'leak'. If we look at the translation of Wang Bi's Yi by Lynn, we can see what Wang actually does. Wang writes: "Xu (gorgeous clothes) should be read here as 'ru' (wet)."

(p. 541) What he is doing is interpreting: he interpretates xu/ru as ru, meaning 'wet' or 'submerge'. According to the Hanyu Da Zidian Wang was the first to interpretate xu/ru like this, it isn't found in earlier works. When this is the case, I am quite rigid: xu/ru cannot mean 'leak' in the Yi, simply because it was not used with that meaning in the time it was written. The second character means 'have' or 'are'. The third character means 'clothes'. This is a direct link with the first character xu/ru, which also deals with clothing. This link strengthens the meaning of xu/ru as some kind of garment. The fourth character means 'worn out'. Roughly translated this makes the sentence Beautiful/coloured clothes - have/are - clothes - worn out. In somewhat better English: Between the beautiful clothes are worn out clothes.

Metaphor
The sentence contains a little bit of rhyme. Many Chinese sayings contain rhyme, and often they consist of four characters. It is possible to view this sentence as a saying with a deeper meaning. When a new dynasty was established the whole apparatus of ministers and other officials was taken over from the former dynasty. Most men promised loyalty to the new emperor and therefore where assured of their position. It was impossible for the new emperor to replace every single person, better it was to use experienced people of whom you knew they were up to their task. And as an official you had the choice between cooperation or a horrible death. But the emperor was not mad (not always). Promising loyalty to the emperor is one thing, to carry it out is something different. The emperor had to find betrayers who were still loyal to the old dynasty and could plan a revolt. When the emperor wondered if his ministry contained traitors and he consulted the Yi about this, he might get the answer 'between the beautiful (=new) clothes are worn out (=old) clothes. Be careful all day long'. With such an answer the emperor knew what to do.

• one pair
• spring, year
• expression ‘duo tun’: is used for the possession of the five-coloured ‘gunyi’ ritual clothes of the emperor
• name of a person (for instance a diviner)
• name of a place

Nothing which makes us think of a flower bud, and the meanings surely are not close to ‘difficulties’. The meaning of ‘spring’ can be linked to a flower bud, but the rest of the meanings leaves us guessing where they come from.

• gather
• stationing of army troops
• obstruct, blockade
• garrison
• army unit of five men
• indication for ‘village’
• name of a person
• measure word for cotton

(Source: Hanyu Da Zidian)