HEXAGRAMS (View pdf for the visual images of the hexagrams)
Derived 31 Primary 49 Nuclears 44
(49,1 – 31 – 44)
Trigrams
*Below, Inner: : Fire Clarity, warmth, connection, passion
Below Derived : Mountain Meditation, stillness, dignity, fruition
Above, Outer: : Lake Joy, soft, reflections, beauty, imagination
Below Nuclear: : Wind Patience, steps, penetration, humble base
Above Nuclear: : Heaven Creativity, power, Heaven, leadership
* Unbalanced, changing
YI TEXT (Jing Nuan Wu):
#49: Changing Skin: Ge repeats the charge given the reader by the entire Yijing. Change! In one’s shaman personae, the individual changes his being by assuming the attributes of another, ie by donning the skin of an animal. The ideogram ge is a picture of a raw animal skin stretched out. Ge is the costume of change, for it is necessary to wear a different guise to penetrate other levels of reality. The skin of a tiger will help you act like a tiger. This hexagram emphasizes that costumes are tools of oracular intervention. Appearance can open the door to change.
The gua ci, “Ge: One’s own day, thus confidence. The origin, a sacrificial offering, profit the divination. Regrets vanish.” *
#31: Influence or Move: Voluntary or involuntary movements of the body may be viewed as portents, and may explain the commentary on the yao ci. In Chinese medical theory, the body has a network of energy channels in addition to the vascular and neural systems. An interruption or change in the qi energy flow would manifest itself in body movements, and form a body language understood by shaman, doctor, and individual.
The heart radical is the key to this hexagram. It points to emotion and passion and their influence on the body. The instruction is to know thyself — through portents in mind, heart, and body — before taking action.
The gua ci, “Xian: A sacrificial offering, profit in the divination. To take a wife, good fortune.”
Changing Lines:
9-1 The first line: “Bound, using the yellow bull’s skin.” The shaman draped in the skin of a totem animal—in this instance a yellow bull — signals and induces change. The yellow bull portrays great animal power. The ideogram gong, “bound,” intimates the idea of strengthening. The recipient is strengthened by a new, formidable dress.
9-1: Thunder: “Warns against taking steps too early. Dare to wait, but do not lose sight of the objective. Thunder wants rapid progress regardless of the consequences. Sometimes quick and firm action is good, but it would be foolhardy at this stage.” [Harmen]
* I like the Wilhelm-Baynes translation here: “REVOLUTION. On your own day you are believed. Supreme success, furthering through perseverance. Remorse disappears.”
SUMMATION:
IMAGE
Pleasing, colourful images within a beautiful lake
DECISION
Change identity by accessing ancestral stillness; rouse inner fire blazing forth as images moving readers with delight. Patient penetration into essential detail summons primordial creative power with far-reaching influence.
Poem
The yellow bull buffalo
The Native Shaman
Primordial Power
not my own and not not my own
but all and everyone’s
revealed to all
without guilt, shame, fear or self centredness.
Let lovely lake reflections
Mirror the luminous compassionate fire within.
WRITE!
Note: In more ordinary language: it’s time for a change. This series of Articles is now over. Now will follow a series of short stories, vignettes, imaginings, subject matter no longer tethered to so-called ‘reality’ – something which in any case is no more than a group fiction.
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