I-ching - Philosophy and Practice

You are here: Home > I-ching > Composition

Composition of I-ching

I-ching is based on 64 short essays on the lineal figures named hexagrams. Each hexagram is composed of 3 trigrams, the Title, the Judgment, the Image, and the texts assigned to the lines. Each of these features is described below:

The trigrams

The trigram is the basic unit of the I-ching. It is is made of 3 lines that can be continuous _____  or broken __  __, meaning yang or yin. Thus, we have 8 possible trigrams, called pa-kua. Traditionally, the pa-kua are the work of the mythical forefather Fu Hsi, the one who invented the I-ching.

We present below the list of attributes for each trigram (R. Wilhelm):

The hexagrams

The hexagrams are also the creation of King Wen. The hexagrams were born by multiplying the 8 trigrams by 8. Thus, a hexagrams is formed by 2 overlapped trigrams. On the whole, there are 64 hexagrams that form the content of the Book of Changes. The first two hexagrams are:

The hexagram table looks like this [ click here ]:

The names of hexagrams

According to the tradition, the names of the hexagrams are the work of King Wen. The names of the hexagrams indicate different everyday occurrences or abstractions. Here are some examples: Marrying Maiden, Preponderance of the Great, Difficulty at the Beginning, Coming to Meet, Treading, Fullness (Abundance) , Conflict, etc. There is no classification or absolute rule to generate the names.

In many instances, when we use I-ching as oracle, the name of the hexagram helps us decipher the meaning of the hexagram as an answer to our question. For instance, the hexagram 6 is called the Conflict. If the oracle's answer to our question is this hexagram, it means that we are faced with an occurrence which can be described by the term of "conflict".

More about hexagram names may be found here .

The Judgment

The Judgment of the hexagram is also the work of King Wen. It is a short text immediately following the name of the hexagram (in James Legge's translation) or following a short comment (at Richard Wilhelm).

The Judgment provides us, besides a short reflection on the hexagram and its meaning, an oracular clue expressed in terms such as: "the perseverance brings fortune...", "it will be advantageous to cross the great waters", "the remorse dissapear…", "do not act in this way for three years", etc. It is not difficult to see in these clues suggestions for the opportunity or ill-timing of an action or intention to perform a deed.

The Image

This is similar to the Judgment , in both structure and function. However, it is no longer the creation of King Wen. Also according to the tradition, the Image of the hexagram comes from Confucius or, in any case, from some intellectual environment contaminated with Confucius' ethical philosophy. In the case of the Image we can also find clues for action - same as for the Judgment - but one can easily notice that such interpretation has a mostly ethical character, as if it were inspired by a behavior code of the noble man. Example of Image:

The Image is included in the text of the hexagram in Richard Wilhelm's translation. At James Legge, the images are included in the Commentaries ( Ten Wings).

^ Top

 

© 1999-2010, Way of Perfect Emptiness. All rights reserved.