I Ching Jijie Zanshu

Author: Li Daoping
Publisher:
Publication Date: 2005-03-01
Features: The Ten Volumes of the Collected Explanations and Annotations of the I Ching, written by Li Daoping of the Qing Dynasty. Li Daoping, styled Bianwang, also known as Yuanshan, and styled Puming Jushi, was a native of Anlu, Hubei. He was a successful candidate in the Jiaqing Wuyin examination (1818 AD). For over twenty years, he was engaged in compiling the Anlu County Annals. He was skilled in the study of the Han Dynasty's I Ching. In the Daoguang Jiaoshen year (1824 AD), he completed the I Ching Divination and Auspiciousness, emphasizing the hexagrams, which laid the foundation for understanding the Collected Explanations of the I Ching. The completion of this annotation and explanation occurred eighteen years later, in the Renyin year (1842 AD). The following year, in the Guimao year (1843 AD), he became the (Chief Education Officer) of Jiayu County. For anyone studying the Collected Explanations of the I Ching, this book provides great convenience. Before introducing its content, it is necessary to explain the origin and evolution of the I Ching and the Collected Explanations of the I Ching to understand the position and value of this annotation and explanation in the history of the I Ching.
The I Ching is an ancient text from the Pre-Qin period. The Book of Han's Bibliography of the Arts and Sciences states: "The I Ching consists of twelve chapters." It also says: "The way of the I Ching is profound, and through three sages, it has passed through three ancient eras. When the Qin burned books, the I Ching became a tool for divination, and its transmission never ceased." The three sages refer to Fuxi, Wen Wang, and Confucius. The three ancient eras refer to the eras in which these sages lived. Observing the content of the I Ching, it is indeed divided into three parts: one, the hexagrams; two, the two chapters of hexagram and line texts; and three, the Ten Wings. Together, they form the twelve chapters of the I Ching. As for whether the Ten Wings were written by Confucius, Ouyang Xiu in the Song Dynasty already questioned this in his Discussions with a Child on the I Ching. As for whether the two chapters were written by Wen Wang, Ma Rong and Lu Ji in the Han Dynasty discovered that some line texts, such as "Jizi's Mingyi," occurred after Wen Wang, forcing them to add the claim that "the hexagram texts were by Wen Wang and the line texts were by the Duke of Zhou" to justify their position. Moreover, whether the eight trigrams were created by Fuxi before Shennong is even harder to verify. Since the late Qing Dynasty, most scholars of the I Ching have focused oning the authors and composition dates of the twelve chapters of the I Ching. Those who pay attention to the I Ching writings since the Qin and Han dynasties and study their content are becoming increasingly rare. As a result, the philosophy of the I Ching is no longer understood by most intellectuals.
It was not until 1977, with the discovery of Western Zhou oracle bones in Fengwu Village, Xiqi, that it was found that the bones used numbers combined with odd and even to represent the changes of yin and yang. These have now been preliminarily confirmed as the "hexagrams" of the early Zhou Dynasty. Similar symbols have been found across the country, indicating that the three I Chings recorded in the Book of Rites were not fictional. The existence of "hexagrams" before the Western Zhou Dynasty is an undeniable fact. As for Fuxi's creation of the eight trigrams, it can be traced back to divination practices in primitive religion. The tools and methods used in divination have changed over the centuries. In terms of divination numbers, they evolved from the eight trigrams to the sixty-four hexagrams, and further to the use of nine months and six. In the early stages, pure numbers were used to represent the changes of yin and yang, demonstrating a deeper understanding of divination methods. Later, the hexagram and line images of the sixty-four hexagrams were combined with the hexagram and line texts to form the two chapters of the I Ching. Although it should not be mistakenly attributed to Wen Wang and the Duke of Zhou, the simple textual structure of the two chapters actually predates the Book of Songs. Most of it was likely composed during the Western Zhou Dynasty, and its original materials may have drawn heavily from historical facts before the Western Zhou. However, distinguishing between hexagrams and lines to determine their dual uses and compiling them into the form of the I Ching two chapters may have already occurred during the Spring and Autumn period. The Zuo Zhuan (Book of Zuo) records Cai Mo's discussion of dragons in the twenty-ninth year of Duke Zhao (513 BC), which mentions "using nine" and can be considered the lower limit for the completion of the two chapters. At that time, the I Ching was under the jurisdiction of the Grand Diviner.