Usually people study I Ching’s meaning through a Hexagram. They don’t even know the basic and the Soul of I Ching; therefore, have no insight of I Ching Study or the Gua itself. It is the Mechanical I Ching or Mechanical Gua or Standing Still Gua, and No Changing Gua because those cannot explain The Law of Nature or the True Universal Law of Changing.

What is I Ching – the Book of Changes meant?

I Ching comprises of 3 meanings, Never Change, Exchange, and Change – after all these changes taking place it will circle back to Never Change. Nature’s Law or True Universal Law of Changes, for hundreds, millions, billions or more years… is always changing but always the same as the pattern never changed. Let us give a brief example to make clear of the 3 meanings of Changes. For example Yang – man is always man and Yin – woman is always woman – Never Change; and that Man and Woman get to marry – Exchange (from 2 families – Yin and Yang) – later the Children come a long – Change. Then of course, Children born is Boy (Yang) will grow up to be Man, and Young woman (Yin) will grow up to be Woman – circle back to Never Change. That is the Nature Changes Law. Also, just like in a day has night – Yin and day – Yang, and the four phases of morning, noon, afternoon, and night… is like the children of a Night and Day, and these four phases also Yin and Yang. The next day the cycle repeats in the same pattern – Never Change. The Study of I Ching is about Yin and Yang, and the nature it starts with Heaven and Earth.

When we study I Ching, we must understand The True Universal Law – Never Change, Exchange, Change, and circle back to Never Change – The Circle of Changes. Once we know that then we can see what ordinary people cannot see, hear what ordinary people cannot hear, and feel what ordinary people cannot feel. We could use I Ching to our daily life, and we could write or own I Ching Text if needed, using our own words in our own language. We do not need to quote anything else but the original Text of I Ching, and we can create our own I Ching school of study. In contrary, we are only like a child learning how to read and write, without knowing the alphabet table. We have no foundation and no insight. We only know what we heard and read, we hardly know anything that we have not read or heard of. I Ching is a “Book of No Word”, no matter how people try to explain; its true meaning cannot unveil. Words cannot describe true meaning, just like the eyes cannot see itself, either through reflecting mirror or water... Therefore, what we understand about I Ching by reading, we only understand the reflecting of I Ching, not the I Ching itself.

Let us ask, “Why Hexagram 64 is “not yet fording, or not completed”? One explanation is Fire flames upward (the nature of fire), water flows downward (the nature of water), like the enemies, or a married couple about to divorce (outside they are hot, but inside their hearts are cold). Another example, when a person who catches a cold, and get fever, his forehead is hot, and his feet are cold.  

We know that Heaven came before the world exists. Then came the water, after water came light; then, the world exist… (if we read the first page of Christian Bible, we can also see the meaning of this). I Ching Matrix says:

- Heaven 1 creates water – Earth 6 water becomes;

- Heaven 2 creates fire – Earth 7 fire becomes;

- Heaven 3 creates wood – Earth 8 wood becomes;

- Heaven 4 creates metal – Earth 9 metal becomes;

- Heaven 5 creates earth – Earth 10 earth becomes.

 Number 5 is the Creation number of this world, a combination of number 3 and 2 (3 + 2 =5) and the center of this world. Therefore, if we take 1 + 5 = 6 water becomes; 2 + 5 = 7 fire becomes; 3 + 5 = 8 wood becomes; 4 + 5 = 9 metal becomes; and 5 is earth itself, so 5 + 5 = 10 earth becomes. Earth created the other 4 elements as we can see water, fire, wood, and gold come from earth. I Ching Matrix consist all combinations to the answers of this world. I Ching the Book of Changes comes from the I Ching Matrix Numbers, not the other way around.

From the I Ching Matrix below we know that Water (1) is first, then, comes fire (2).  Hexagram 64: Fire on top of water, as we know fire (on top – Heaven) does not come before water (at bottom – Earth), so it must be Hexagram 64 which “not yet fording, or not completed”. Heaven on top, Earth at the bottom, Water on top (heaven) and Fire at the bottom is Hexagram 63 既濟 (jì jì), “after completion”. It already completed. We can see the meaning of 既濟 (jì jì), "Already Fording", already completed or done from the Magic Matrix, too. The Image for Hexagram 63 is a water heater, or a pot on a stove – cooking water, cooking food…

Original Matrix Image – He Tu

South on top

 

North at the bottom

We can translate He Tu into number like following:

2	7	4
3	5	9
8	1	6

If we count the dots of He Tu (Diagram), we will have the number as the bottom I Ching Matrix number. That is what the He Tu and I Ching Matrix Number look like.

Saint Fu Shi the creator of I Ching followed He Tu and created the Pre-Heaven 8 Trigrams:

 

Lou Shu Diagram came later.

South on top

North at the bottom

The most important Diagram about I Ching is Lou Shu Diagram. Eastern Asian uses it to unveil the world’s secret. The Easterners call it the Tortoise Diagram; it looks like a turtle if you have a fare imagination. The Post-Heaven Matrix of I Ching comes from Tortoise Diagram, which use for all I Ching School of Study.

4	9	2
3	5	7
8	1	6

It does not matter which direction we add the 3 numbers always equal to 15. As compare to the He Tu Diagram, we see that number 4 and 9 metals moving from Southwest and West to Southeast and South, which consider fire region (hot) part of the world. On the other hand the number 2 and 7 fires move to Southwest and West, the metal region part of the world. Let us just try to understand why these numbers move and they make sense. In nature Metal needs heat to melt or alter it to put it to different use. Just like our lungs (metal) is always weak in the wintertime, it is when metal comes to it weakening cycle. We have to keep warm (heat) or else we will catch a cold and cough. Coughing and sneezing are because of weak lung. Metal needs fire, which is why the fire numbers 2, 7 moves to West (metal region) and metal number move to the South. 

Adopted the Tortoise Digram (Lou Shu), King Wen created the Post-Heaven 8 Trigrams:

King Wen of the Zhou Dynasty reasoned: "The world began when heaven and earth mated and gave birth to everything in the world. Heaven is Qian-gua ☰, and the Earth is Kun-gua ☷. The remaining six gua are their sons and daughters".

That is all

☴

☶ Hexagram 53 漸 (jiàn) is "development (gradual progress)”, progressing, slowly develop or progress, next to, close by, neighbor hood, neighbor, accept to wait, relax, taking time, chill out, calm, . The inner Gua is ☶ (艮 gèn) bound = (山) mountain, blockade, ending, stop, problem, stand still, resting, hardship, barrier, Northeast, month of the Water Buffalo (12) or Tiger (1), or the year of Water Buffalo or Tiger, youngest son… The outer Gua is ☴ (巽 xùn).

                 

Why is it slowly developing or gradually progressing?

The Judgment said, “DEVELOPMENT. The maiden. Is given in marriage…”. The Image said, “On the mountain, a tree: The image of DEVELOPMENT…”.

Marriage is much different from 2-3 thousands of years ago. First daughter is old enough to get marry, but in the old day, the man cannot meet the bride that he wants to marry like now. It will take him many times bringing presents after presents to come and asking to marry her without seeing her face (3-5 times is normal). When we see the Image of the Xun ☴ outer gua we see a man trying to infiltrate to get closer to his new bride, but hard to do so because of the barrier, he cannot see her. Gen (☶) inner gua is the internal barrier – a wall, stopping him from seeing her, but she stay behind the wall and peeks at him through the Yin line of ☴ Xun (an opening). 

The Image of “a tree, on the mountain”, Yin wood (☴) growing on a rocky mountain (☶) the hard rock hurts the wood, it can grow but slowly. However, not too many people understand I Ching just because they do not have clear images in their minds – They cannot relate. Most people learning I Ching do not know the images and numbers; therefore, they only learn the words of I Ching, not true meaning. Just like learning math with all words, and never learn the numbers. Doing math in words is not easy.

Let us look in modern Image that would make it much easier for everyone to understand. The image of a person climbing mountain. Mountain at the bottom, Legs and Hands on top, means that a person want to climb the mountain have to use their arms and legs to hold on and climb. Climbing mountain is a slow procedure, and making progress gradually. If we turn the Gua upside down it would be the Hexagram 18 '蠱' (gŭ). Hexagram 18 means “Correcting”, “work on what has spoiled (decay)”, “long-standing malpractice”, falling apart, going down, hurricane, tornado, overthrown (like Egypt and Libya Protest). The inner gua is ☴ (巽 xùn) ground = (風) wind, and its outer gua is ☶ (艮 gèn) bound = (山) mountain.

We know that going up the hill is hard, but going down is fast. Earning respects from people are hard and might take us all our lives to do it; however to lose it just one incident, like Clinton on Monica case, or Nixon on Water Gate. (This example use to clear my point, not a comment).