Gua 1 ~ Qian: Initiating/Creating

Gua 1; Qian above, Qian below. 111 111

Explanation of Qian: Heaven is the ultimate, the unknowable, but also the great benefactor. Heaven reigns its benefits upon Kun, the earth. The ancient Chinese believed that the earth was at the center of the universe, and therefore the principle object of its attention.

Even with our present knowledge are the heavens any less revered by so-called moderns than by the ancients? For me, all I need do is go out on a cloudless night and stand amazed and exceedingly small in view of the panoply spread before me.

I found the following at: http://www.anton-heyboer.org/i_ching/index.html. This site is a fun free site, amongst several, which you may access. The following is taken from that site.

1 Heaven

Creation
Eminent - expansion
Harvest - determination

The great image says:
Heaven moves: firmness.
A noble one owing to his own strength never ceases

In the early morning the rays of the sun touch the trees and plants, still wet from the night. They evaporate, as if they breathe. As if spirits with faint rainbow colors are dancing around the trunks of the trees.

The mists travel down along the slopes, toward the valley, where they collect and cover everything. But not for long, when the sunlight reaches down, they disappear.

Every morning the light wakes up the earth, brings it back to life. Every new day is a new creation. Heaven reaches down to the earth, and the earth responds, brings forth, makes life.

Initial 9 : Submerged dragon. No employ.
Not acting is not enough when it is not the time for acting; the mind has to be without acting. Like the stag, he does not know about rut outside the mating season. Every action needs rest like seeds need winter. Only then one can react to season, time, Dao and find action at the right moment. The most important part of any action is knowing when the time says not to act.
(Changes to hex. 44)

9 at 2: The dragon appears in the field. Harvest: seeing great people.
Whatever one shows or does or even thinks should be genuinely and truly himself. Only oneself appearing is shining. Associate with people of value, good and bad are both contagious.(Changes to hex.13)

9 at 3: A noble man is the whole day creative. In the evening he is alert like in danger. Without fault. Go ahead if Dao goes ahead, turn back if Dao turns back. Stay in tune with the universe, nobody can ever go another way than Dao and still keep his strength and good fortune.
(Changes to hex.10)

9 at 4: Somehow dancing in the abyss. Without fault.
To find new ideas, dare to dance in the abyss and depart from certainty. Inspiration isn't found within fixed rules, old habits or formalities. Creativity isn't making something happen, it is allowing it to happen through you and the tools you work with.
(Changes to hex.9)

9 at 5: Flying dragon in heaven. Harvest: seeing great people.
When the creative spirit becomes visible, it influences everyone who has a spark of it. One's own thoughts and behavior and everybody who is able to see. Associate with valuable people, who are able to give or receive value.
(Changes to hex.14)

Above 9: Overbearing dragon. There is regret.
In the realm of the spirit, one can only follow obediently the universal laws. What deviates from them, is always wrong. If man tries to lead according to his own human laws, he shuts the door on universe, and life will fail.
(Changes to hex.43)

Beginning with Qian it might also be helpful to consider
the underlying nature of all the double-tri-hexagrams:

Qian Dui Li Sun Zhen Kan Gen Kun

1 - 58 - 30 - 57 - 51 - 29 - 52 - 2

This follows the "organic" progression which
I have found to be inherent to the trigrams
111 011 101 110 100 010 001 000
Which as I have demonstrated, will 'flow' the
through the same progression when reversed.

Of perhaps notable interest, is what happens
when the 8 hexagrams above are inverted.

I have had personal experience with this hexagram in some diverse settings.

In a quickie reading, it can be as simple as "Yes! Go for it!"

In some ways it is a bit "The Force is with you Luke". That is, the underlying, not visible but driving, energies of the universe are flowing in the same direction as you and you are being carried along with them. Think of it like the tao, a giant flowing river. And you are swimming with it. it adds its great energies to yours, and you are following The way.

It is potential energy, the water raised in the town water tower that provides the pressure to keep everything flowing, but unseen, only felt.

In some ways it is the Aces in the tarot. Everything is lined up, ready to go. But not yet visible in the world, energy you can tap and through Kun, make visible, tangible.

But, as the lines mention, timing is very important. Act too soon, and you will be crushed. Act too late, and you lose the opportunity. Don't go far enough, and it won't be satisfactory. Go too far and give in to pride, well, see the last line. The last line often (not always) shows what happens when you go too far with this force.

Don't think, feel, then ACT.

a few more thoughts

This is of course the first hexagram and hence the Prime Mover. The Initiator.

It does pair with hexagram 2, and between them that which was just concept becomes form. In earthly terms the male provides the sperm, which is nothing in itself but potential. The female provides the egg and the womb to create an actual being.

But, hexagram 1 is like that which exists before form, almost in religious terms. Or like Jung's archetypes, which are pure potential and can be made form is many ways but all coming from the same source.

One example is the crossing of the Rubicon. Crossing a river is an archetype, but it is also some water flowing along a lower area of earth. But, unconscious knowledge of the archetype causes the motion in the minds of men. On this hopefully fertile ground, then something can come into being, through the use of other energies, often Kun. Sometimes you don't make a decision until something that is both concrete and symbolical happens.

I think another think to note in this hexagram is the progression through the lines. It is true in many hexagrams but it seems to achieve its purest form here. I think it is in Wilhelm's book where he describes it as rising as if stepping on the backs of dragons. Some steps with warnings and cautions attached, others urging that the path is clear and to fly now.

Sometimes the progression seems to be in time, and sometimes in "time", as in, the time is right. That is, sometimes, certain steps have to be followed in an orderly way and sometimes the circles and wheels form a door you were looking for and now is when you can step through it.

Oceans 11

I've been intuitively connecting to this as the oceans...
not the heavens up in the clouds but the ultimate seas.
Water is our next basic need after Air, and from the air
above comes falling the rain, flowing in an endless cycle.

nocturne

In a dream, Qian rises from his bed, and goes to a mirror.
'You are dreaming' says Qian's reflection, in a clear voice.
He is about to ask his reflection a question, but awakens.

Kunst's Notes

Here are the first three pages of Richard Kunst's notes typed up... Sorry, its too large. If you want what I have now, just let me know.

The Dragons in Hex 1

Dragons play an important part of hex 1, qian.... kind of like "Red sky at dawning, sailor take warning." But what does it mean? There can be a lot of ambiguity, especially when translating these common sayings from one language to another. This from R. Rutt, Zhouyi, the Book of Changes:

1 qian/active

Supreme offering.
Favourable augury.

Base (9) A dragon lies beneath the lake.
No action take.

(9) 2: Lo, on the fields a dragon hides
To meet with great men well betides.

(9) 3: A prince is active all day long
and after dark still stays alert.
DANGEROUS.
NO MISFORTUNE.

(9) 4: Sometimes it leaps above the tides
NO MISFORTUNE.

(9) 5: A dragon through the heavens glides.
To meet with great men well betides

Top (9): A dragon soaring away.
There will be trouble.

All (9): See dragons without heads.
AUSPICIOUS

What are these dragons? Kunst's notes state,
-RK: On dragons: dragons have been sighted Wong yinghi, as well throughout Chinese history, and belief in the existence continued into the present century. According to one survey at the beginning of the 20th century, when a hundred people were asked whether they believed that dragons exist, 82 replied that they did. (Nagel’s Encyclopaedia - Guide: China pp. 170-1 entry, which contains an excellent summary of what it refers to as the “popular zoology” of dragons.) In fact Gao (Heng) himself treats long as regular amphibious animals.

W.B. 1.1.2 “Do Not Act.”

He goes on to state that the dragons are asterisms, i.e., heavenly visions.

-Wen Yiduo “Leizuon” p. 46: The sex references to long ’dragon’ in the Qian hex. Line texts in 1.1, 1.3, 1.5, 1.6, 1.7 and the explicit one in 1.4 all concern the dragon asterism, the green, or gloucous, (more precisely), Dragon of the Eastern Palace (or esoteric). This constellation includes the three stars of “Heart” Xin lunar lodge, which rises after dusk in the southeast in spring-summer and sets after dusk in the southwest in fall-winter. In 1.1 the phrase, “Hidden dragon” like 1.4 “Or it leaps into the deep”, refers to the dragon at the autumnal equinox, as in the Slhouwen remark, “The dragon ….. ascends to the heavens of the vernal equinox and is submerged in the deep at the autumnal equinox. Since Wen has identified the Hex name as probably for the Northern Dipper (see 1.3) he argues another name (p. 48) based on
1.13 and later works that the Dipper stands for a chariot and the Dragons are the heavenly team of horses which draw it. The line texts thus serving to elaborate the meaning of the hexagram image. The statement in the Tuan commentary houses six dragons so as to drive Heaven as indicated to Wen that the author of the Tuan was “chariot.” Aware also of the astrological significance of the live texts of hex.1.

-Li Jingchi supports Wen Yiduo’s astrological interp. Of all dragons except in 1.4 where the you states diviners have drawn on the results of astrology in order to reinforce the strength and increase the accuracy of their prognostication.

- (“Beonzuon” Tanyuon pp. 197 -198). The astrological symbolism of the four lines 1.1, 1.2 ond 1,5m 1,6 us a case if intentional symmetry as a result of editing. Line 1.1 balances 1.6, as 1.2 balances 1.5 working for an extremely orderly text. Lines 1.3 and 1.4, on the other hand form a pair with non-astrological, human topics. See 1.4.

-Li’s Wuzhou” “Tonyuou p. 388, also refers to astrological references quoting 1.1, etc. zui zhi zsi parallels, but 2.6 different (q.u)

-R.K. Neither Wen Yiduo nor Li Jingchi, nor Shaughnessy seem concerned with the fact that Wen’s evidence is late for all the astronomical ideas and nomenclature he employs. Just how old is the idea of a heavenly Dragon? In Ziao Xi’s there is the phrase from a children’s ditty (quoted in Jin) cf Legge.
Tso p. 146 “Wei of the dragon lies hid in the conjunction of the sun and moon.” (The whole song is filled with astrol imagery. Also in Ziao: Xiang 28

-Edmond Shaughnessy. In an unpublished study in Chinese entitled has dealt with the long cf 1.1 etc.
1.1aV
concrete symbols, referring to the Dragon asterism’s positioning the sky in successive months of the year. Reviewing of this hexagram as a kind of farmer’s almanac is thus different by being involved in the reading of specific works from the astrological interpretation which Wen Yidew gave to it, while agreeing in the identification of the dragon asterism.
1.1.2 LiJingchi (“Beingzuon” Tanguon p. 211) means “unfavorable” (no further explanation)

- some scholars consider long to be either a crocodile or a transmogrified mythological version of crocodile, e.g., Michael Fulliuon (A Short History of Chinese Art, p. 42, referring to some peoples of the sevth) He says they worshipped the forces of the rain and rivers in *serpents and crocodiles (‘dragons’).”

GSR 2412 (*Kian) to see (Shi); *g’ian appear (Shi)
field, cultivated land; to hunt (Shi); loon for id. Sound of the drum (Li); to cultivate the lord (Shi)

-this line quoted in Zuo 29

-Gao, Heng: should be read following Shriven. Thus “appear,” in contrast with qian “hide” in 1.1. He understands the sentence to mean, “a dragon appears/ed in the field(s). He does not justify his inclusion of noun and verb here, from the original, which would have to be read, “Saw a dragon in the fields”. All transitive uses of (chinese character) are read jian (Gudoi Houyu p. 199). Indeed there is not a case among the 21 occurrences of (chinese character) in yi where it follows a subject noun, and in fact almost always is followed by an explicit object noun: “saw x, “r see x’ as in this same line: . The same is true of in (Shi): it routinely means “to see (something)”. Gao reads simply as “lucky to see a great man.”

- in yi (chinese character) seems to be the counterpart to the (Shi’s) where the phrases “haven’t yet seen the lord” and, “when I have seen the lord.” Occur 11 times and 22 times respectively. In the (Shi) do ren does (see reverse *) occur too, in phrase 189/7 and 190/4. And dofu occurs more often (8 times) in the (Shi) “seeing a lord” seems to be accompanied by much prior concern and subsequent satisfaction (some of this is a wife’s referring to her husband though)

-on (chinese character) : while all interpreters take to be ‘field,’ this is in fact more likely to mean the open field where the hunt takes place than a cultivated field, since in all four other cases where occurs in yi, the hunting of game is involved, while there is no mention of cultivation

(In addition to 1.2 ) 7.5
there is only one clear reference to cultivation in the whole yi: 25.2 (chinese character), as Guo Muoro noted.

-E.R. Hughes (p. 8): “Discloses a dragon in a field: advantageous to have audience of the great man."

I guess I could go on, but you get the point. As the ancient Chinese believed that the Dipper and the rest of heaven revolved around the earth, I can see the significance of the Dragon appearing in the heavens.

Any thoughts?

Dragons' Tail

Marion said:

I think another think to note in this hexagram is the progression through the lines. It is true in many hexagrams but it seems to achieve its purest form here. I think it is in Wilhelm's book where he describes it as rising as if stepping on the backs of dragons. Some steps with warnings and cautions attached, others urging that the path is clear and to fly now.

Sometimes the progression seems to be in time, and sometimes in "time", as in, the time is right. That is, sometimes, certain steps have to be followed in an orderly way and sometimes the circles and wheels form a door you were looking for and now is when you can step through it.

Click to expand...

What can we say about the essential Zhouyi, excepting that it is a divinition which is supposed to work in the real world, not the academic world. Qian, the initiating, the beginning, the 'wonderful', (my wonderful). The Qian tells us to look around us. Are we ready? What can we take from our world which provides us with the ability to move forward. To the ancients this was on the backs of dragons. What a wonderful, stellar point of view for humans to take, so long ago. But, the Chinese have about 10,000 years of culture which have been outlined.

But as I have said to others in this group, here in the Aeclectic, it is your personal point of view, how you view the Yijing, which is important, not how the academics view things. Afterall, academics are emotionally uninformed, anyway.

The Qian is about beginnings, life, energy, lust, knowing, etc. When you receive Qian in your readings, how do you interpret it?