HISTORY OF THE I CHING

It all began about 5,000 years ago with the story of Fu Hsi, a great and very wise emperor.

But was he a historical or mythological being? It makes no difference to us - the important thing is that the knowledge that existed at that time was perceived, incorporated and transmitted through the I Ching to our days.

Among the themes perceived by "Fu Hsi" are the natural phenomena that occur in Heaven and on Earth, the development of plant and animal life, including human beings, and the interaction and adaptability among all these beings and events.

"Fu Hsi" besides understanding all this knowledge, recognized that they are represented in the trigrams and the hexagrams.

Then came King Wên, a historical character who ruled a small province around 1,143 B.C. through the principles of the I Ching. He is recognized as the sage who organized the hexagrams into the modern sequence - a sequence now used by Richard Wilhelm, Alfred Huang, and so many other authors - and who wrote the Hexagram Judgments. The Hexagram Trials cites the Kings of Antiquity as great rulers and signals the idea of a developed human being. However, it is a text aimed at ordinary human beings, who initially no have domain about their attitudes.  We believe that King Wên also proposed the Later Heaven Sequence, a theme that will be developed in another post.

Duke of Chou, youngest son of King Wen, advanced his father's studies by writing the Lines from the Hexagrams - which are texts dedicated, for the most part, to explaining to the ordinary human being what is the best attitude to take when faced with a given situation.

Confucius, the last great thinker to develop the I Ching, wrote what is now known as the Ten Wings. The Ten Wings are explanations and commentaries of the material "left" by Fu Hsi, the texts of King Wen and the Duke of Chou, plus the Images of the Hexagrams.

Confucius developed conclusively, through the texts of the Images of the Hexagrams, the concept of the wise human being.

Let's take advantage of all the knowledge worked out by the philosophers and get on with our studies!