The I Ching Handbook: A Practical Guide to Logical and Personal Perspective (review)

Reviews 423 Edward A. Hacker. The I Ching Handbook: A Practical Guide to Logical and Personal Perspective. Brookline, Massachusetts: Paradigm Publications , 1993. 426 pp. Hardcover $49.95, isbn 0-912111-36-4. The I Ching, or Book ofChanges, is one ofthe most popular Chinese classics sold in the West. Numerous English editions, paraphrases, studies, and commentaries can be found in modern bookshops, supermarkets, and libraries. These English editions are, for the most part, popular in nature, meant for trade rather than textbook use. The work of Edward A. Hacker, a summary ofvarious English studies , attempts to fill both roles, trade and textbook, for scholar and layperson unfamiliar with the wide variety of studies available on this perennial Chinese classic. It is interesting to note that the I Chinghas also been the object ofa resurgence ofinterest in the People's Republic ofChina, with a newer set ofsources available only in Chinese, or in more up-to-date Japanese scholarly publications. New Chinese editions of die work are readily purchased in mainland China book shops. The profit-oriented market in China has supported a renewed scholarly interest in the ancient text, as a counterpart to the interest ofbuyers who seek an approved form of oracular advice. Since the forbidding offortune-telling in temples by Chinese law, personal consultation ofthis ancient classic has become widespread . One ofthe most recent best-sellers in China is a cartoon version of the I Chingclassic, by the famous artist-scholar Li Yan. According to Li's prefatory remarks , an understanding of the 1 Chingmust be based on using the Oracle Bone meanings of the characters in the opening lines ofeach ofthe sixty-four hexagrams. Professor Edward A. Hacker's study ofthe I Chingis based on English translations that appeared before the most recent research in Asia on the I Ching. Useful in its own right, the work of Hacker is the result oftwenty-two years oflectures on Chinese philososophy in the university classroom. The amount of time devoted to the text grew from two hours to ten hours per semester, Professor Hacker states in his preface. The work was intended as an introduction for students who had no previous knowledge ofthe book's origin or content. As such, it was meant to be used as a background study for a course on Chinese philosophy, or for the casual reader unaware of the complexities of the ancient text. The work was undertaken, Hacker states, to provide information on the origin ofthe I Ching (see pp. 26-28), the interrelationships of the hexagrams, and the use of the text as an oracle (differences in modes of consultation), and to provide a select,© 1996 by University annotated bibliography (see the Preface, p. vii). ofHawai'iPress-J-J16 aumor is not a sinologist, and correcdydoes not provide a translation of the original text into English. Instead he reUes on the works offour noted transía- 424 China Review International: Vol. 3, No. 2, Fall 1996 tors, James Legge, Richard Wilhelm (translated from the German into English by C. F. Baynes), John Blofeld, and Greg Whincup, from which he chooses by reasoned preference the English tides of the sixty-four hexagrams (chapter 4). The major contribution of Professor Hacker's work is found mainly in chapter 7, entitled "Hexagram Cycles, Flowers and Stories." By changing each line of the hexagram one by one, six "petals" can be generated from the original hexagram. Each petal provides insight into the possible transformation from one cycle to another . To generate these petals, Hacker changes each line of the hexagram in order , into its opposite. It takes thirteen such changes to bring the hexagram back to its original form, the seventh in succession being the opposite of the starting order. The progression ofhexagrams makes up a story in itself, as illustrated on page 97, and in appendix H, on pages 215-231. One of the special features of the book is the use of binary code, generated by computer programming, to predict the frequency of changes occuring from "moving" to "static" lines. One of the skills that must be learned in order to read the I Ching, whether by the use ofyarrow stalks or coins (all...