Hi, every in the last module, we talked about the origin of Yi Culture and in this module, we will talk about the core thought of Yi Culture we divide it into three parts the first one is introduction of Yi Jing to have a general undertanding of it the second is the explanation of the word "Yi" it's very important what do you think the meaning of "Yi"? the third one is the core thought of Yi Culture let's look at the overall structure for the introduction of Yi Jing we know that Zhou Yi has twe parts, Yi Jing and Yi Zhuan Yi Jing contains information of images, image structures, image names, image explanation, divination names, divination explanation,orderly sequence,and Miscellaneous Gua Yi Chuan is also named as Shi Yi including Tuan Zhuan (two volumes), Xiang Zhuan (two volumes), Wen Yan Zhuan, and Xi Ci Zhuan (two volumes) in Yi Jing, Yao is the basic unit a continuous horizontal line is called Yang Yao a disconnected horizontal line is called Yin Yao Yang Yao and Yin Yao are combined in the certain rules and to show the rules the of changes of nature and homan society the combination is called "Gua" Gua is kind of symbol rank for divination it is the basic unit in Yi Jing now we know that Gua is the basic unit of Yi Jing Let's take Qian Gua for example to see how it works let's look at this image the picture formed by six full lines is called "Gua Image" Gua Image is the symbol of Gua Qian is the name of Gua the six symbols of the Gua Image are all Yang the six horizontal lines are continuous so Qian means vigorous and energetic the Gua explanation of this imge, one Gua and six Yao is Yuan Heng Li Zhen (means successful and properous) besides the Gua explanation of Yuan Heng Li Zhen it has Yao explanation for each Yao from this image, there are Yao of "Up Nine", "Nine Five", "Nine Four", "Nine Three", "Nine Twe", and "First Nine" what does "First Nine" mean? it is the Yao name of the last Yao of Qian Gua we call it "First Nine" what's its Yao explanation? It is Qian Long Wu Yong it means that it is not the time for predicting affairs, it says that it is not the time to do it now what does "Two" mean in "Nine Two"? the second horizontal line from bottom to top is "Nine Two" it is called Jian Long Zai Tian, Li Jian Da Ren (see the dragon in the field, good to visit authority. Means would get appreciated) when predict affairs, the first yao is Yang Yao the second yao is still Yang Yao it shows that things are getting better and we also have the explanations of "Nine Three", "Nine Four", and "Nine Five" if you are interested in the Yao explanations, you could refer to some relatated books let's look at Gua Images of Zhou Yi the basic Guas are eight diagrams besides "Qian Gua" we talked about before there are "Kun Gua" these three Yaos are all Yin Yao. We call it Kun and also there are Zhen, Xun, Kan, Li,Gen, and Dui overlapping two of them the second power of eight then there are 64 diagrams, also 64 Gua in the last module, we learned that Emperor Zhou Wen overlapped two of them in the prison and then created 64 Gua we could see that 64 Gua have lots of Gua images in the second part, we'll see the definition of the character "Yi" in history, there were several definitions for "Yi" firstly, we'll look at the one in "Zhou Yi Can Tong Qi" written by Wei Boyang it said that Yi was made up of the sun and the moon he thought the origin of Yi had closed relation with astronomical phenomena let's look at the character carefully the upper part is similar to the character "Ri" (means the sun) and the lower part is the character "Yue" (means the moon) just written in a large way it also makes sense the second definition is that there are three meanings of Yi they are "simple","variety" and "not easy" how do we understand the three meanings? in my opinion "simple" refers to the simple pictures although there are 64 Gua dislike the complicated works nowadays they are very simple only 64 image made up of Yin Yao and Yang Yao "variety" means that 64 Gua contain lots of principles and rules and for "not easy" it is very hard to master it after Zhou Yi appeared lots of people in all dynasties were dedicated to doing the research about it the more they learned, the more complicated it becomes so we could conclude that it could not be understood by everyone yet it seems like very simple in Xi Ci Zhuan, it said that Yi meant that life could be endless it shows that Yi is not only for predicting affairs from the Gua images we could tell what we should do, and what we shouldn't do they also contain the rules of nature later, we will talk about this again when we discuss the core thoughts in Guo Yu Jin Yu and others similar, it meantioned the thought of variety "Yi is various" and here Yi means variety in Zuo Zhuan, it said that "Yi is opposite" it changes to the opposite place the essence has changed in a netshell we could know for sure that there are at least two meanings of "Yi" the first is that it contains the thought of Yin and Yang the second is that it is various the most difficult thing is how to understand it it is very simple when figuring it out and very difficult when not at last, we'll talk about the core thought of Yi Culture the core thoughts of Yi Culture mainly contain the following parts the first one is birth of Tai Chi thought the second one is Yin and Yang thought the third one is movement changing thought firstly, we'll see how to understand the birth of Tai Chi in Xi Ci Shang Zhuan, it said that Yi is Tai Chi, and has two hemispheres. Two hemisphere change to four shapes. four shapes change to eight diagrams. Eight diagrams could decide whether it is good or bad.The fortelling fosters prosperity it shows the process from Tai Chi to Eight Diagrams then what is Tai Chi? the first core thought of Yi Culture should be Tai Chi when we talk about Tai Chi, we may think about Taijiquan which is a kind of boxing created by Zhang San Feng actually, "Tai Chi" is come from Zhou Yi Xi Ci Shang which we talked about just now from the sentence" Yi is Tai Chi, and has two hemispheres" what does "Tai" mean? it means big and huge what about "Chi". It means the end the extremes of things are changing, and derive other new things so the origin of variety is Tai Chi this sounds a little tricky there are several definitions of Tai Chi the first one is that Tai Chi is the vitality in the beginning of univers in Zhou Yi Zheng Yi, written by Tang Yin Da, it said that "Tai Chi is the only vitality when the sky and earth are not seperated" it is formed with all the life materials and we call it chaos substance chaos substance is Yuan Qi ( vitality) the integrity of Yuanqi is Tai Chi and defined by the meaning of original substance the second definition is that the substance of nothingness is Tai Chi what does this mean? we assume that "one" is Tai Chi here one is not number it is nothingness "nothingness" is the origin of 49 divinations actually we call it "nothingness Tai Chi" kinda like Dao thoughts and there is another version 49 divination from Da Yan Measure don't have Tai Chi it was related to the divination at that time e.g., there are 50 achilleas. How to pick up the first one and then processed Gua reading and ther is another saying that the mixture of Yin and Yang is Tai Chi in Tai Chi Picture Reading, written by Zhou Dun Yi, it said that "nothingness becomes to Tai Chi. Tai Chi moves and comes to Yang. When it is at rest, it comes to Yin" "the extreme of stillness is motion. The motion and the stillness are the roots for each other. Divid Yin and Yang. Then there are two parts of Tai Chi there are three groups for Zhou's explanation of Tai Chi the first one is represented by Shao Yong he showed Tai Chi by numbers "Taichi is the one (nothingness), and so magic to generate two" this is a way explained by numbers the second one is represented by Zhu Xi, Theory Tai Chi he said "extreme is the truth of truth. Tai Chi is the assemblage of all the truths and Zhang Zai advocated the idea that one suject has two hemispheres he thought there were no Yin or Yang gathering together comes to variety be opposite comes to conversion this shows that Tai Chi is the origin of the nature and all creations Tai Chi is the substance when Yin and Yang are gathering together the substance has its own rules for changing and moving and it applies to all creations all the phenomenons are just different showing by Yin and Yang Vitality of Tai He is the essence of the world and also Tai Chi refers to Yin and Yang thoughts we'll talk about this later now we will look at Two Hemispheres "Two hemishere" in ancient Chinese language means two appearances of sphere it shows the vague and abstract understanding of universe from the opinions of people in ancient times it is also the natural perspective of ancient Chinese people ancestors observed the opposite and related natural phenomenons e.g. sky and earth, sun and moon, day and night, summer and winter, male and femail, upper and lower, and etc. and then concluded to Yin and Yang from the philosophic measure and symbolized with Yin Yao (— —) and Yang Yao(——) there are several definitions of Yin Yao and Yang Yao someone thinks that they are the symbols of reproductive organs and someone thinks that they are evolved from tortoise shell divination and trillion patterns another saying is that it is the symple of achillea divination and another saying is knotting theory Yang Yao is a continuous horizontal line in ancient times, knoting was used to record sacrifice process big knot refered to Yang Yao small one refered to Yin Yao it shows the unity of opposites of Yin and Yang and Yao refers to sunlight and moonlight at the same time, it also refers to numbers. For instance, Yao Yao is number nine and Yin Yao is number six what does "Four Direction" mean? ancestors matched the four shapes of east, west, south and north with four animals and it is called "Four Shapes" Four Shapes refer to four animals, Blue Dragon, White Tiger, Red Bird and Black Turtle and also represent four directions, east, west, south and north it came from the star religion in ancient China the different combinations of Yin Yao and Yang Yao reflect the weather changes for instance, spring is Shao (little) Yang summer is Tai (big) Yang fall is called Shao (little) Yin and winter is called Tai (big) Yin in the module of collateral channels, we learned that Shao Yang, Tai Yang, Shao Yin and Tai Yin are related to human body what does "eight diagram" refer to? it refers to the combination of two hemisphere and four shapes and reflects 8 basic natural substances and phenomenons this is the end for birth of Tai Chi the second important thought is Yin and Yang how to understand it? "Yin and Yang endow people all the rules of nature and living" what does this mean? the changes of Yin and Yang are called Dao people learn kindness from Dao human nature makes the kindness could be completed and presented what is kindness? coinciding with Yin and Yang is kindness "Xing" is a noun in ancient Chinese language, it had two meanings, "human nature" and "human life" there is a clear explanation in Xi Ci Living rules are rules of Yin and Yang we cannot have a correct understanding of living phenomenons with application of Yin and Yang and also this opinion is very important for traditional Chinese medicine moreover, individual life is the specific presentation of Yin and Yang it is a physics explanation of substances in a netshell, biological phenomenon and living essence are gathering together let's look at two setences the first one is from Yi Jing "people should behave like the sky and the earth, striving and promoting virtues we hear about this often what does this mean? the sky refers to the nature. The movement is powerful and fast people should be like the sky, improving themselves and the earth is chunky and gentle people should work on the virtues and be good-tempered so you need Yang, and also you need Yin this is how to become an outstanding people a university in China adopts the essence of the sentence to be as shcool motto that is "be striving; be tolerant" we all know that university it is Tsinghua University the core thoughts of Yi Culture we talked about before the first one is Tai Chi Thought the seconde one is Yin and Yang Thought and the last one is Movement Changing Thought in the part of explanation of the character "Yi", we learned about "variety is Yi" do you remember? so "Yi" actually is "change" and "changing" is a continuous process there is no creator it is created by the nature "changing" is the basic way for survival Zhou Yi emphasized in New Birth and New Prosperity this is same as the thought of Lao-tzu "Dao comes to one; one comes to two; two come to three; three come to everything" TCM thinks that life is successive process of the birth of Yin and Yang we also mentioned it when we talked about Yin&Yang, and Five Factors life is changing all the time and also Yi Xue mentioned the same princple "extreme to changing; changing to variety; variety to prosperity" it is a changing thought if you are interested in this, pls check more materials this is the similar phenomenon in illness from TCM's perspective "exteme of coldness turns to heat; extreme of heat turns to coldness" physiologically, it is usually divided the process of growth, maturation and declination by ten years or eight years for male and seven years for female to learn the life regulation Chinese people pick up two characters in the sentence "Bian (change" and "Tong (prosperous)" in China, it also means flexibility and there are several explanations the one who has a general understanding of Chinese Culture could know that In a netshel, Yi Culture refers to combination of Yin and Yang, unity of hardness and softness it helps us to learn about the general changing rules of all the creations it advocats being striving and tolerant these thoughts had made a huge influence in the development of TCM Ok, this is the end for this module in next module, we will talk about Yi's influence on TCM