Historical Studies (Chinese Edition)

No.5, 2015

 

The Early Development of the Study of the Yi Jing from the Perspective of the Shi Fa in the Tsinghua Bamboo Slips

(Abstract)

 

Liu Guangsheng

 

The names and order of the eight trigrams or gua (gua refers to a combination of broken and unbroken lines forming a trigram or hexagram and used for divination) in the Shi Fa (筮法 Methods of Divination) in the Tsinghua Bamboo Slips coincide closely with those recorded in the Gui Cang(归藏) version of Yi Jing, thus show a distinctive feature of it. The form and methods of divination in the Shi Fa, however, show distinct differences from those in the Gui Cang, as the former are based on the eight trigram system rather than the sixty-four hexagram system. The ba (八) of a particular gua in Zuo Zhuan and Guo Yu refers to the divinatory number “eight”; thus Wei Zhao is clearly mistaken in explaining it as “Ba is an unchangeable yin yao (阴爻).” The shift from numerical to symbolic gua marks an important transition in pre-Qin study of the Yi Jing; the division of labor between the numerical and the symbolic yao seen in the Tsinghua Bamboo Slips’ Shi Fa may offer important evidence and guidelines here. The Divinatory Method B found in the Yin and Zhou she shi (揲蓍) may be the origin of the divinatory methods represented by the Shi Fa in the Chu region. The academic importance of the Tsinghua Bamboo Slips’ Shi Fa lies in the fact that even when the six divinatory numbers are combined, we still do not have sufficient grounds for deciding whether the yi gua (易卦) are chong gua (重卦). If we were to rely only on the combination of six divinatory numbers without the supporting evidence of the Shi Fa and a knowledge of how its contemporaries analyzed the divinatory numbers, we would still be unable to determine whether chong gua had emerged in the late Shang Dynasty.