Yaun Gu
The author says; The Book of Changes (the I Ching) ancient teaching is infinitely inclusive - politicians read it for shrewdness; artists read it for nourishment and stimulation; managers study it for management excellence; military strategists read it for military prowess; many consult it for divination; and ordinary people read it for daily inspiration. The Book of Changes is about change and transformation.Full of wisdom; such as; 'and, in the end you will find that we are all racing against life, and everything you get is less valuable than the life you lost running after' 'Where the channel is clear, there is a source of pure water' Under the Leadership section; 'When the nourishing is correct, there will be good fortune.' The work contains analysis and instruction on the divination function.For Chinese people, The Book of Changes is the source of all philosophy. When you study Zeng Guofan, Xue Yangming, Confucius and Laozi, if you go deeper, you will find that their source is in the Book of Changes. The concepts in the Book of Changes are equivalent to the basics of music, writing, or mathematics. It is the 1+1 = 2 of them.It is the earliest of all Chinese classics, and it is the 'prince' of all texts. Any other Chinese book is directly or indirectly affected by it, and so they are not one hundred percent original. It is the one original Chinese text, it has no other books to refer to, its only reference is nature.In the case of Laozi’s Tao Te Ching, his thought is almost entirely derived from the Book of Changes. The idea of 'the movement of the Dao proceeds by contraries, weakness marks the course of Dao’s mightiest deeds' is obviously derived from the Book of Changes.As for Confucius; Historical Records recorded that he read Book of Changes. When he talks of 'turning the slips three times', he is talking about the ropes of the bamboo slips that were used for the pages of early books. In The Analects, it is recorded he said, ’If some years were added to my life, I would devote fifty to the study of the I Ching, and then I might come to consider myself virtuous’. This means that if he could have studied The Book of Changes for a few more years, his accomplishments would have been even deeper.
