14. The Yi-Kua in the Shang Dynasty and Various Problems Pertaining to Divination

Abstract

The method of divining by yarrow stalk in accordance with the scheme of 64 hexagrams did exist in the Yin Dynasty. Numerical strings of three and six lines on oracle bones recently unearthed provide the new evidence for the above statement and many scholars have discussed it. My paper contributes the following new points:

(1) Comparing the 64 hexagram names in the Ma-wang-tui manuscript with those appearing in the so called Kuei-tsang () recorded by later scholars, we find some similarity on both sides. This indicates that the Kuei-tsang is not a legendary matter.

(2) Some Hsin-tien period wares found in Kansu also show the numerical marks such as . This also suggests that such trigram images had been used by still earlier people.

(3) The graph for nine “” was found on one oracle bone from Ch'i-chia . It shows that the Western Chou people had advanced the way of divining and thus the emphasis on Yin of the Yin people had been developed into the emphasis on Yang .

(4) I try to interpret, with reference to the sentences of Chou-yi, the divining hexagrams which appear on the bamboo strips found in T'ien-hsing-kuan , Chiang-ling . As the symbol of was still employed by the Ch'u people, it seems that they were following the way of the Yin people in the emphasis on Yin.