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Bushi Zhengzong · The Orthodox Tradition of Divination
Hexagram Body, Flying and Hidden Spirits, Movement and Stillness
Read in English. Switch to Original for word notes, or select text to ask a question.
Formula for Favorable and Avoided Conditions of the Hexagram Body
When the Body meets Blessing and Virtue and no Officer appears,
the worry must finally turn into joy.
The present ill affair must end well;
what is urgent gradually becomes easy.
When the Body meets Source, Useful, and Green Dragon,
a joyful affair will enter the door at its time.
If Traveling Horse is encountered and the Body line moves,
plans made away from home all go through.
The Body line most avoids entering the Void.
Affairs are difficult to complete: keep to the ordinary.
Penalty, injury, break, and extinction are all avoided.
I urge you to keep your place and remain at home.
Verse on Generation, Control, Good, and Ill in Flying and Hidden Spirits
Hidden controlling the Flying Spirit is emergence from oppression.
Flying coming to control Hidden instead injures the person.
Hidden going to generate Flying is called draining qi.
Flying coming to generate Hidden obtains the Birth stage.
A line with Hidden controlling Flying has no trouble.
When the Useful sees Flying injure Hidden, there is unrest.
Flying and Hidden not harmonizing are “assistance.”
Examine the cause of Hidden being concealed or appearing.
Reading note: The current 为助 in the third clause is unclear and is retained literally as “assistance”; no missing consequence is invented.
Do Not Cling to Spirit Stars in Judging the Changes
The yin and yang of hexagrams lie in change and penetration.
The Five Phases' generation and control are wondrous without end.
People must distinguish the principles of yin and yang;
do not use Spirit Stars to fix good and ill.
Formula for Six Still Lines
When all six lines of a hexagram are still, examine the Useful and the day.
If the day controls the Useful or penalizes it,
undertakings should be cautious.
Investigate Self and Response as well:
the Avoided Spirit must not be added to Self.
When Response meets the Useful or Source Spirit,
undertakings are certainly prosperous.
Formula for Six Lines Moving in Disorder
When six lines move in disorder, the affair is hard to understand.
Look within the palace for the Useful Spirit.
If the Useful is resting or imprisoned and suffers control and harm,
know that this affair will cost much spirit and effort.
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