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Bushi Zhengzong · The Orthodox Tradition of Divination
Golden Counsels · Silkworms, Mulberries and Domestic Animals
Read in English. Switch to Original for word notes, or select text to ask a question.
Silkworms and Mulberries
Having discussed planting, one should discuss silkworms and mulberries. Gathering leaves and feeding them is hard work, all for silk and floss.
Uncertainty about the good or ill of rearing them gives occasion to consult divination by milfoil and turtle.
Reading note: The supplied 著 is read in its divination context as milfoil, without changing the source graphic.
First, Descendants properly placed means the young silkworms must benefit. Next, Wealth in command means much silk and many cocoons.
Blessing and Virtue should rise, and especially welcomes the day’s assistance. Wife and Wealth fears Extinction and especially dislikes moving images’ penalty or clash.
Brothers at Body means leaves are spent but silk remains scant. Parents holding Self means anxious labor and difficulty with the silkworms.
The Five Phases meeting an Officer line must bring injury and loss. Only a hexagram without Ghost or baneful influence begins to fare well.
The day clashing with Body especially forbids a person considered ritually unclean entering the room. Wife and Wealth combining with Response must mean a woman considered impure approaching the silkworms.
Reading note: These purity terms retain the chapter’s historical ritual vocabulary; no unrecorded cause of impurity is supplied.
Descendants receiving hidden Clash requires care whenever the trays are divided. Wealth without injury or control means leaf prices must rise when asked about.
Brothers entering Void turns silk to white snow. Blessing and Body at Si or Wu piles cocoons like yellow gold.
Reading note: The supplied 已 in the pair is read as the Si branch; the Chinese graphic is unchanged.
Parents moving into Wealth means all that toil is not wasted. Officer rising and changing into Blessing still brings several false alarms.
A hexagram from the Qian Palace is especially favorable for summer silkworms. Parents in a penalty position predicts collapse if asking about the silkworm room.
Silkworm cocoons yield their achievement when threefold combination forms a strong, supported Wealth configuration. With the hexagram palace’s positions fixed, infer in detail from the six lines’ movement and stillness.
The Six Domestic Animals
The Way gives form to myriad things; their principle returns to one mind. The Changes encompasses the Three Powers: how could divination omit the six domestic animals?
Examine them with refinement, and clarity naturally becomes evident.
Life lies in the Blessing Spirit: rising and flourishing means growth and rearing. Profit belongs to Wealth: imprisoned or dead means it must be slight.
Neither of these two can be absent; both should appear.
Wealth strong and Blessing declining means lean yet a good runner. Wealth empty and Blessing moving means slow yet promising.
Wealth in Void means that though useful briefly, it has no lasting strength. Blessing with penalty or harm means either a notched nose or scars.
Combination with Wealth receiving generation must mean docile and good. Mutual clash or control must mean stubborn and unmanageable.
To know hoof, foot and bodily shape, examine the attached eight-trigram image. To distinguish blue-green, yellow, white or black, consult generation, control and the Six Spirits.
Yin and yang distinguish female and male. Embryo and Nourishment describe foals, calves, lambs and chicks.
Body at Descendants’ Embryo must mean a pregnant animal. Blessing at Ghost’s Tomb means illness within its body.
Parents moving brings injury, and Descendants at Extinction makes the labor futile. Brothers rising prevents growth; with Blessing, there is instead generation and support.
Self in Void means disappointment in the end.
Metal receiving generation and strength requires concern that it bites people. Earth crossing or heavy requires concern about contracted illness.
Officer with Snake or Bird must bring litigation or alarm. Descendants changing into Brothers or Wealth tests coarse or fine feed.
Wealth joined to Brothers means untimely feeding with grass or grain. Descendants changing into Parents must mean excessive labor and worry.
Blessing linked to Officer and Ghost requires guarding against someone stealing it. Ghost changing into Descendants raises fear that the animal was stolen.
Officer and Brothers changing into one another makes verbal conflict hard to escape. Day and month both bringing penalty makes unexpected death hard to avoid.
In asking about purchase, Blessing moving to generate Body is likewise desirable. In asking when profit comes, Wealth rising and changing into Extinction is most feared.
For betting or fighting, Self strong and Wealth rising are desirable. For hunting or fishing, Response empty and Blessing at Extinction are always feared.
Suckling or brooding requires Embryo and Blessing to receive generation and strength without injury. Treatment requires Parents and Officer to decline or meet Extinction and be restrained.
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