Yet despite its brevity, cryptic text, paucity of colorful stories, virtual absence of deities, and lack of a sustained narrative, the Yijing exerted enormous influence in all realms of Chinese culture for well over two thousand years - an influence comparable to the Bible in Judeo-Christian culture, the Qur’an in Islamic culture, the Vedas in Hindu culture, and the sutras in Buddhist culture. The “absolute gulf between God and his creatures” in the West had no counterpart in the Chinese tradition. One might add that in the Western tradition, God reveals only what God chooses to reveal, while in traditional China, the “mind of Heaven” was considered ultimately knowable and accessible through the Changes. The Changes posits neither a purposeful beginning nor an apocalyptic end and whereas classics such as the Bible and Qur’an insist that humans are answerable not to their own culture but to a being that transcends all culture, the Yijing takes essentially the opposite position. There is no jealous and angry God in it no evil presence like Satan no prophet, sinner, or savior no story of floods or plagues no tale of people swallowed up by whales or turned into pillars of salt. Structurally it lacks any sort of systematic or sustained narrative, and from the standpoint of spirituality, it offers no vision of religious salvation, much less the promise of an afterlife or even the idea of rebirth.Īccording to Chinese tradition, the Yijing was based on the natural observations of the ancient sages the cosmic order or Dao that it expressed had no Creator or Supreme Ordainer, much less a host of good and malevolent deities to exert influence in various ways. And yet it seems so different from other “classics” that instantly come to mind, whether literary works such as the Odyssey, the Republic, the Divine Comedy, and The Pilgrim’s Progress or sacred scriptures like the Jewish and Christian Bibles, the Qur’an, the Hindu Vedas and the Buddhist sutras. By these criteria and by most other measures as well, the Yijing certainly fits the bill. One might add that precisely because of these characteristics, a classic has great staying power across both Second, it must address these principal issues in “lovely, moving, and huge courses,” with “empowering and welcoming pictures.” Third, it must be perplexing, nuanced, thorough, and significant, requiring watchful and rehashed study so as to yield its most profound privileged insights and most prominent shrewdness. What makes a work of art? Initially, the work must concentrate on matters of incredible significance, distinguishing essential human issues and giving some kind of direction to managing them.
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