Sources and method
The Chinese text
The judgments, line statements and Images follow the received text, collated clause by clause against two standard editions: the Tang-dynasty Zhouyi Zhengyi (Wang Bi and Han Kangbo’s commentary with Kong Yingda’s subcommentary) and Zhu Xi’s Song-dynasty Zhouyi Benyi in the Siku Quanshu edition. Where the two editions agree against the common electronic text, the site follows them. The Chinese shown on these pages is in traditional characters, as in the original editions.
The translation and the plain readings
Each of the 64 judgments and 386 line texts (384 lines plus the “All nines” and “All sixes” of Qian and Kun) appears three ways: the Chinese original, a literal English rendering, and a reading in plain words. The plain readings were first written in Chinese, line by line against Zhu Xi’s notes in the Zhouyi Benyi, then translated. They follow his interpretation and nobody else’s: where he reads 元亨利貞 as a verdict (“great success; it is favorable to stay true”) rather than as four virtues, so does this site.
The English was translated fresh from the Chinese with a fixed glossary, so that “no blame”, “regret vanishes” or “it is favorable to cross the great river” always stand for the same Chinese words. It does not reproduce Wilhelm/Baynes, Legge or any other published translation. The plain readings add no promises the text does not make and soften none of its warnings.
The notes on work, love and money apply the same plain reading to those three areas: on a hexagram page, to the situation as a whole; on a line page, to the moment when only that line is changing. They describe the situation and what to do. They do not predict outcomes or give investment advice. Hexagram names are shown with their pinyin pronunciation; where a name also has a traditional reading (Bi, Xiaoxu, Daxu, Guan, Xie), both are given.
How a cast is read
Which text applies is decided by Zhu Xi’s seven rules for changing lines: with no changing line, the judgment of the primary hexagram; with one, that line; with two, both lines, the upper governing; with three, both judgments; with four or five, the unchanged lines of the resulting hexagram; with six, the judgment of the resulting hexagram (Qian and Kun have their own text for this case).
The red seal on a reading (吉 favorable, 慎 proceed with care, 止 hold back, 平 neutral) is derived from the verdict words in the governing text. Where the text gives no verdict, the seal follows the image it paints; for a judgment, it also weighs whether the hexagram as a whole describes a favorable or an adverse moment. “Misfortune” together with “no blame” is read as misfortune that can be avoided.
The coins
Each coin’s face is decided by a cryptographically secure random number, with even odds, independently of the others. The chances of 6, 7, 8 and 9 are therefore 1/8, 3/8, 3/8 and 1/8, exactly as with three real coins. The tumbling and landing you see is a physics simulation of a result that has already been decided; the animation cannot influence it. See how to cast with three coins.
The calendar line on the cover
The small line above the cover gives today in the Chinese calendar: the lunar month and day, the current solar term, the current five-day period, and the hexagram assigned to that period. Lunar dates and solar terms are computed by the standard modern method for China (UTC+8); “today” is the date where you are. The names of the seventy-two five-day periods are the ones in common use.
Assigning hexagrams to the calendar (卦氣) goes back to the Han-dynasty scholars Meng Xi and Jing Fang: Kan, Li, Zhen and Dui govern the twenty-four solar terms, and the other sixty hexagrams share out the seventy-two periods. The site follows the table in the Tang monk Yixing’s Dayan calendar, as recorded in the New Book of Tang: the first period after the winter solstice belongs to Zhongfu, the second to Fu. It marks the season. It says nothing about your fortune today and has no bearing on the hexagram you cast. See the solar terms and their pentads.
What this site does not do
It does not predict particular events and it does not decide for you. The text offers a way of looking at your situation; what you do is up to you. It does not encourage asking the same question twice. There are no accounts, and your question is never recorded, since you never type it. Only anonymous, cookie-free visit statistics are collected.