It’s back: Friday I Ching blogging.  The Dongzhou killings demanded my attention last week but today, as we move into the holiday weekend, I have carved out a bit of time to consult the oracle.

    The question I asked this week is, as is usually the case here, about politics.  Since it is the time of year when everyone is looking back at the past year, I thought it would be good to know what the I Ching might tell us about politics in 2005. I kept the question very broad, not limiting it to US politics or Chinese politics, because I was curious to see what we might learn about "all under heaven," our most general view of the world.  The query: how should we understand politics in the year now past?  And the answer is: things started out good but ended up bad

    The details: Hexagram 58, "The Joyous," with a moving line in the first position, thus tending toward, Hexagram 47, "Oppression."

    Hexagram 58 is generally quite positive:

The Joyous. Success.
Perseverance furthers.

Lakes resting one on the other:
The image of The Joyous.
Thus the superior man joins with friends
for discussion and practice.

    The commentaries add that "true joy, therefore, rests on firmness and strength within…"  The moving line in the first position does nothing to undercut the generally favorable feeling evoked here:

Nine at the beginning means:
Contended joyousness.  Good Fortune.

    A more ominous image emerges with the hexagram toward which the divination is tending:

There is no water in the lake:
The image of Exhuastion.
Thus the superior man stakes his life
on following his will.

    This hexagram denotes a time of adversity, when people must turn inward to find the strength to withstand oppression:

Thus everywhere superior men are oppressed and held in restraint by inferior men.

    Considering the message as a whole, the I Ching is saying that things have moved from good to bad.  How does this image relate to the politics of the past year?

    It is a bit difficult to discern such a general pattern: I imagine how you see the past year will depend upon your political worldview.  But there may have been a certain promise or potential for good when 2005 began.  A Presidential inauguration occured in the US which might have signalled a fresh beginning, a new start that might have moved in a positive direction.  An election occured in Iraq, which may have held the same sort of promise.  And the people of Dongzhou, while struggling to win just compensation for their land, may also have felt somewhat positive about their chances to secure a fair deal.  Whether this sums up into a "joyous" political milieu is quesitonable, but it may have been somewhat propitious.

     It is easier to see how things have turned out badly.  American politics have suffered through a debiiltating year of growing scandals, official lying and decption and administrative incompetence.   Iraq, too, has slipped away from the promise of the January elections.  And the people of Dongzhou have ended the year in the worst possible manner: mourning the deaths of their family members.

     The I Ching, however, tells us how to withstand these bad days:

…in times of adversity it is important to be strong within and sparing of words.

    The good will return, the bad recede.  We must bide our time now, when the bad appears ascendent, and be strong for the time when the good re-remerges.  Think of how the difficult political issues of the moment might open up into new possibilities and better outcomes…