The Taoscopy project

Published: Tuesday, 9 October 2012
Updated: Tuesday, 28 July 2015

Having noted problems with the I Ching text, and wishing to realize a web site and softwares around this theme, I have decided to write my own comments, initially to simply illustrate and comment Richard Wilhelm's text and after those became an independent project.

At the beginning, I only wanted to comment the few lines that I had understood and illustrate them with examples found in books and movies. Then, when I have abandoned the idea to include the texts from Richard Wilhelm, I have consulted a number of sources to realize the first version of Taoscopy's text. Later, I have asked the oracle to validate these texts, twice and even thrice for the hexagrams 1 to 14. It was when the oracle has criticized my method and had me remove the quotes i had prepared, because they would have complicated the understanding, this is what I realized later. From critics to advices, I could refine the textes, line after line, hexagram after hexagram, in order to understand better the I Ching's philosophy and thus, the oracle's answers. My current method consists of identifying the comments which result in problems of interpretation problems, specially with the public questions of this site, and to correct these texts by asking the oracle.

Taoscopy's text is mainly intended for an uninformed public, but can also be of interest to an informed public for the comments whose meaning has been lost. This is one of the reasons why some strong images have not been retained (Such as The man with the scarlet knees, The carriage or The axe). It was also important to differentiate from Richard Wilhem's version, because when I started, I have paraphrased a number of comments from his book, and the oracle called me to order with the second line of the hexagram 6: One should not claim what belongs to someone stronger, they will find comfort within their neighbourhood. Because the competition between Taoscopy's text and the classical version is not necessary, as one of the classical comments of the hexagram 41 says: one can be increased without depriving other.

The process is unfortunately not achieved, many texts are still to be corrected (from which more than fifty are causing serious understanding issues in August 2012). You can follow their evolution with Twitter (@Taoscopy) or on the forum. And if you have published hexagrams and you didn't get the answer, you can come back from time to time to see if the text has improved.

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