I knelt before the table and bowed three times, each time lightly touching my forehead to the floor. I would remain kneeling throughout the entire process, a gesture which at the time was for me not accomplished without some measure of pain. I hoped the rabbi would appreciate this!
I unwrapped a bundle of fifty dried yarrow85 stalks and, holding them in my right hand, rotated them clockwise three times in the incense smoke while I asked the question out loud: “What is preventing David and Sarah from conceiving a child?”
I removed one stalk from the bundle and laid it horizontally in front of me as a reminder of the supreme consciousness. Then, for the next fifteen minutes (in obedience to the rather complex traditional procedure) I carefully manipulated the remaining forty-nine stalks to randomly generate the number groupings that would create a stack of six lines (called a hexagram).
Each of the six lines of the basic hexagram is either an unbroken line (male—yang) or a broken line (female—yin). There are thus sixty-four ways possible ways to combine six lines that are either broken or unbroken. To the ancient Chinese sages who developed the system, these sixty-eight different hexagrams presented to their minds archetypal images that in turn suggested ideas, situations, even moral commentaries on historical, social, political, and personal matters.
These ideas are not static. Indeed, like everything in our objective reality, the hexagrams are in a constant state of change (hence the name, “Book of Changes”). Consequently, depending upon the nature of the answer, any one of the six lines of any given hexagram may be in the process of changing (or “moving”) into its opposite. In other words, each line of the hexagram can be one of four varieties:
An unbroken line (male—yang)
A broken line (female—yin)
An old unbroken line (a male so old it will soon change/move to female)
An old broken line (a female so old it will soon change/move to male)
The text of the I Ching provides specific commentaries for each hexagram and for each of the “moving lines” of the hexagrams. For the reader who may feel hopelessly confused at this point, let me just briefly summarize:
While it is possible, using the traditional yarrow stalk method, to arrive at a hexagram containing no moving lines at all, in most cases, the person asking the question receives the answer in three stages:
The primary hexagram (and its commentary) that usually paints a picture of conditions surrounding the present situation.
The commentary (or commentaries) on the moving line (or lines), which usually points to the aspect of the situation that is currently changing, or is about to change.
The new hexagram (and its commentary) that is formed when the moving line (or lines) have changed/moved into their opposites. This part of the answer is usually the most suggestive of what the “future” might hold.
I liken the process to viewing three consecutive drawings on one of those flip cartoons we used to make with a pad of paper when we were kids. The viewer can’t understand the plot or message of the cartoon by simply looking at each individual drawing. The plot is revealed by sensing the apparent progressive movement of the images when several pages are flipped before our eyes.
As in all divinatory systems, the answer is ultimately revealed through the agency of one’s own intuitive impressions. Almost without exception, the I Ching speaks to us in metaphoric language (like a fortune cookie on steroids) that rings true only if we are attuned to hear the answer from out of its flowery prose.
To my great relief, the I Ching answered my question—What is preventing David and Sarah from conceiving a child?—in a remarkably clear manner. It came as a classic three-part answer made up of:
1) The primary hexagram (No. 9), which is called The Taming Power of the Small;
9
2) with moving line 4 (from the bottom), which transforms the primary hexagram into …
3) Hexagram 1, which is called, The Creative.
1.
Now it doesn’t take a seer to see that the ultimate answer to my question (the third and final step in the process) was hexagram 1, the most “male” of all the hexagrams. That being the case, it was pretty clear to me that David and Sarah would indeed succeed in becoming parents and that it was highly likely that the firstborn would be a boy. Furthermore, the appearance of Hexagram 1 as the third and final part of the answer seemed to suggest that the eventual birth of this particular child would be a particularly profound event:
… When an individual draws this oracle, it means that success will come to him from the primal depths of the universe …86
This, however, did not answer the question of what was currently preventing David and Sarah from conceiving and bringing forth this child and what change would occur to make this happen.
Looking back at the first part of the answer, Hexagram 9, The Taming Power of the Small, we see that most of the ingredients for a successful conception, pregnancy, and birth (dense clouds) are in place but there was yet no rain:
The Taming Power of the Small has success. Dense clouds, no rain from our western region.87
The text continues at length and these are a few of the highlights that jumped out at me:
… Hence the image of many clouds, promising moisture and blessing to the land, although as yet no rain falls … Only through the small means of friendly persuasion can we exert any influence … To carry out our purpose we need firm determination within and gentleness and adaptability in external relations.88
The commentary on the moving line (the fourth line from the bottom—the line that when changed turns Hexagram 9 into Hexagram 1) says:
If you are sincere, blood vanishes and fear gives way. No blame.89
Now, I’m certainly not
