Strangest Mysteries of the World and Beyond !

I Ching and 2012

I Ching and 2012:

The relation between the I Ching and 2012 is publicized in a book called “The Invisible Landscape: Mind, Hallucinogens, and the I Ching” written by Terence McKenna who died in 2000.

In his book, he was inspired by the 64 Hexagram arrangements in King Wen’s I Ching     ( Book of Change ).

In the I Ching, King Wen has a special sequence in arranging the order of the 64 hexagrams, putting them in the order with Heaven (The Creative) and Earth (The Receptive) as first and second Hexgram, after going through 60 hexagrams arranged in 30 pairs, it ends with the final pairs Water on Fire ( After Completion) and Fire on Water ( Before Completion). This sequence is taken to represent different stage of development of the world from the beginning with Heaven and Earth to the end with Fire on Water.

Inspired by this sequence, McKenna assigned mathematical values to each of 384 lines (jao) of the 64 hexagram and he came up with a curve which he claimed is reflecting the timing of important world events. Every peak and bottom point of the curve seems co inside with an important stage in human civilization. He called this a Time Wave theory, and it seems if one translate the 384 lines of King Wen’s 64 Hexagrams into time, according to this theory, we will find the time interval between big events on earth.

His most significant theory is that if he put the end date of the curve at 21/12/2012, then all the peak and bottom points of his curve match with significant events in human history. Hence he consider the date 21/12/2012 is the ending day when the curve reaches the bottom.

As such, the I Ching itself actually did not predict 2012, at best, one can only say it gives inspiration to McKenna to invent the Time wave theory. The original meaning of the last two Hexagrams – After Completion and Before Completion does not imply end of the world, to the contrary, it implies there is no ending, because the change is not yet completed. It is like many cyclical change in nature, when one year’s four season finished, another new year’s four season begins. So it is wrong and not fair to say the 2012 doomsday is predicted by I Ching.

Is there anything in the I Ching that can be associated with such end of world ideas?

The most relevant could be the “Supreme World Order principles” invented by Shao Yong of Sung Dynasty. Shao Yong is an expert of I Ching and he invented a time counting system dividing time into Yuan, Huai, Yun, Shi.

10,000 years ago humans began domesticating plants and animals. 

500 years ago we invented the printing press. 

100 years ago we began driving automobiles.

50 years ago we invented the computer.

30 years ago we landed on the moon.

The speed of change is rapid.  Population, computing power, speed of transport, the sheer amount of known information, and most other things that involve humans, are all increasing at an accelerating rate.

Maybe there will come a time when the rate of change will reach such a speed that change is all that will exist. Various fringe scientists have tried to calculate this point of infinity, giving us calculated dates ranging from 2010 to 2050. Dates that many of us will live to see. Perhaps the date is Dec 22, 2012.

About what may happen in 2012 they have this to say:

“Achievement of the zero state can be imagined to arrive in one of two forms. One is the dissolution of the cosmos in an actual cessation and unraveling of the natural laws, a literal apocalypse. The other possibility… the culmination of a human process, a process of tool making, which comes to completion in the perfect artifact: the monadic self, exteriorised, condensed, and visible in three dimensions; in alchemical terms, the dream of a union of spirit and matter.”

In the end, I would say. What is your interpretation?