1. Chinese Culture
凌海衡

2. Why this course? γνῶθι σεαυτόν: know thyself
inscribed in the pronaos (forecourt) of the Temple of Apollo at Delphi, an ancient Greek city on the slopes of Mount Parnassus; site of the oracle of Delphi

3. What to Learn I Ching, or The Book of Change (周易) Confucianism (孔孟程朱)
Taoism (老庄)
Budhism (肇论、坛经)
History (战国策、史记)
Others

4. How to Learn Attend classes; Read the reading materials;
Consult other references;
Take notes & write papers.

5. Chronology

7. Yi-Jing, or The Book of Change
Chinese philosophy (both Confucianism & Daoism) as deep thinking on the nature of the world and the nature of human self can be said to have begun with the formation of the text of Yi-Jing at the beginning of the Zhou dynasty in the early 12th century BCE.
The name suggests that it deals with all changes (易yi) in the world, thus covering both natural changes and changes introduced by human action.

8. From Divination to Philosophy
The disclosure of philosophical insights embodied in the texts of the Zhou-Yi transformed it from a text of divination into a text of philosophical wisdom.
This transformation is essential for understanding how the Zhou-Yi could be regarded as the forming of a system of ideas or views about the world and ourselves as human beings.

9. Yin & Yang
It concerns the genesis of the onto-cosmological world (nature) in terms of the movement and rest of yin and yang.
explaining all things in their formation and transformation
incorporating human beings as part & parcel of ontocosmological process of reality–realization
enabling human beings to actively change the world
forming the image-forms (trigrams/hexagrams guas 卦) and yaos (爻) in the Yi-Jing text.

10. Gua
The book consists of 64 hexagrams (gua) and related texts. The hexagrams, as combinations of two trigrams (also gua), are composed of six lines (yao) arranged one atop the other in vertical sequence and read from bottom to top.
Each line is either solid (yang —) or broken (yin --). The combinations are determined by the numerical manipulation of divining sticks, originally yarrow stalks, or milfoil蓍草.

11. The Eight Guas
Allegedly, a legendary ruler, Fu Xi (ca BCE), was responsible for the construction of this earliest form of Yijing.
These trigrams represent the eight basic natural elements: heaven (乾), earth (坤), water (坎), fire (离), wind (巽), thunder (震), mountain (艮), and lake (兑).
朱熹：乾三连，坤六断；震仰盂，艮覆碗；离中虚，坎中满；兑上缺，巽下断

12. The Eight Guas
On the level of natural representations, these eight trigrams stand for eight basic natural phenomena.
However, they also stand for other relations in a metaphorical sense.
E.g., in one of the Ten Wings, the Discussion of the Trigrams (说卦), the trigrams are associated with various things.

13. Constant flux, or Changes
These trigrams were conceived as images of all that happens in heaven and on earth. At the same time, they were held to be in a state of continual transition, one changing into another.
Attention centers not on things in their state of being, but upon their movements in change. They therefore are not representations of things as such but of their tendencies in movement.

14. Structure 1
Each hexagram is accompanied by a hexagram name (卦名), a hexagram statement (卦辞), and line statements (爻辞) for each of the six lines.
The line statements have a sequential or associational organization based on the general topic given in the Judgment (彖).
Each states a specific, differentiated instance or variation of the topic, followed by a charge or injunction that one should take some action or refrain from it and a final determination.

15. Duke Zhou’s Philosophy of Life
At this stage, Yijing emerged as a philosophy of life. It was no longer just a book for divination.
Each situation, symbolically represented by either the hexagram as a whole or a single line in the hexagram, signifies a moral situation in life.
The Judgment frequently depicts possible options in any given situation along with their possible outcomes.

16. Structure 2
The 2nd layer consists of another two parts: commentary on the Judgments called Tuanzhuan 彖传 and commentary on the abstract meanings or ‘Images” of the Judgments and the line statements called Xiangzhuan 象传.
The Judgments have “Great Images” (大象) -- the abstract meanings of hexagrams as whole entities -- and the line statements have “Little Images” (小象) -- the abstract meanings of individual lines.

17. Confucianist Philosophy
彖传 turned the mystical oracle nature of the ancient text into a philosophical exposition of various situations in life. It serves both as an analysis of the various contexts and as a discussion on the moral duties of individuals in these contexts.
象传 fully developed the sense of Nature's possessing moral attributes, or Nature's being symbolic representations of various moral attributes.

18. Ten Wings
The traditional format of Yijing divides the 彖传 and the 象传 each into two sections; together, they form the first four of the so-called Ten Wings (十翼) of the exegetical material included in the Classic o f Changes.
All Ten Wings are traditionally attributed to Confucius. However, individual Wings actually date from different periods, with some predating his time while others date from as late as the third century B.C.

19. Great Treatise
The Great Treatise (系辞传) received the most attention from Neo-Confucians.
This treatise is divided into two parts. It covers a wide range of topics, including the nature of Yijing, the method of divination, the social reforms made by ancient sages, and the history of human civilization.
It can be seen as one of the most important philosophical foundations for Neo-Confucianism.

20. In theory, The Book of Change, or Yijing, provides a profound cosmological foundation for Chinese philosophy.
In practice, Yijing was commonly used in divination, a process in which advice is given to a particular person in a particular situation on how to accomplish success and avoid disaster.
It also serves as the theoretical basis for Feng Shui, an art of the rearrangement of one's life and one's surroundings.