Customer Reviews

The Authentic I Ching: The Essential Guide to Reading and Using the I Ching

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I bought "The Authentic I Ching" based on the other review found here and found it interesting, though it seems to contain errors. For example,the author describes a way to determine trigrams by calculating numbers but when you check his math his answers aren't right (check pages 73, 90, 96, etc).
Also, on page 66, the authors use an example from the book "Three Kingdoms." The heading entitled "Case 3. The Death of a Martial God," He states Master Yu Fan (Actually "Lu" Fan) cast hexagram number 60 with changing lines and states that Lu Fan thought General Guan would be killed two days later.
Actually, if you read San Guo Yan Yi (Three Kingdoms) the hexagram cast was #7 (earth over water) and Lu Fan said it signifies "an enemy fleeing northwest..."
Though General Guan does get captured and dies, it appears to me the author twisted a story and changed the trigrams to fit his needs.

He also gives examples of prediction based on events that already happened. Well, hindsight is easy. However, when he discusses that all presidents since Lincoln who are elected in a 20 year cycle have died he doesn't take a venture at what will happen to Bush. I'd be more impressed with the author if he made a prediction - before something happened instead of after.

Last of all, the authors give email addresses to contact them but the Chinese author's email addresses are no good and the English author doesn't respond. So much for answering questions.

As I said, interesting and potentially valuable information but with mistakes in the book you may waste your time and money reading it.

I recently purchased this version of the I Ching and am intrigued by the ability to do readings based upon the date & time of an event or meeting. I've applied it to two recent concerns and received interesting, thought-provoking answers which were in accordance with my intuition.

The main problem I have with the methods described in this book is that they are quite time-consuming and tedious for a person who is not mathematically oriented or skilled. I hope to improve my understanding of the methodology by practice so that I can make more use of this version in the future.

Also, the presentation of the 64 hexagrams at the end of the book is quite simplified. I would advise anyone using this book to consult other, more detailed versions of the I Ching for further interpretation after obtaining the primary hexagram, changing line, and secondary hexagram with this book.

Im sorry michael but maybe you have no background of the I ching calculations. The problems with the pages you mention are that, they were dividing the numbers according to the number and has a remainder. It is impossible for you to calculate the I ching in decimals. As i have some feng shui background and i ching masters to assist me it is the way of calculating. I wish i could contact you but some how amazon does not let me. Well hopefully they send this to you and remove your post because it is nonsense.

This book is the best book out there for learning the I ching. It gives you three methods of prediction. No other book has this. It has broaden my understanding it and has helped me throughout. I deeply recommend it. 100% guarantee. I pity the author and for the people who have read the review before mine. It will discourage you but ill tell you if you dont know how to calculate the number you can always email me howe_85@yahoo.co.uk

Congradulations to Wang Yang and Jon Sandifer for writing a clear, user-friendly book on classic and powerful I Ching prediciton methods. This is the first book that allows the western to apply these methods immediately. This is an outstanding book, revealing professional level I Ching divination and theory. I recommend this book to anybody interested in Taoist Arts and Chinese Metaphysics.

This is the best book in English on this topic.

David Twicken
www.healingqi.com