About the Author
Carol K. Anthony; Hanna Moog
Ms. Anthony began her study of the I Ching in 1971, during a mid-life crisis. She describes this time as of sufficient difficulty to have made her open and receptive when a friend introduced the I Ching to her. She found that it immediately spoke to her on several levels of awareness, and taught her to meditate in an entirely unique way that helped her understood more clearly what the hexagrams were saying. She began to keep notes of these understandings. More than 7 years later, these notes became a complete set. Two experiences in meditation guided her to publish them under the title, A Guide to the I Ching, and to found Anthony Publishing Company in 1979. She very quickly experienced that her book filled a unique need for people who were trying to understand the I Ching’s counsel; it remains today a continuing success. The I Ching has continued to be her teacher and guide for all aspects of her life.
Born Carol Kessler in West Virginia, Ms. Anthony attended Ward-Belmont College in Nashville and the State University of Iowa, in Iowa City, majoring in English and Creative Writing. She has lived most of her adult life in Stow, Massachusetts, where she spent some time writing as a journalist and editorial writer for the local newspaper, and raising her family of four children, who, together with her seven grandchildren, still live nearby.
Hanna Moog, b. 1946, has been a translator of English books on the I Ching into German, before she put out a collection of essays under the title Leben mit dem I Ging. Erfahrungen aus Kunst, Therapie, Beruf und Alltag. ("Living with the I Ching. Experiences in the Arts, Therapy, and Professional and Everyday Life," Diederichs, 1996). She also contributed as a translator and commentator to the book I Ging, Das Orakel- und Weisheitsbuch Chinas. ("I Ching, The Oracle and Wisdom Book of China." Knaur, 1994).
Ms. Moog, who has a master’s degree in National Economics, and diplomas in French and English, came to the I Ching in 1982 during a personal crisis. Although she had no one to teach her the I Ching, she allowed it to speak to her feelings. "I was deeply touched by its answers. I realized that no human being would have been able to characterize, as it did, my desperate situation so perfectly. At the same time, it gave me the deep certainty that there was something good in my life waiting to be discovered...something that meant growth, and a new kind of life; something that would truly fulfill me."
Consulting the Richard Wilhelm translation of the I Ching daily, she felt that she often only got a glimpse of what it was saying, but she decided to keep her mind open so that a deeper understanding could take place through experience.
Her dedication to the I Ching began to open more and more doors to being invited to speak and write about it. In 1985 she became a free lance editor for Eugen Diederichs Verlag, the company that had first published the Wilhelm translation, specializing in editing books and translations on the I Ching, Asian philosophy, and mythology.
An extraordinary dream, several years later, encouraged her to teach others what she had learned. This marked the beginning of her long-standing activities as an I Ching teacher, giving lectures and seminars in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.
Her inquisitive attitude and ever-open mind finally led Ms. Moog to move to the United States and join forces with Ms. Anthony, in 1998, and to help found The I Ching Institute in Stow, Massachusetts, where both women conduct seminars and new researches into the I Ching.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
The I Ching as a Book of Philosophy About the Cosmic Way
The entire I Ching is comprised of the answers of the oracle to human questions about what is in harmony with the Cosmos, and what is not. The answers were communicated to the recipients as a basic Yes to what was in harmony with the Cosmic Way, and a basic No to what was not in harmony with it. Thus the philosophy written within the I Ching developed from human thought about life as it was put to the test of the oracle. What emerged originally from this communication was a view of the Cosmos as a system of harmony which benefits everything that thinks and acts in accord with it, while reacting with Fate (adversity) to all that sets itself in opposition to that harmony. Being in harmony was expressed throughout the I Ching by the words "good fortune" and "success," whereas thinking and acting in ways that were discordant had the prognosis of "misfortune," or "remorse."
However, over the centuries, the oracle came to be overwritten, particularly by scholars of the Confucian school, who subjected it to what Joseph Campbell called "a forest of pencils."* Their overwriting added many contradictions to the I Ching text. These additions reflected the man-made order and the values of feudalism.
This new version of the I Ching is radically different from the traditional versions, in that the contradictions created by this overwriting, have been identified and separated from the oracle text. The manner in which this was done, was through consulting the Sage, using the rtcm, as to what the Cosmic meanings of the hexagrams were. The Sage has helped us to clearly identify the ideas and language of the feudal mindset that characterized ancient China, but which have also been carried over to most of today’s cultures. This mindset differs sharply from the Cosmic view illustrated in the various hexagrams. The advantage for the reader who learns how to use the new method of communicating with the Sage, is that he can verify for himself whether the Cosmic view we have shown here, is correctly rendered. (See p. 736, Using the Retrospective-Three-Coin Method, or rtcm.) For our part, we have used this method to check nearly every line and word, as to whether we were communicating the Sage’s message correctly.
This version of the I Ching, then, is the result of four years of asking thousands of questions. Our questioning followed one principle: were we understanding it correctly? When the answer was often No, we continued questioning until it responded that we had understood correctly. The answers corrected and enlarged the text. In regard to the two primary hexagrams, 1 and 2, it gave us a completely new understanding. It also explained why they, as written, contained misconceptions, and how these misconceptions had come about. It showed us how they are the very same misconceptions that are found in the major world philosophies, and to some extent, in the major world religions.
It removed from our own minds misunderstandings that have stood in the way of our finding, exploring, and developing the wonders of our own natures. Our impression grew that it wanted to liberate us, and humans generally, from the mindset of the "young fool," which reflects our training to be shepherded throughout life by human authorities, to help us grow up into fully responsible, fully realized beings.
Despite all our sincere intentions, the nature of communicating with the oracle is such that however many questions one asks, and however careful one is to clarify to the best of one’s ability the answers, there remain always some key questions one has failed to ask: questions that are not yet within one’s grasp. As we went along, we believe we became more skilled in asking these, but as the student of the Sage grows in his perspective, the questions he asks are always from this new platform of understanding. Important unasked questions will certainly occur to one or another reader. He now has in his grasp the same methods we have used, to ask his own questions.
Footnote: * "...all of the myths (or rather, as we now have them, moralizing anecdotes) of the Chinese golden age have to be recognized as the productions rather of a Confucian forest of pencils than of any ‘good earth’ or ‘forest primeval.’" "Oriental Mythology: The Masks of God" by Joseph Campbell (New York, Viking Penguin, 1962), p. 380.
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