The Complete I Ching ― 10th Anniversary Edition: The Definitive Translation by Taoist Master Alfred Huang Paperback – November 17, 2010

I 'tripped' over the Wilhelm version (translation of Chinese to German to English) of the Ching when I was 16 years old and was entranced - that was almost 40 years ago. It takes half an hour to learn to throw coins/yarrow sticks, but it took (for me) a subsequent 15 years to penetrate the I Ching. I have read/perused almost every English translation of the Ching since (excluding the New Age fringe nonsense) and found that the Wilhelm translation (with its poetry) and Karcher's (with its adaption to more Western thinking) were the best in combination ... until Huang's translation/interpretation. This is the definitive work for the serious English reader.The Ching does not even adequately translate into modern Chinese - so unless you understand pre-Bronze or Zhou Dynasty classical Chinese you are left with translations/interpretations of your particular native tongue. Huang sagely points out that the Ching - to be adequately mastered - needs to be taught by a master. (No wonder it took me 15 years to penetrate and the learning is still ongoing; it is learning of yourSelf, the human world within which you interact, a meditation, and a means for Confucian Enlightenment). I make the Ching a daily exercise/meditation, simply asking it to read the current energies. It is an oracle of wisdom, not a psychic tool.To consult the Ching is not simply a matter of throwing coins/yarrow sticks and reading the commentaries and moving lines; it takes great patience to penetrate the wisdom of a given gua (hexagram), its moving lines, the yin and yang tensions, positions of the same, and subsequent changes are transfering to the person who appoaches the Ching. Often, the (open ended) question posed is not answering what you think it is; often it is revealing your state of mind/attitude in asking the question; sometimes it is describing the state of mind/intentions of the person who is a second or third party to the question - one must approach cautiously and with a pure heart (see the Initial Six in the 64th gua). Huang is aware of all this (read intro sections) and has taken great pains to accurately as possible present the INTIMATIONS OF IMAGARY that the original text presents. He states that the original text has approx only 4,900 characters - and if anyone has a passing knowledge of Chinese, they will know that these 4,900 characters are the sum total of a WRITTEN/TEXT BASED explanation of all divine and human knowledge available on earth - in what would be tantamount in English to a child's reader. IT IS IN THE IMAGERY - not the explanation/interpretation - WHICH TRANSFERS THE WISDOM TO S/HE WHO CONSULTS. An impossible job to translate - but Huang has done a brilliant piece of intuitive scholarship by transfering as best as ANYONE would be able the ancient imagary into a foreign language on every level. Meaning: not only text, but a completely different way of thinking as we are conditioned to as Westerners.If you have some decades to spare, wish to be enlightened, and have an affinity to Neo-Confucian/Daoist thought - this is the book!

I've used the Bollinger's publication of the I Ching as an oracle many years ago. In beginning to read this publication, the author provides instructions and guidance for the use of this publication with reverence and a devotional attitude towards its use, considering it a sacred text similar to the Christian's Holy Bible. He also says it should only be used for "important decisions" so as not to diminish the value of reverence and devotion for the oracle. If used as he prescribes, I'd say it will be a useful tool as a guide where life decisions are involved, but the learning curve will be extended due to using it only for "important decisions" which for me certainly limits my interactions with it. You will only come to truly understand the value of this oracle by repeated use of it, and reflection upon its information as it applies to your own life experiences. Therefore, as a student, I'd recommend using it daily and even multiple times a day to become familiar with its use and how the information applies to your day-to-day life experiences.

Many years ago, having been attracted to the I Ching through the Wilhelm translation with a bit of Blofeld thrown in, I had a chance to do a semester tutorial in the first two hexagrams, reading the original under a Chinese scholar of classical Chinese. It was quite wrenching to realize that my "understanding" of the work had been entirely colored by Western thought and cultural concerns. Wilhelm sticks very closely to the original, including the many layers of commentary, but he makes it easy to read our own cultural meaning into it. For example, calling the first hexagram, "The Creative," can make it seem like some sort of Platonist or neo-Platonist, mystical Form, principle or archetype, but it sounds quite a lot more practical, descriptive, and straightforward with a Chinese explanation. There is still a lot of complexity and depth, but it isn't like what one finds in Western philosophy, psychology or metaphysics. Huang warns against this problem in his introduction, describing his own dissatisfaction with previous translations, and his explanations of the hexagrams sound very much like those of my former professor in their character. It's a Chinese book that's not that easy to understand without help, and unless one has grown up in a traditional Chinese culture, it's extremely useful to have it explained by someone who has received a traditional grounding in it. Huang's explanations of the challenges in approaching the original without this help, even for educated Chinese people in a Chinese culture that still reveres the I Ching, match my own experience in this and other Eastern traditions.Huang helps us get past inadvertently Westernizing our understanding of the work extremely well, and he does it by interspersing his explanations with the text. You can tell easily enough what is the original and what is Huang's commentary, but that means that it's not a "pure" translation like Wilhelm, where apart from the introductory materials, footnotes and so on, you see only the translated original. That makes this version very useful in divination, since everything for the hexagram is in one place and Huang's comments are very helpful in relating the text to your specific inquiry, but if you want only the "real" I Ching and no modern interpretation, then this isn't the version for you. For that, Wilhelm is still the gold standard.