ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author explores the processes of change and balance as reflected in the hexagrams for the contemporary reader. The hexagram pictures the ancient Chinese vessel, the Ting. The divided lines in the first and fifth positions are seen as the feet and the carrying handles of the Ting, respectively. The Ting was a ceremonial vessel, not used for ordinary cooking, and consequently, this hexagram symbolizes much more than might be immediately obvious. Human culture is virtually synonymous with the use of fire, for cooking, for agriculture, as a focus for social interaction, as a threat to large predators, and, perhaps most important of all, simply to light the darkness; consequently, Ting also refers to the growth of culture and civilization. In terms of this hexagram, we can shape our life into an ordinary cooking pot and live perfectly happily, a vessel for the transformation of the ordinary into the transcendental.
