The Essence of the 'Great Treatise A': A Philosophical Inquiry into the Gentleman's Establishment of Life and the Order of the *Yi*
This article deeply interprets the core proposition from the 'Great Treatise A'—'That which the gentleman dwells in and finds peace is the order of the *Yi*.' It examines how the gentleman, by internalizing the Way of Heaven and Earth and utilizing the *Book of Changes* as the foundation for establishing his life, achieves a state of 'auspiciousness without detriment' through observing the images and contemplating the textual explanations, situated within the Pre-Qin context and the Confucian tradition.
V. Historical Example: King Wen Imprisoned at Youli and Developing the Yi
The historical figure who best embodies the spirit of "That wherein the Gentleman resides and finds ease is the Arrangement of the Yi," is King Wen imprisoned at Youli (羑里) while developing the Zhou Yi.
The Basic Annals of the Zhou (Shi Ji, Zhou Ben Ji 史记·周本纪) records:
"The Western Chief had reigned for fifty years. While imprisoned at Youli, he is said to have augmented the Eight Trigrams of the Yi into the Sixty-four Hexagrams."
Moreover, Sima Qian's Letter to Ren An (written during the transition to the Han Dynasty) notes the established tradition that "King Wen, being imprisoned, elaborated the Zhou Yi."
King Wen was imprisoned by King Zhou of Yin at Youli, an extremely constrained situation. Trapped in prison, facing imminent execution, and with his political future dark, King Wen did not succumb to despair or collapse. Instead, he devoted himself to studying the Yi, overlapping the eight trigrams of Fuxi to form the sixty-four hexagrams, and appending judgments to them.
Why could King Wen maintain inner composure and creative power in such dire circumstances$25 Precisely because "That wherein the Gentleman resides and finds ease is the Arrangement of the Yi." The Arrangement of the Yi—the fundamental order of Heaven and Earth—provided him with a place for spiritual settling. By studying the Yi, he understood the laws governing the movement of the Heavenly Way, realized the principle that adversity reaches its extreme only to reverse (no situation is permanently bad), and thus could calmly await the shifting of the Heavenly Mandate while engaging in great academic creation.
The Wen Yan Zhuan on the Kun Hexagram states:
"A family that accumulates virtue will have abundant blessings; a family that accumulates non-virtue will have abundant calamities. A minister murdering his sovereign, a son murdering his father—this is not the work of a single day or a single morning; the process comes gradually, arising from the failure to distinguish early on. The Yi says: 'Stepping on frost, hard ice is coming.' This speaks of sequence/compliance."
King Wen deeply understood that the decline of Yin "is not the work of a single day," and that the rise of Zhou was likewise a gradual process. His seven years in Youli were spent using the Arrangement of the Yi as his spiritual residence, patiently waiting for the transfer of the Heavenly Mandate.
The Zuo Zhuan, 15th Year of Duke Xi (僖公十五年) records that before the battle at Han Pass, Duke Mu of Qin sought divination regarding the campaign and obtained Jian (蹇, Insolvency) changing to Kui (睽, Opposition). The diviner Bu Tutu interpreted it, saying: "Auspicious. Crossing the river, the host's chariots will be defeated." This later occurred as prophesied. This shows that in the Pre-Qin era, Yi divination was indeed used for major decisions, and the accuracy of the divination depended on whether the diviner truly understood the Arrangement of the Yi.