The two trigram arrangements
(Abstract)
The two main trigram arrangements are known as the “Anterior Heaven” and “Posterior Heaven”. To achieve a better understanding of these arrangements, the key issue is to grasp the primeval relationship between the famous yin-yang symbol located at the centre and the trigram representations in terms of yin and yang categories.
The deep study of both arrangements shows that they recover in fact three meanings:
- The “Anterior Heaven” arrangement symbolizes the Oneness (Tai-Chi) as well as the One within any potential polarity or the One in two.
- The “Posterior Heaven” arrangement refers to the “Primordial Androgyne” and shows how the feminine and the masculine are unified into the true man or how the transformation of two into one occurs.
- When the human has left the Centre for the periphery and not yet recovered the state of the true man, he goes round in circles and is no-one.
The two trigram arrangements may be represented in a single picture, where the “Cosmic Egg” occupies the Centre. When considered as an indivisible whole, the vertical cross-section becomes the symbol of Tai-Chi, the Oneness, which means prior to any distinction between yin and yang. Subsequent to it, within the manifestation world, the horizontal cross-section symbolizes the “Primordial Androgyne”.
This picture underlines the strong coherence of the trigram arrangements and, through it, of the Chinese tradition. It emphases the relationship between metaphysical and cosmological views, between the descent from Heaven to Earth, from yang to yin, linked to the “Anterior Heaven” arrangement and the ascent from Earth to Heaven, from yin to yang, related to the “Posterior Heaven” arrangement. The strong interdependency between both visions is reflected within the two trigram arrangements. The vertical axis of the “Posterior Heaven” arrangement is identical to the horizontal axis of the “Anterior Heaven” arrangement for all what is higher in the terrestrial order is lower in the celestial order.
The relation between the metaphysical and cosmological visions can also be represented by superposing trigrams from both arrangements. By superposing a trigram of the “Anterior Heaven” upon a trigram of the “Posterior Heaven”, we obtain the 64 hexagrams of the I Ching. The first and last hexagrams, composed respectively of 6 solid and 6 open lines, correspond to the fullness of yang (identified to Heaven) and yin (identified to Earth). The other hexagrams combine yang and yin in various ways and take place between these two extremes. They represent as so many degrees on the way towards the Principle manifestation (the descent from yang to yin) and the return from the manifested to the undifferentiated Principle (the ascent from yin to yang).
Trigrams and hexagrams teach us that our ordinary human being condition, mostly yin, has to move in yang direction. Our future stands in our lost natural state of “Primeval Being”, where we all come from and which may be rediscovered at any place and any moment.
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