Jiegua is the 60th hexagram, and the traditional Chinese character of Jiegua is Jietou, which means bamboo festival and abstinence. "Shuo Wen Jie Zi" says: "Festival is called Bamboo Festival." Bamboo is used for restriction. After the festival divination, "Huan" is scattered, and things cannot be separated forever, so we must control it. Therefore, festival divination is just the inversion of festival divination, that is, Shui Ze Festival, with water above and water below. The whole divination is like the water in the swamp is restricted by the fence around the swamp. The water can't overflow, which is control.
Oracle Bone Inscriptions with the word "Jie" looks like a person kneeling on the ground, which is a gift from the ancients. Therefore, after the festival, it becomes etiquette, which is linked to the ceremony, that is, the "ceremony" of Confucianism, benevolence, righteousness, propriety and wisdom. "The Analects of Confucius Learning": "It is not feasible to know harmony without courtesy." Know peace, but you can't control it according to the ceremony, and it won't work. In Book of Rites Quli Shang, it is said that "the ceremony should not exceed the festival", which means that the ceremony should not violate the golden mean, indicating that everything starts from the etiquette, which originates from the golden mean, so the festival divination is actually about the golden mean.
Let's look at the hexagrams first: chastity, constancy, and bitterness cannot be faithful.
Festival divination thrives, but if you are too restrained, you can't keep the right path.
The biggest difference between people and animals is that people know etiquette, know how to control and stop, and "stop with courtesy when falling in love"; However, if it is excessive, it is not desirable. The "bitter festival" here refers to excessive restraint. So festivals are a moderate adjustment. If it exceeds the moderate limit, it will become a "bitter festival" and the people will suffer. This is not feasible. The antonym of "bitter festival" is "sweet festival", and the slogan of the Ninth Five-Year Plan is "sweet festival": moderation of sweetness and happiness.
What exactly is moderation? Restrain one's desire, behavior, possession. If you control your property too much, you will be called stingy. I remembered the story of Yan Jiansheng recorded in The Scholars: Yan Jiansheng never died. He held out two fingers, but his eyes were wide open. No matter what his family said, he kept his eyes open, but he didn't put down his fingers or close his eyes. At this moment, his wife suddenly understood and immediately said, "You mean there are still two wicks burning in the lamp?" So he put out a wick and Yan Jian died. This is called "bitter festival", which is too stingy and undesirable. So divination is to tell us how to control it appropriately.
"Xun Chuan" explains:
Xun said: Jie, perseverance, rigidity and softness, but rigidity wins. Bitterness cannot be true, and its way is poor. It is said that we should take risks, have moral integrity and be positive. The festival of heaven and earth is completed at four o'clock, and it will not harm money or people.
"Jie, perseverance, rigidity and softness, but rigidity wins": Why does Jie Gua flourish? Because there is a difference between fortitude and suppleness, and Yang is in the middle. This is from the perspective of divination, because divination is changed from Thai hexagrams: Thai hexagrams are three yang in the bottom and three yin in the top. After becoming a hexagram, 93 of the three rigid hexagrams rose to the fifth place, becoming 95 hexagrams and soft hexagrams (Yin hexagrams). Six or five of the three yin hexagrams fell to the third place, and they became the six or three hexagrams of festival divination, living with Gang hexagrams. Therefore, the result of separation is that masculinity and femininity are mixed together, and the two middle positions (two and five) are just stubborn, which means that masculinity is in the middle and the middle way is obtained, which means that the middle way should be moderate, neither too much nor too little. At the same time, combining rigidity with softness also means that etiquette is formulated from men's and women's lives, which is in line with human feelings and is appropriate.
"If you are bitter, you can't be chaste, and the road is poor": If you are too temperate, you can't keep the right path, because the road ahead is already very poor. Explain that the doctrine of the mean goes too far, and everything will do the opposite. Everyone should stand up against this restraint. What do you need to do?
"Take risks when you are in office, be thrifty when you are in office, and be upright when you communicate": Control yourself with joy, control yourself at the right time, and take the upright road, and you will prosper. "Say" (joy) refers to the conversion of the next hexagram, because the conversion of the hexagram is happy; And "danger" refers to the divination of the diviner, which is a kind of danger. This is an appeal for everyone to use joy and heartfelt control. This is what the Ninth Five-Year Plan said, which is conducive to mobilizing everyone's enthusiasm and overcoming difficulties and obstacles.
"The four seasons of heaven and earth are festivals, which are controlled by festivals, and do not harm money or people": Heaven and earth are temperate, and the cycle of four seasons is thus formed. If we make laws and regulations according to etiquette, we won't waste money or hurt people. This sentence says that human nature comes from heaven, and heaven should be restrained to form four seasons, and human nature should also be restrained to protect the people and gather wealth.
Xiang Chuan explained:
The elephant said: there is water on the river, festival. A gentleman talks about virtue by measuring several degrees.
"There is water on the river, Jie": The divination of Jie is that there is water on the swamp, that is, water flows in the swamp, and the swamp has a moderate effect on water. This is what we call "saving water" today. How can we save water? First of all, we should gather it together in ponds and swamps, just like enclosing swamps with dams to limit it, so that water will not be wasted. This is the golden mean. "A gentleman talks about virtue by quantity": a gentleman should make etiquette according to the divinatory symbols of festivals and also comment on virtue. The front is biased towards the law and the back is biased towards morality. Law and morality complement each other. They are all norms, which are used to regulate and control people's behavior. Only in this way can the whole society be orderly and the people live and work in peace and contentment.