The Primary Way

<p><b>A unique work on the underlying ontology, cosmology, and moral philosophy of the </b><b><i>Yijing.</i></b></p><p>In <i>The Primary Way</i>, the distinguished scholar of Chinese philosophy Chung-ying Cheng synthesizes his lifetime of work on the <i>Yijing</i>, also known as the <i>I Ching</i> or <i>Book of Changes</i>. Cheng offers a systematic engagement with the classic Chinese text as a philosophy that is still valuable and relevant today. In contemporary philosophical terms, Cheng has developed the ontological hermeneutics of the <i>Yijing</i> as well as its philosophical methodology of symbolic reference in a holistic and onto-generative system of trigrams and hexagrams. The book is organized around eight themes that illuminate Cheng's interpretation of the <i>Yijing</i> as a philosophy for creative human action and transformation. He demonstrates how the philosophy of change in the <i>Yijing</i> embodies early Chinese ontology, cosmology, epistemology, and virtue ethics in the interpretation of divinatory judgments. Cheng's work shows how the philosophy of change contains a vision of humanity as creatively related to heaven and earth, and how it gives positive meaning to any change as part of a ceaseless creativity. With this understanding, it enables humanity to develop its potential as a partner of heaven and earth.</p>