The I Ching, or Book of Changes

New York: Pantheon Books, 1950. First Edition. Near fine/good. 2 vols. First edition in English, first printing. Foreword by Carl G. Jung. Original cloth, near fine, in chipped and rubbed dustjackets, with a small repair to the spine of volume 1, worn slipcase. From many varieties, these jackets have rear flap ads reassuringly dated “1950” and married reprints don’t. The I Ching is the most venerable masterpiece in all of Chinese Literature with all you can handle on multiple levels including a fortune telling game for the sleeping uninitiated and a stairway into the mind of Confucius for the conscious and awakened. The origins of I Ching were as a divination text from the 10th-4th century BC. This edition was originally translated into German by Wilhelm in 1924, then into English here by Baynes; considered the first accurate and culturally sympathetic translation. One of the oldest continuous philosophical and divinatory traditions, a text that bridges ancient Chinese cosmology with practical wisdom over the course of three millennia. As both an oracle and a philosophical treatise, it embodies the fundamental Chinese concept of change as the only constant in existence, offering a systematic approach to understanding the dynamic interplay between opposing forces (yin and yang) that govern all phenomena. Its influence extends far beyond divination into Chinese philosophy, literature, politics, and daily life, making it one of the most consulted books in human history and a cornerstone text for understanding Chinese thought, from Confucianism to Taoism.