The Original Meaning of the Zhouyi (Zhouyi Benyi)

The text's governing premise is that 'the Zhouyi was originally a book for divination' (Yi benwei bushi'er zuo) [citation:1][citation:4]. Zhu Xi argues that Fuxi created the hexagrams to help all people—not only the moral elite—make decisions by accessing the incipient patterns (ji) of change, and that only later did Confucius and the Ten Wings articulate the moral philosophy implicit in this practice. What Zhu Xi rejects is the tendency, exemplified by Cheng Yi's commentary, to treat the Yi purely as a repository of moral principles divorced from its divinatory function [citation:4]. He also criticizes Han-dynasty 'Image and Number' interpreters for forced and unfounded analogies [citation:1]. The 'original meaning' is therefore the integration of divination and morality, not the suppression of one by the other.

Zhu Xi followed Lü Zuqian's arrangement of the ancient text, printing the hexagrams and oracular statements separately from the Ten Wings. His rationale was historical: Wang Bi had collated the appendices with the hexagrams, a practice that obscured the text's layered authorship and made it harder to grasp Fuxi's original intent [citation:8]. By restoring the ancient separation, Zhu Xi aimed to let readers encounter the Yi as the sages created it—first the divination core, then the moral commentary. The consequence, however, was that connections between the hexagrams and their commentaries became harder to see. Zhu Xi's own students ignored his arrangement, and most later editions of the Zhouyi Benyi use the collated format, meaning Zhu Xi's intended reading never became standard [citation:8].

Zhu Xi used Lü Zuqian's ancient Zhouyi as his base text, producing a twelve-juan edition that preserved the separation of classic and commentary. In the late Southern Song, Dong Kai divided the text and appended it to Cheng Yi's Yizhuan in four juan, and during the Ming Yongle period, when the Zhouyi Benyi became the sole examination text, a standalone four-juan edition was printed . The twelve-juan version is valued for its fidelity to Zhu Xi's original arrangement, while the four-juan version became the practical standard for examination candidates. Both circulated widely, and modern critical editions, such as the Phoenix Publishing House twelve-juan edition, restore the original structure with extensive collation .

The composition spanned over two decades. According to Bai Shouyi's research, Zhu Xi began drafting in 1175 and continued revising until the Qingyuan era (1195–1200), with the work reaching substantial completion by 1188, when Zhu Xi wrote that 'the Benyi is roughly complete' [citation:2][citation:6]. However, Zhu Xi continued to revise it until his death, and scholars regard it as not fully finalized. The text contains cross-references to the Yixue Qimeng (completed 1186), indicating that the Benyi was still being developed after that date [citation:2]. This unfinished character is significant: it reflects Zhu Xi's ongoing engagement with the Yi rather than a settled system.

The difference is methodological. Cheng Yi's Yizhuan follows the 'Meaning and Principle' (yili) approach, deriving moral guidance for the junzi from the text and largely ignoring divination. Zhu Xi respected Cheng Yi but argued that this approach missed the Yi's original function: Fuxi created the hexagrams so that all people, not just the moral elite, could consult them for guidance when their own resources were exhausted [citation:4]. Zhu Xi's commentary therefore reintegrates divination as the mechanism through which moral principle is accessed, rather than treating it as a primitive residue to be overcome. Qing scholar Diao Bao summarized the complementarity: Cheng's commentary provides the depth of principle, while Zhu Xi's provides the practical method of divination, and the two should be read together [citation:3].

Joseph A. Adler's 2020 translation, The Original Meaning of the Yijing: Commentary on the Scripture of Change (Columbia University Press), is the standard English edition [citation:10]. Adler provides a substantial introduction explaining Zhu Xi's hermeneutic principles, particularly the integration of divination and moral philosophy, and he translates Zhu Xi's commentary on the classic and selected appendices. A review in Dao notes that Adler's translation is 'an exemplary exercise in both hermeneutics and exegesis,' and that it faithfully reflects Zhu Xi's view that the meaning of the Yi emerges in the reader's personal encounter with the text [citation:10]. The translation does not include the full Ten Wings, focusing instead on Zhu Xi's commentary on the core divination text and key appendices.