Rudhyar: Formula of Change

We referred to the Yi King of ancient China and to its “Formula of Change” based on the interplay of the two cosmic polarities Yang and Yin. As already mentioned, such a formula is of special interest to us because it had obvious astrological origins. Moreover it is a characteristic expression of a philosophy of time, such as we postulated in a previous chapter as the necessary background for any consistent and valid astrological thought. Astrology is philosophically meaningless unless it rests on a thorough understanding of cycles and of the creative potency of every moment — especially those “seed-moments” which become such by reason of their being the points of departure of cycles. The “Formula of Change” of the Yi King is a cyclic formula, which purports to determine symbolically the universal and essential structure of all cycles; better still, of the Cycle or of cyclicity. As all life-processes are cyclic — in essence, if not in outer appearance — such a formula becomes the basic law of all life-processes. Thus a truly universal synthesis of being and becoming is reached — a synthesis probably grander and more absolute, in its symbolical applicability, than that contemplated by Einstein through his “unified field theory” reducing all natural phenomena to a simple law.