佛祖統紀 43.22

43.22

The author remarks: The 'Appended Phrases' say: 'The River brought forth the Chart'—this indicates its name. 'Multiplying and grouping in fives to change and interweaving its numbers'—this indicates its substance. This is the text in which the Master openly displayed the Yellow River Chart. In Han times there was a book discussing the Yellow River Chart that said: 'The Great One took it to traverse the Nine Palaces; the four cardinal and four intercardinal directions are all fifteen.' This is the detailed presentation of the numbers of the Yellow River Chart in the Apocrypha to the Changes (Yici). At the time of the Five Dynasties, there was a man in monk's garb who wore hemp; having marvelously penetrated the Way of the Changes, he first revealed the secret of the Yellow River Chart and transmitted it to Xiyi [Chen Tuan]. Xiyi first wrote the formula to transmit it to the world. Yet people of the world can only repeat Xiyi's words, without knowing that their meaning fundamentally derives from the 'Appended Phrases' and the Apocrypha to the Changes. If one now takes the composed formula, it tallies above with the text of the Nine Palaces and fifteen in the Apocrypha to the Changes; and if one takes the Apocrypha to the Changes to reverently consult the explanation of 'multiplying and grouping in fives to change' in the 'Appended Phrases', they completely correspond. The text of the 'Appended Phrases' and apocrypha is brief and veiled, hence ordinary people cannot comprehend it; only the Hemp-Clothed [Master] awakened to this marvel after two thousand years—this was surely bestowed by Heaven! (The texts of the River and Luo are now seen before the Book of Changes.)