Walking to work early one morning in 1992 I saw the setting moon two days after full, and the image of the Taiji Tu (yin / yang symbol) was clearly visible in its pattern of craters and "seas".
It may seem strange to see the Taiji Tu apparently inverted - with the bright mass sweeping under rather than over the dark as is usual in pictures of the Taiji Tu derived from the Ba Gua. Fortunately, this is not hard to explain although it may take a little mental gymnastics to imagine clearly...
The Ba Gua is a map of the ground: its circle is the horizon. You gaze down upon it as if you are up in the sky gazing down upon the earth. The bright part of the Ba Gua is to the south (the Ba Gua has a long association with the points of the compass in Feng Shui). Now, imagine you are back on the ground (still facing the bright south): you stand in the middle of a huge Ba Gua map that stretches as far as your eye can see.
Look up at the full moon sailing high in the sky in front of you. The moon seems to be getting larger... It is actually getting closer - and it is heading straight for you (thank heavens it is only a diaphonous disc rather than a solid ball of rock!). Its bright lower part sinks towards the southern horizon, its dark part looms overhead and disappears behind you: you are standing at its centre.
When it finally falls through you like the ghost of an autumn leaf, you look around and see that the moon's pattern of light and dark does indeed match the Early Heaven Ba Gua map. Congratulations, you have just brought a little bit of heaven down to earth!
Like finding a bright pebble on a beach, I treasured the moment I saw the lunar Taiji Tu, but didn't really know what to do about it (this was long before I dreamed of writing a book on any Chinese subject). But as I learned more about the Early Heaven tradition I came to see it in context, and it made perfect sense: this was the third event that finally launched me into the midst of the ancient controversy between Early Heaven and Later Heaven.
This key image of the moon and the Taiji Tu was chosen for the cover of The Early Heaven Oracle, which is the very first time to the best of my knowledge that this amazing celestial coincidence has been revealed to the public.
Which rather begs the question why was this simple association of the Early Heaven Ba Gua with the moon kept secret?
This is a mystery that goes to the very heart of our appreciation of the divine immanence in nature: is this merely a meaningless coincidence, or does this somehow set the seal on the cosmic "rightness" of Early Heaven wisdom?
Fu Xi's gua are constructed using binary logic, which enlightens our rational mind; and they correspond with a wide range of natural phenomena, which nurtures our bodies and strengthens our emotional wellbeing; but the sight of this beautiful orb shining in the heavens - with its mysterious pattern of light and shade - stimulates our emotions and touches our very soul.
I have no doubt that this vision of the union of the natural and the supernatural, must have had a profound impact on the ancients; and it can still inspire wonder today, decades after men first left their own marks on the moon's serene surface.
And how perfectly appropriate it is, of course, that the unity of all such opposites - and especially the cyclic rhythm of waxing and waning - are the key concepts at the very core of the Taiji Tu itself.
For additional information on the relevance of the moon to the Early Heaven sequence of gua, see Lunar Mysteries.
Full Moon picture reproduced with kind permission: © 2003 NASA Johnson Space Center - Earth Sciences and Image Analysis.
Early Heaven Oracle book cover reproduced with kind permision: © 2002 Rider Books.
© Ken Taylor 2002 - 2007.