A variation of the YELLOW RIVER DIAGRAM apparently arose in Central Africa.

It was preserved in the ancient divination system, IFA. The Odu of Ifa was considered a very sacred image and is reminiscent of the mandala. It was made of a calabash and had a lid. It contained four shallow depressions or small vessels. One contained a little charcoal, another contained chalk, another contained camwood and the fourth contained a little mud. Mud is a type of "earth," charcoal is a type of burnt woor or carbon, (traditionally asociated with "fire"), camwood is a substance consisting of a certain percentage of "water" and chalk is a soft, porous metal. So the Odu of Ifa was a representation of the Egyptian diagram called the PRINCIPLE OF OPPOSITES.

The illustration of the PRINCIPLE OF OPPOSITES DIAGRAM above appears in AFRICA by Dr. Yosef A. A. Ben Jochannan, Black Classic Press).

THE YELLOW RIVER DIAGRAM (below) can be found in most illustrated versions of the I CHING:

If the four outer (larger) numbers of Yellow River are placed diagonally with respect to the four inner numbers, then we obtain, what I call, the MAGIC SQUARE CIRCLE DIAGRAM below:

Pushing the numbers of the inner, diagonal square out towards the corners of the outer, dashed border square, the transformation becomes the figure below:

Depicted as a 3x3 square array, the MAGIC SQUARE CIRCLE looks like the array below:

We will define it to be the sequence 6,1,8,3,5,7,2,9 and, finally, 4, which traces out an "indented" circle around the sides of the 3x3 array.
If we use comments from the I CHING and FORMER HAN HISTORY in assigning qualities and/or sense values or directions to the numbers of the Magic Square Circle (which we just derived from the Yellow River Diagram), we will discover a similarity between the Principle of Opposites diagram and the Yellow River Diagram.

From the I CHING (see Blofeld's version), 7= mountain, 6=abyss (water), 8=yin (cold) and 1=yang (hot). In the FORMER HAN HISTORY, the following associations are made: Mercury=North=water, Jupiter=East=wood, Mars=South=fire, Saturn=center=earth and Venus=West=metal.
Further, in Blofeld's I CHING, lake=2, fire=3, thunder=4. If we think of rain when we think of thunder, then it is possible 4=water=Mercury=North. Also, from Number Theory, we know 9 is congruent to 1 modulo 8 (i.e., 9=1, in a number system with just 8 integral values). Another possible association is the following: during a flood, a moutain is dry. Applying these assumptions, we obtain the following diagram:

It is clear that, the number-element associations are ambivalent and interchangeable to to some degree, but, from almost any perspective, the two diagrams (the Magic Square Circle and the Yellow River Diagram) are basically similar.
Undoubtedly, the nature qualities, which were associated with the numbers gave a clue as to how the diagrams should be interpreted. In the next part of this paper CONTINUE, the key to this will be explained. Please visit my products? VIEW