The <i>I Ching</i> as a Potential Jungian Application: History and Practice

<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:p>Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung had a lifelong interest in the <jats:italic>I Ching</jats:italic> after discovering it in 1919. Jung’s interest in the <jats:italic>I Ching</jats:italic> is arguably more practical than purely theoretical or intellectual, and references to <jats:italic>I Ching</jats:italic> divination appear frequently in his various publications, seminars, letters and clinical practice records. After a few observations on the history of the study of the <jats:italic>I Ching</jats:italic> in China, the author categorizes Jung’s three uses of the <jats:italic>I Ching</jats:italic> as physical use (to preview future potentials of outer reality), psychological use (to reveal one’s psychological state), and psychical approach (to engage with the divine through “神”[“shen”, spiritual agencies]). Finally, the author discusses the current Jungian engagement by demonstrating clinical cases in contemporary times. Some Jungian analysts practise <jats:italic>I Ching</jats:italic> divination to obtain insights into the physical and psychological state of therapeutic relationships and for personal development. This paper is a historical and critical engagement of the Jungian practice of <jats:italic>I Ching</jats:italic> divination.</jats:p>