I-ching is one of the classical (ching) Chinese books dating back to Fu Hsi and the Yin dynasty, about 2900 BCE. It was used mainly as divination means, that is a device to predict future events.The book escaped the arson of books ordered by Ch'in Shih-huang-ti Emperor, in 213 AD.
I-ching is translated usually by Book of Changes, though the word "book" should be taken in the sense of a "holy book" in the Western cultures.
The book is a collection of 64 short essays assigned to 64 figures formed each of 6 continuous and/or broken lines (____ or __ __). These figures are called hexagrams.
Each hexagram corresponds to a specific life situation, therefore when consulting I-ching as oracle it leads one to his/her specific life situation and its development in time.