泰 → 蒙
Hexagram 11: Peace → Hexagram 4: Youthful Folly
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 3 changing lines (lines 1, 3, 6).
Line 1
初九 拔茅茹。以其彙。征吉。
Nine at the beginning means: When ribbon grass is pulled up, the sod comes with it. Each according to his kind. Undertakings bring good fortune.
Line 3
九三 无平不陂。无往不復。艱貞无咎。勿恤其孚。于食有福。
Nine in the third place means: No plain not followed by a slope. No going not followed by a return. He who remains persevering in danger Is without blame. Do not complain about this truth; Enjoy the good fortune you still possess.
Line 6
上六 城復于隍。勿用師。自邑告命。貞吝。
Six at the top means: The wall falls back into the moat. Use no army now. Make your commands known within your own town. Perseverance brings humiliation.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
葛藟蒙棘，花不得實；讒佞為政，使恩壅塞。
Kudzu vines smother the thornbush; blossoms bear no fruit. Slanderers govern; benevolence is blocked and choked.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Earth above heaven, Peace overturned by parasitic growth. Kudzu and creeping vines smother the thorny shrub, choking its blossoms so that no fruit can form. The image is political: slanderers and flatterers have seized governance, blocking the flow of royal benevolence until it is entirely dammed. The vine-choked plant recalls the Shijing's 'Ge Lei' imagery of entangling growth, but here the entanglement is malicious — counsel corrupted at the source. From Peace to Youthful Folly, the transformation shows how a spring emerging beneath a mountain can be muddied before it ever reaches open ground. When sycophants obstruct the channel between ruler and people, even genuine grace cannot penetrate.
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