否 → 噬嗑
Hexagram 12: Standstill → Hexagram 21: Biting Through
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 2 changing lines (lines 1, 5).
Line 1
初六 拔茅茹。以其彙。貞吉。亨。
Six at the beginning means: When ribbon grass is pulled up, the sod comes with it. Each according to his kind. Perseverance brings good fortune and success.
Line 5
九五 休否。大人吉。其亡其亡。繫于苞桑。
Nine in the fifth place means: Standstill is giving way. Good fortune for the great man. "What if it should fail, what if it should fail?" In this way he ties it to a cluster of mulberry shoots.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
伯蹇叔盲，足病難行；終日至暮，不離其鄉。
The elder brother is lame, the younger blind; feet ailing, travel is hard. From dawn to dusk they go; they cannot leave their village.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Heaven and earth refuse to communicate, and the elder brother limps while the younger brother is blind — legs diseased, movement impossible. From dawn to dusk they cannot leave their village. From Standstill to Biting Through, Pi's sealed stagnation meets the decisive bite of thunder and lightning that should break through obstruction. Yet the verse denies the breakthrough entirely: the lame and the blind are trapped, unable to move even one step beyond their home. Shi He demands sharp, judicial action — lightning clarity that bites through obstacles — but when the body itself is broken, no amount of decisiveness can compensate. The verse is Standstill's cruelest face: not just blocked roads but broken legs, not just darkness but blinded eyes.
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