謙 → 蠱
Hexagram 15: Modesty → Hexagram 18: Work on the Decayed
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 2 changing lines (lines 2, 6).
Line 2
六二 鳴謙。貞吉。
Six in the second place means: Modesty that comes to expression. Perseverance brings good fortune.
Line 6
上六 鳴謙。利用行師。征邑國。
Six at the top means: Modesty that comes to expression. It is favorable to set armies marching To chastise one's own city and one's country.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
留仲叔季，日暮寢寐；羸臥失限，虐我具囊。衘卻道傍。
Liu, Zhong, and Shuji; at dusk they lie down to sleep. Weary and bedridden past the appointed hour; they ransack my bags. Abandoned by the roadside.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Earth holds the mountain in stillness, but the household is dissolving. The brothers — eldest, second, third, youngest — linger until nightfall and take to their beds. Weakened and bedridden, they lose their boundaries; their stores are plundered, and they collapse by the roadside with goods clenched in their teeth. The descent is physical and social: a family of brothers reduced to exhaustion, robbery, and displacement. From Modesty to Work on the Decayed, wind blows beneath the mountain, stirring up corruption that has accumulated in stagnant places. The transformation diagnoses what happens when a family's internal discipline collapses: modest circumstances become decayed ones. Work on the Decayed demands that someone stir the rot and rebuild, but this verse captures the moment before renewal — the nadir of disorder.
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