隨 → 未濟
Hexagram 17: Following → Hexagram 64: Before Completion
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 4 changing lines (lines 1, 2, 5, 6).
Line 1
初九 官有渝。貞吉。出門交有功。
Nine at the beginning means: The standard is changing. Perseverance brings good fortune. To go out of the door in company Produces deeds.
Line 2
六二 係小子。失丈夫。
Six in the second place means: If one clings to the little boy, One loses the strong man.
Line 5
九五 孚于嘉。吉。
Nine in the fifth place means: Sincere in the good. Good fortune.
Line 6
上六 拘係之。乃從維之。王用亨于西山。
Six at the top means: He meets with firm allegiance And is still further bound. The king introduces him To the Western Mountain.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
江河變服，淫湎無側；高位顛崩，寵祿反覆。
Rivers change their garments; excess and indulgence know no bounds. High positions crash and topple -- favor and fortune turn on themselves.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Thunder rests within the lake, but the rivers have changed their course and donned alien garments. Excess and indulgence know no restraint; those in high positions topple and collapse, favor and status reverse themselves overnight. The 'rivers changing clothes' is a striking image of natural order perverted — waterways abandoning their channels, the landscape itself in moral disarray. Drunkenness (淫湎) compounds the chaos: the ruler follows pleasure instead of duty. From Following to Before Completion, fire sits above water in Wei Ji — everything is in the wrong position, nothing has crossed over to fulfillment. The verse is Wei Ji at its starkest: following disorder to its conclusion, where even the elemental forces have traded places and no resolution is in sight.
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