噬嗑 → 萃
Hexagram 21: Biting Through → Hexagram 45: Gathering Together
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 3 changing lines (lines 1, 5, 6).
Line 1
初九 履校滅趾。无咎。
Nine at the beginning means: His feet are fastened in the stocks, So that his toes disappear. No blame.
Line 5
六五 噬乾肉。得黃金。貞厲。无咎。
Six in the fifth place means: Bites on dried lean meat. Receives yellow gold. Perseveringly aware of danger. No blame.
Line 6
上九 何校滅耳。凶。
Nine at the top means: His neck is fastened in the wooden cangue, So that his ears disappear. Misfortune.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
烏孫氏女，深目黑醜；嗜欲不同，過時無偶。
The Wusun woman, deep-set eyes and dark complexion; tastes and desires differ from ours -- past her time, she has no match.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Fire and thunder enforce the law, and here the verse speaks of a Wusun woman — deep-set eyes, dark and considered ugly by Chinese standards. Her desires and habits are alien, and past the age of marriage she remains without a mate. The Wusun were a Central Asian people with whom the Han dynasty arranged diplomatic marriages. Princesses like Liu Xijun were sent to marry the Wusun king, enduring extreme cultural estrangement. The verse evokes the impossibility of union across irreconcilable difference. From Biting Through to Gathering, the lake gathers upon the earth — people should naturally congregate. But gathering requires shared ground, and where customs and desires diverge entirely, no community forms.
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