噬嗑 → 革
Hexagram 21: Biting Through → Hexagram 49: Revolution
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 3 changing lines (lines 3, 5, 6).
Line 3
六三 噬腊肉。遇毒。小吝。无咎。
Six in the third place means: Bites on old dried meat And strikes on something poisonous. Slight humiliation. 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
大蛇為殃，使道不通；歲露尠少，年穀敗傷。
A great serpent brings calamity, blocking the road so none can pass; dew is scant, rainfall meager -- the year's grain is ruined.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Fire and thunder enforce the law, yet here a great serpent brings catastrophe. The serpent blocks the roads, cutting off all passage. Dew and rainfall become scarce, and the year's grain harvest is ruined and spoiled. The serpent as road-blocker is a folk motif of malevolent obstruction — a predator that paralyzes commerce and agriculture alike. With roads cut and rain withheld, famine follows inevitably. From Biting Through to Revolution, fire burns within the lake as incompatible forces demand transformation. Yet the verse shows revolution's dark face: the old order overthrown not by righteous renewal but by monstrous disruption. The serpent that blocks the road is the agent of destructive change, leaving only ruin in its wake.
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