剝 → 否
Hexagram 23: Splitting Apart → Hexagram 12: Standstill
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 2 changing lines (lines 4, 5).
Line 4
六四 剝牀以膚。凶。
Six in the fourth place means: The bed is split up to the skin. Misfortune.
Line 5
六五 貫魚。以宮人寵。无不利。
Six in the fifth place means: A shoal of fishes. Favor comes through the court ladies. Everything acts to further.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
龍馬上山，絕無水泉。喉燋唇乾，口不能言。
Cracked earth for a thousand li — not an inch of green. Well-bottoms are dry mud with turtle-shell patterns. An ox collapses in the field, tongue stiff — the old farmer looks up to the sky and no sound comes.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Mountain upon earth collapses into total blockage — heaven and earth refuse to communicate. The original verse reads: 'A dragon-horse climbs the mountain, finding absolutely no spring; throat scorched and lips parched, the mouth cannot speak.' The creature that should command rain finds only drought at the summit. This is Standstill incarnate: a figure of power rendered mute and helpless, stranded where no nourishment exists. The dragon-horse, emblem of heaven's vitality, is trapped upon a dead mountain without water. From Splitting Apart to Standstill, the erosion of the mountain does not open new possibilities but seals them shut. Heaven retreats upward, earth sinks below, and between them nothing flows. Even the voice of authority is silenced.
The Six Lines app includes all 4,096 Yilin verses, each with original ink brush artwork and full commentary. Download on the App Store