剝 → 蠱
Hexagram 23: Splitting Apart → Hexagram 18: Work on the Decayed
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 2 changing lines (lines 2, 6).
Line 2
六二 剝牀以辨。蔑貞凶。
Six in the second place means: The bed is split at the edge. Those who persevere are destroyed. Misfortune.
Line 6
上九 碩果不食。君子得輿。小人剝廬。
Nine at the top means: There is a large fruit still uneaten. The superior man receives a carriage. The house of the inferior man is split apart.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
黍稷禾稻，垂畝方好。中旱不雨，傷風病熇。
Millet, grain, rice, and paddy; drooping in the fields, nearly ripe. Midway comes drought without rain; wind-blight and scorching heat wound them.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Mountain upon earth erodes into mountain over wind — decay upon decay, the image of Work on the Decayed. Millet, glutinous millet, grain, and rice all hang heavy in the fields, the harvest looking splendid. Then drought strikes mid-season, the rain never comes, and scorching wind withers everything. This is Gu — the hexagram of corruption and inherited rot — captured in agricultural terms. The grain was healthy and promising; the failure is not in the seed but in the season. Wind trapped beneath the mountain breeds stagnation rather than nourishment. From Splitting Apart to Work on the Decayed, the mountain's external erosion mirrors internal putrefaction: what looked abundant was already vulnerable. Gu's task is to diagnose and repair, but here the diagnosis comes too late, after the harvest has already burned.
The Six Lines app includes all 4,096 Yilin verses, each with original ink brush artwork and full commentary. Download on the App Store