剝 → 節
Hexagram 23: Splitting Apart → Hexagram 60: Limitation
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 4 changing lines (lines 1, 2, 5, 6).
Line 1
初六 剝牀以足。蔑貞凶。
Six at the beginning means: The leg of the bed is split. Those who persevere are destroyed. Misfortune.
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 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.
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
虵行蜿蜒，不能上阪。履節安居，可以無憂。
The serpent winds and slithers, unable to climb the slope. Treading on measure and dwelling in peace, one may be free from worry.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Mountain upon earth strips away, and water rests above the lake — Limitation, the hexagram of knowing where to stop. A snake slithers along but cannot climb the slope. By observing proper limits and dwelling in peace, one may live without worry. The snake — limbless, ground-hugging, sinuous — meets its natural boundary at the hillside. It cannot ascend, and this is not tragedy but fact. The verse does not lament the limitation but pivots to its positive corollary: by 'treading the rhythm of limits and dwelling peacefully,' anxiety disappears. From Splitting Apart to Limitation, the mountain's erosion defines a new boundary. What was once a towering peak is now a modest slope — but that slope is precisely what gives the landscape its usable form. The snake that accepts its limit finds peace; the one that fights it finds only exhaustion.
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