坎 → 隨
Hexagram 29: The Abysmal Water → Hexagram 17: Following
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 3 changing lines (lines 1, 2, 4).
Line 1
初六 習坎。入于坎窞。凶。
Six at the beginning means: Repetition of the Abysmal. In the abyss one falls into a pit. Misfortune.
Line 2
九二 坎有險。求小得。
Nine in the second place means: The abyss is dangerous. One should strive to attain small things only.
Line 4
六四 樽酒簋貳。用缶。納約自牖。終无咎。
Six in the fourth place means: A jug of wine, a bowl of rice with it; Earthen vessels Simply handed in through the Window. There is certainly no blame in this.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
天地際會，不見內外，祖辭遣送，與世長決。
Heaven and earth meet at the boundary; inside and outside vanish. The ancestors speak words of farewell; one parts from the world forever.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Water upon water, the boundary between heaven and earth dissolves. Sky and ground merge until inside and outside are indistinguishable — a cosmic erasure of all orientation. Ancestral rites send the departed off with farewell words, and the living part from the world forever. This is a death verse, spare and final. The ancestors officiate the severance; the departure is absolute. From The Abysmal to Following, danger transforms into the lake's thunder resting at dusk — the natural rhythm of following the day's end into night. Death here is not catastrophe but transition: the sage enters rest as evening falls, following the Way into its darkness without resistance.
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