晉 → 謙
Hexagram 35: Progress → Hexagram 15: Modesty
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 3 changing lines (lines 3, 4, 6).
Line 3
六三 眾允悔亡。
Six in the third place means: All are in accord. Remorse disappears.
Line 4
九四 晉如鼫鼠。貞厲。
Nine in the fourth place means: Progress like a hamster. Perseverance brings danger.
Line 6
上九 晉其角。維用伐邑。厲吉无咎。貞吝。
Nine at the top means: Making progress with the horns is permissible Only for the purpose of punishing one's own city. To be conscious of danger brings good fortune. No blame. Perseverance brings humiliation.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
南行求福，與喜相得。封受上賞，鼎足輔國。
A thousand li to the capital, finally granted an audience. In the golden hall, the dragon's countenance brightens. The imperial brush personally inscribes the scroll of merit — a brocade robe draped, ascending the minister's platform.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Fire rises above the earth, and the original verse speaks: 'Travel south to seek fortune, and meet with joy. Receive the highest reward and be enfeoffed, standing as a pillar of state like the legs of a cauldron.' The image of the cauldron's tripod legs supporting the state evokes the three great ministers who stabilize the realm. The figure journeys south — the direction of fire and brilliance in Chinese cosmology — and finds not merely personal gain but structural importance: becoming load-bearing support for the dynasty. From Progress to Modesty, the transformation is instructive. The mountain hidden within the earth embodies the paradox: the greatest elevation achieved through the deepest self-effacement. The rewarded minister who sustains the state does so not through display but through quiet foundational strength.
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