明夷 → 坎
Hexagram 36: Darkening of the Light → Hexagram 29: The Abysmal Water
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 4 changing lines (lines 1, 2, 3, 5).
Line 1
初九 明夷于飛。垂其翼。君子于行。三日不食。有攸往。主人有言。
Nine at the beginning means: Darkening of the light during flight. He lowers his wings. The superior man does not eat for three days On his wanderings. But he has somewhere to go. The host has occasion to gossip about him.
Line 2
六二 明夷。夷于左股。用拯馬壯吉。
Six in the second place means: Darkening of the light injures him in the left thigh. He gives aid with the strength of a horse. Good fortune.
Line 3
九三 明夷于南狩。得其大首。不可疾貞。
Nine in the third place means: Darkening of the light during the hunt in the south. Their great leader is captured. One must not expect perseverance too soon.
Line 5
六五 箕子之明夷。利貞。
Six in the fifth place means: Darkening of the light as with Prince Chi. Perseverance furthers.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
陰積不已，雲作淫雨。傷害平陸，民无室屋。
Yin gathers without ceasing; clouds bring excessive rain. It damages the level plains; the people have no roofs or shelter.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Fire beneath the earth plunges into doubled water — the Abysmal, danger compounded upon danger. 'Yin accumulates without cease; clouds become excessive rain. The flat land is ruined; the people have no shelter.' This is environmental catastrophe as political metaphor: when yin forces gather unchecked — bureaucratic darkness, tyrannical suppression — they eventually flood the very ground people depend on. The destruction of the 'level land' (平陸) suggests the obliteration of stable, ordinary life. From Darkening of the Light to the Abysmal, the transformation is among the most dire: buried fire meets doubled water, and what was merely suppressed now drowns. The verse offers no rescue, only the image of a populace stripped of shelter by forces that began as mere overcast skies.
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