解 → 兌
Hexagram 40: Deliverance → Hexagram 58: The Joyous Lake
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 2 changing lines (lines 1, 5).
Line 1
初六 无咎。
Six at the beginning means: Without blame.
Line 5
六五 君子維有解。吉。有孚于小人。
Six in the fifth place means: If only the superior man can deliver himself, It brings good fortune. Thus he proves to inferior men that he is in earnest.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
水中大賈，求利食子。商人至市，空无所有。
A great merchant on the water seeks profit and feeds his family. The trader arrives at market — empty, with nothing to be had.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Thunder over water opens into the doubled lake — the shared delight of the Joyous. Yet this joy is hollow: the great merchant on the water seeks profit but consumes his own capital. When traders arrive at the market, they find nothing at all. The verse describes commercial failure dressed in optimistic setting — lakes symbolize joy and exchange, but the marketplace is empty and the merchant eats into his reserves. From Deliverance to The Joyous, the freed merchant discovers that release from constraint does not guarantee prosperity. Paired lakes promise mutual enrichment through shared discourse, but when there is nothing to trade, even joy becomes a form of depletion.
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