解 → 小畜
Hexagram 40: Deliverance → Hexagram 9: Small Taming
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 5 changing lines (lines 1, 3, 4, 5, 6).
Line 1
初六 无咎。
Six at the beginning means: Without blame.
Line 3
六三 負且乘。致寇至。貞吝。
Six in the third place means: If a man carries a burden on his back And nonetheless rides in a carriage, He thereby encourages robbers to draw near. Perseverance leads to humiliation.
Line 4
九四 解而拇。朋至斯孚。
Nine in the fourth place means: Deliver yourself from your great toe. Then the companion comes, And him you can trust.
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.
Line 6
上六 公用射隼于高墉之上。獲之无不利。
Six at the top means: The prince shoots at a hawk on a high wall. He kills it. Everything serves to further.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
福棄我走，利不可得。幽人利貞，終无怨慝。
Fortune abandons me and flees; profit cannot be obtained. The recluse holds to what is right, and in the end bears no resentment or blame.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Thunder over water releases into wind drifting above heaven — the gentle restraint of small accumulation. Fortune abandons and flees; profit cannot be caught. Yet the hermit who holds to integrity finds no cause for resentment or malice. The verse borrows phrasing from the I-Ching's own Xiao Xu hexagram: 'The secluded person benefits from constancy.' When external fortune departs, inner rectitude becomes the only wealth that endures. From Deliverance to Small Taming, the storm's release dissipates into a light breeze too gentle to bring rain. Not every liberation leads to abundance — sometimes freedom simply means having nothing left to lose, and dignity intact.
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