萃 → 隨
Hexagram 45: Gathering Together → Hexagram 17: Following
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 1 changing line (line 1).
Line 1
初六 有孚不終。乃亂乃萃。若號一握為笑。勿恤。往无咎。
Six at the beginning means: If you are sincere, but not to the end, There will sometimes be confusion, sometimes gathering together. If you call out, Then after one grasp of the hand you can laugh again. Regret not. Going is without blame.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
貧鬼守門，日破我盆。毀甖傷釭，空虛无子。
The ghost of poverty guards the gate, daily breaking my basin. Smashing the jar, cracking the lamp; empty and hollow, without issue.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Lake upon earth gives way to thunder within the lake, where Following should bring joy but here brings only loss. A poverty ghost guards the gate, daily smashing the household pots. Jars shatter and lamps break; the house stands empty with no heir. The 'poverty ghost' (pin gui) is a folk belief from Han dynasty popular religion: a malevolent household spirit that causes destitution by destroying domestic goods. Each vessel broken is another fragment of household prosperity gone. From Gathering to Following, the transformation is perverse: what follows this household is not fortune but a persistent curse. The gathered community becomes the venue for systematic destruction, as though the very act of assembly attracts ruin rather than repelling it.
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