萃 → 損
Hexagram 45: Gathering Together → Hexagram 41: Decrease
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 5 changing lines (lines 1, 2, 4, 5, 6).
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.
Line 2
六二 引吉无咎。孚乃利用禴。
Six in the second place means: Letting oneself be drawn Brings good fortune and remains blameless. If one is sincere, It furthers one to bring even a small offering.
Line 4
九四 大吉无咎。
Nine in the fourth place means: Great good fortune. No blame.
Line 5
九五 萃有位。无咎匪孚。元永貞。悔亡。
Nine in the fifth place means: If in gathering together one has position, This brings no blame. If there are some who are not yet sincerely in the work, Sublime and enduring perseverance is needed. Then remorse disappears.
Line 6
上六 齎咨涕洟。无咎。
Six at the top means: Lamenting and sighing, floods of tears. No blame.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
張王子季，爭財相制。商君頑嚚，不知所申。
The lords Zhang, Wang, and Ji contend for wealth, each constraining the other. Lord Shang is stubborn and unyielding; he knows not where to plead his case.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Lake upon earth gives way to mountain above the lake, the painful Decrease. The Zhang princes and the Ji clan fight over wealth, restraining one another. Lord Shang is obstinate and unreasonable, unable to find anyone to plead his case. The verse names factional strife among noble clans and invokes Shang Yang, the Legalist reformer of Qin who enriched the state through ruthless law but made so many personal enemies that when his patron Duke Xiao died, he was torn apart by chariots. From Gathering to Decrease, the transformation is one of subtraction through conflict. What the community gathered is consumed by infighting, and the reformer's rigidity, which once built, now isolates him completely. The mountain takes from the lake below, draining the very assembly it sits upon.
The Six Lines app includes all 4,096 Yilin verses, each with original ink brush artwork and full commentary. Download on the App Store