井 → 復
Hexagram 48: The Well → Hexagram 24: Return
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 4 changing lines (lines 1, 2, 3, 5).
Line 1
初六 井泥不食。舊井无禽。
Six at the beginning means: One does not drink the mud of the well. No animals come to an old well.
Line 2
九二 井谷射鮒。甕敝漏。
Nine in the second place means: At the wellhole one shoots fishes. The jug is broken and leaks.
Line 3
九三 井渫不食。為我心惻。可用汲。王明。並受其福。
Nine in the third place means: The well is cleaned, but no one drinks from it. This is my heart's sorrow, For one might draw from it. If the king were clear-minded, Good fortune might be enjoyed in common.
Line 5
九五 井冽。寒泉食。
Nine in the fifth place means: In the well there is a clear, cold spring From which one can drink.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
明月作晝，大人失居。眾星宵亂，不知所據。
The bright moon turns night to day; the great man loses his dwelling. The myriad stars swarm in confusion through the night; none knows where to stand.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Water drawn up through wood, the well depends on the steady rhythm of day and night — but the moon blazes like daylight, and the great man loses his dwelling. Stars scatter in nocturnal chaos, and no one knows where to take a stand. When celestial order inverts — when night becomes day — all terrestrial hierarchies dissolve with it. The 'bright moon as noon' suggests an unnatural illumination that blinds rather than guides. From The Well to Return, thunder stirs within the earth at the winter solstice. The chaos of dislocated stars must resolve into Return's single yang line, the first flicker of proper order reasserting itself beneath the frozen surface.
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