革 → 頤
Hexagram 49: Revolution → Hexagram 27: Nourishment
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 4 changing lines (lines 3, 4, 5, 6).
Line 3
九三 征凶貞厲。革言三就。有孚。
Nine in the third place means: Starting brings misfortune. Perseverance brings danger. When talk of revolution has gone the rounds three times, One may commit himself, And men will believe him.
Line 4
九四 悔亡有孚。改命吉。
Nine in the fourth place means: Remorse disappears. Men believe him. Changing the form of government brings good fortune.
Line 5
九五 大人虎變。未占有孚。
Nine in the fifth place means: The great man changes like a tiger. Even before he questions the oracle He is believed.
Line 6
上六 君子豹變。小人革面。征凶。居貞吉。
Six at the top means: The superior man changes like a panther. The inferior man molts in the face. Starting brings misfortune. To remain persevering brings good fortune.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
尼父孔丘,善釣鯉魚。羅釣一舉,得獲萬頭,富我家居。
Father Ni, Kong Qiu, skilled at angling for carp. One cast of his net, he catches ten thousand head, enriching my household.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Fire within the lake yields to the mountain above thunder — Nourishment, where what enters the mouth sustains the spirit. Father Ni, Confucius himself, proves a master angler of carp. One cast of the net brings in ten thousand heads, enriching the household. The image of Confucius as supreme fisherman is striking: the sage who feeds minds here feeds bodies. The carp — auspicious in Chinese culture, associated with abundance and the Dragon Gate — arrives in overwhelming quantity. From Revolution to Nourishment, the transformation shows that after upheaval, a sage's single well-placed effort can produce abundance beyond measure. The net captures what the revolution made available.
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