需 → 蠱
Hexagram 5: Waiting → Hexagram 18: Work on the Decayed
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 3 changing lines (lines 1, 5, 6).
Line 1
初九 需于郊。利用恆。无咎。
Nine at the beginning means: Waiting in the meadow. It furthers one to abide in what endures. No blame.
Line 5
九五 需于酒食。貞吉。
Nine in the fifth place means: Waiting at meat and drink. Perseverance brings good fortune.
Line 6
上六 入于穴。有不速之客三人來。敬之終吉。
Six at the top means: One falls into the pit. Three uninvited guests arrive. Honor them, and in the end there will be good fortune.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
佩玉蕊兮，無所繫之。旨酒一盛，莫與笑語。孤寡獨特，常愁憂苦。
Wearing jade and garland pendants; nowhere to hang them. A full cup of fine wine; none to laugh and talk with. Orphaned and alone; always grieving and sorrowing.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Clouds above heaven yield to wind stirring beneath the mountain — decay in what should be nourishing. Jade pendants hang from a sash with nowhere to fasten; fine wine fills a vessel with no one to share laughter and conversation. Orphaned, widowed, alone and singular, one dwells in perpetual sorrow. The verse is pure lament: every element of social ritual — the ornaments of rank, the wine of fellowship — exists in form but lacks the human bonds that give them meaning. Adornment without occasion, wine without company. From Waiting to Work on the Decayed, what once nourished has rotted from within: relationships have collapsed, and the solitary figure amid useless finery embodies the corruption that must be repaired.
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