小畜

Hexagram 5: Waiting → Hexagram 9: Small Taming

Waiting
Water / Heaven
小畜
Small Taming
Wind / Heaven
Changing LinesStable Lines

Changing Lines

This transformation involves 1 changing line (line 6).

Line 6

上六 入于穴。有不速之客三人來。敬之終吉。

entering
into
xuéa pit
yǒuwith
no
invitation
zhīextended to
visitors
sānthree
rénpeople
láiarrive
jìngto respect
zhīto them
zhōngwill end in
good fortune

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

Upper TrigramWater WindThe Deep → The Gentle
Lower TrigramHeaven Heaven

Yilin Verse

紝績獨居,寡處無夫。陰陽失忘,為人僕使。

Spinning and weaving in solitary dwelling; living alone without a husband. Yin and yang are forgotten and lost; one becomes a servant to others.

— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE

Commentary

Clouds above heaven, yet below a woman weaves alone, dwelling in solitude without a husband. The balance of yin and yang is lost and forgotten; she is reduced to serving others. The verse paints domestic desolation — a spinner at her loom with no household to sustain, her labor exploited rather than nourishing a home. The disruption of conjugal harmony (陰陽失忘) signals a broader failure of natural pairing. From Waiting to Small Taming, the nourishing potential of clouds encounters wind that scatters without releasing rain: gentle influence restrains heaven's power but cannot yet bring it to fruition, leaving abundance suspended and the solitary figure unreached.

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