鼎 → 復
Hexagram 50: The Cauldron → Hexagram 24: Return
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 5 changing lines (lines 1, 2, 3, 4, 6).
Line 1
初六 鼎顛趾。利出否。得妾以其子。无咎。
Six at the beginning means: A ting with legs upturned. Furthers removal of stagnating stuff. One takes a concubine for the sake of her son. No blame.
Line 2
九二 鼎有實。我仇有疾。不我能即。吉。
Nine in the second place means: There is food in the ting. My comrades are envious, But they cannot harm me. Good fortune.
Line 3
九三 鼎耳革。其行塞。雉膏不食。方雨虧悔。終吉。
Nine in the third place means: The handle of the ting is altered. One is impeded in his way of life. The fat of the pheasant is not eaten. Once rain falls, remorse is spent. Good fortune comes in the end.
Line 4
九四 鼎折足。覆公餗。其形渥。凶。
Nine in the fourth place means: The legs of the ting are broken. The prince's meal is spilled And his person is soiled. Misfortune. A man has a difficult and responsible task to which he is not adequate. Moreover, he does not devote himself to it with all his strength but goes about with inferior people; therefore the execution of the work fails. In this way he also incurs personal opprobrium. Confucius says about this line: "Weak character coupled with honored place, meager knowledge with large plans, limited powers with heavy responsibility, will seldom escape disaster. "
Line 6
上九 鼎玉鉉。大吉。无不利。
Nine at the top means: The ting has rings of jade. Great good fortune. Nothing that would not act to further.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
女室作毒，為我心疾。和不能治，晉人赴告。
The woman of the household brews poison, bringing illness to my heart. Harmony cannot cure it; the men of Jin send urgent word.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Fire over wind fills the cauldron; thunder stirs beneath the earth as Return begins. A woman in the inner chamber brews poison, inflicting a heart-sickness that no medicine can cure. Even the mild harmonizing herbs fail. Then 'the people of Jin rush to report' — news of the crisis spreads beyond the household. This evokes a pattern found in Spring and Autumn annals: palace women administering slow poison to husbands or rivals, with neighboring states drawn in to arbitrate or exploit the resulting chaos. From The Cauldron to Return, the transformation suggests that what festers in secret must eventually emerge. Thunder stirs underground; the cauldron's fire, corrupted by poison, forces a reckoning — return to the root means confronting what was concealed.
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