小畜

Hexagram 51: The Arousing Thunder → Hexagram 9: Small Taming

The Arousing Thunder
Thunder / Thunder
小畜
Small Taming
Wind / Heaven
Changing LinesStable Lines

Changing Lines

This transformation involves 5 changing lines (lines 2, 3, 4, 5, 6).

Line 2

六二 震來厲。億喪貝。躋于九陵。勿逐。七日得。

zhènthe thunder
láibrings (about)
difficulty
a hundred thousand
sànglost
bèibelongings
and climb
up
jiǔnine
línghill
do not
zhúpursue

Six in the second place means: Shock comes bringing danger. A hundred thousand times You lose your treasures And must climb the nine hills. Do not go in pursuit of them. After seven days you will get them back again.

Line 3

六三 震蘇蘇。震行无眚。

zhènthe thunder
awakens
and revives
zhènbe aroused
xíngto movement
and
shěngto distress

Six in the third place means: Shock comes and makes one distraught. If shock spurs to action One remains free of misfortune.

Line 4

九四 震遂泥。

zhènthe thunder
suìis followed by
mud

Nine in the fourth place means: Shock is mired.

Line 5

六五 震往來厲。意无喪有事。

zhènthe thunder
wǎngin
láiand
is difficult
the meaning
is not
sànglost
yǒuhaving
shìwork to do

Six in the fifth place means: Shock goes hither and thither. Danger. However, nothing at all is lost. Yet there are things to be done.

Line 6

上六 震索索。視矍矍。征凶。震不于其躬。于其鄰。无咎。婚媾有言。

zhènthe thunder
suǒstartles
suǒand confuses
shìlooking
juéin wild-eyed
juéin terror
zhēngto expedite
xiōngis foreboding
zhènthe thunder
is not
in
one's (own)
gōngbeing
but merely in
one's (own)
línneighborhood
there is no
jiùblame
hūneven a
gòusuitor
yǒuwill
yántalk

Six at the top means: Shock brings ruin and terrified gazing around. Going ahead brings misfortune. If it has not yet touched one's own body But has reached one's neighbor first, There is no blame. One's comrades have something to talk about.

Trigram Changes

Upper TrigramThunder WindThe Arousing → The Gentle
Lower TrigramThunder HeavenThe Arousing → The Creative

Yilin Verse

羊舌叔虎,野心善怒。黷貨无厭,以滅其身。

Yangshe Shuhu, wild of heart and quick to rage. Greedy for bribes without end, he destroys himself thereby.

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

Commentary

Thunder doubled yields to wind over heaven: shock restrained by gentle accumulation. Yangshe Shuhu of Jin, wild-hearted and quick to anger, insatiable in his greed for wealth — and so destroyed himself. According to the Zuo Zhuan, Yangshe Hu was a nobleman of Jin entangled with the powerful Luan faction. His fierce temperament and reckless ambition drew him into Luan Ying's conspiracy; when the Luan clan fell around 552 BC, Yangshe Hu was executed along with them. From The Arousing to Small Taming, the verse warns that thunder's untamed energy, when it refuses the gentle restraint of wind over heaven, leads only to self-destruction. The power that cannot be tamed accumulates nothing.

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