漸 → 謙
Hexagram 53: Development → Hexagram 15: Modesty
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 2 changing lines (lines 5, 6).
Line 5
九五 鴻漸于陵。婦三歲不孕。終莫之勝。吉。
Nine in the fifth place means: The wild goose gradually draws near the summit. For three years the woman has no child. In the end nothing can hinder her. Good fortune.
Line 6
上九 鴻漸于陸。其羽可用為儀。吉。
Nine at the top means: The wild goose gradually draws near the clouds heights. Its feathers can be used for the sacred dance. Good fortune.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
蟠梅折枝，與母別離，絕不相知。
The coiled plum, its branch broken; parted from the mother, utterly lost to one another.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Wind over mountain subsides into earth containing a mountain: gradual development withdraws into the lowliness of Modesty. A plum branch is bent and broken; mother and child are separated, never to know each other again. The image is stark and sorrowful: what grew gradually is snapped, and the bond between root and branch is severed beyond repair. From Development to Modesty, the mountain that once rose above now hides within the earth. Modesty's power lies in diminishing what is high, but here the diminishment is involuntary, a loss rather than a virtue. The broken plum branch evokes exile or death that severs family ties. Gradual growth does not guarantee permanence; sometimes what the mountain nurtured, fate strips away.
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