歸妹 → 鼎
Hexagram 54: The Marrying Maiden → Hexagram 50: The Cauldron
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 3 changing lines (lines 1, 3, 6).
Line 1
初九 歸妹以娣。跛能履。征吉。
Nine at the beginning means: The marrying maiden as a concubine. A lame man who is able to tread. Undertakings bring good fortune.
Line 3
六三 歸妹以須。反歸以娣。
Six in the third place means: The marrying maiden as a slave. She marries as a concubine.
Line 6
上六 女承筐无實。士刲羊无血。无攸利。
Six at the top means: The woman holds the basket, but there are no fruits in it. The man stabs the sheep, but no blood flows. Nothing that acts to further.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
夏麥麩䵃，霜擊其芒。疾君敗國，使年夭傷。
Summer wheat turned to bran and chaff; frost strikes down its awns. Sickness plagues the lord and ruins the state; the year's young lives are cut short.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Thunder over lake shifts to fire over wind: the maiden's vulnerable position meets the Cauldron's transformative refinement. Summer wheat is covered in chaff and bran; frost strikes down the grain's awns before they can ripen. A diseased ruler ruins the state, cutting the year's harvest short and causing premature death. The verse layers agricultural blight onto political decay: just as unseasonable frost destroys wheat before maturity, a corrupt sovereign destroys the people's livelihood before its time. From the Marrying Maiden to the Cauldron, fire atop wood transforms raw ingredients into refined sustenance. The Cauldron demands proper leadership to nourish the worthy. Here that process is inverted: the ruler poisons rather than refines, and the cauldron's contents spoil.
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