豐 → 益
Hexagram 55: Abundance → Hexagram 42: Increase
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 4 changing lines (lines 3, 4, 5, 6).
Line 3
九三 豐其沛。日中見沬。折其右肱。无咎。
Nine in the third place means: The underbrush is of such abundance That the small stars can be seen at noon. He breaks his right arm. No blame.
Line 4
九四 豐其蔀。日中見斗。遇其夷主。吉。
Nine in the fourth place means: The curtain is of such fullness That the polestars can be seen at noon. He meets his ruler, who is of like kind. Good fortune.
Line 5
六五 來章。有慶譽吉。
Six in the fifth place means: Lines are coming, Blessing and fame draw near. Good fortune.
Line 6
上六 豐其屋。蔀其家。闚其戶。闃其无人。三歲不覿。凶。
Six at the top means: His house is in a state of abundance. He screens off his family. He peers through the gate And no longer perceives anyone. For three years he sees nothing. Misfortune.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
去辛就蓼，毒愈苦甚。避穽遇坑，憂患日主。
Leaving bitterness for smartweed, the poison grows ever worse. Dodging a pit, meeting a trench; worry and trouble rule each day.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Thunder and fire converge in Abundance, and the verse describes a man fleeing from one poison into another. Leaving the spicy to seek the bitter — the poison only grows more severe. Avoiding the pit, he falls into the ditch; worry and calamity multiply daily. Each attempted escape leads to worse trouble. The 辛 (pungent) and 蓼 (smartweed) are both acrid plants — one does not improve upon the other. The pit (穽) and ditch (坑) are equally treacherous. From Abundance to Increase, wind and thunder work together: the irony is that Increase promises improvement through 'seeing good and following it, having faults and correcting them,' yet the verse shows someone who keeps choosing wrong. True Increase requires discernment, not just motion — without it, every change is lateral at best.
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