旅 → 復
Hexagram 56: The Wanderer → Hexagram 24: Return
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 2 changing lines (lines 3, 6).
Line 3
九三 旅焚其次。喪其童僕。貞厲。
Nine in the third place means: The wanderer's inn burns down. He loses the steadfastness of his young servant. Danger.
Line 6
上九 鳥焚其巢。旅人先笑後號咷。喪牛于易。凶。
Nine at the top means: The bird's nest burns up. The wanderer laughs at first, Then must needs lament and weep. Through carelessness he loses his cow. Misfortune.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
茹芝餌黃，塗飲玉英。與神流通，長无憂凶。
Eating lingzhi, taking the Yellow Essence, drinking the Jade Nectar on the way. In communion with the spirits; forever free from worry and misfortune.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Fire on the mountain, and the wanderer discovers the path of immortality. Eating fungus of long life, ingesting alchemical elixirs, drinking the essence of jade — the traveler enters communion with the spirits and dwells forever free of misfortune. The verse draws on Daoist cultivation imagery: lingzhi mushrooms (芝), cinnabar preparations (黃), and jade-infused potions (玉英) are the standard pharmacopoeia of the immortal-seeker. From The Wanderer to Return, thunder stirs beneath the earth at the winter solstice — the single yang line returns at the base. The wanderer's spiritual practice is itself a return: by cultivating the body's vital essence, one returns to the primordial state before dispersal, finding permanence within the cycle.
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