中孚 → 小過
Hexagram 61: Inner Truth → Hexagram 62: Small Exceeding
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 6 changing lines (lines 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6).
Line 1
初九 虞吉。有他不燕。
Nine at the beginning means: Being prepared brings good fortune. If there are secret designs, it is disquieting.
Line 2
九二 鳴鶴在陰。其子和之。我有好爵。吾與爾靡之。
Nine in the second place means: A crane calling in the shade. Its young answers it. I have a good goblet. I will share it with you.
Line 3
六三 得敵。或鼓或罷。或泣或歌。
Six in the third place means: He finds a comrade. Now he beats the drum, now he stops. Now he sobs, now he sings.
Line 4
六四 月幾望。馬匹亡。无咎。
Six in the fourth place means: The moon nearly at the full. The team horse goes astray. No blame.
Line 5
九五 有孚攣如。无咎。
Nine in the fifth place means: He possesses truth, which links together. No blame.
Line 6
上九 翰音登于天。貞凶。
Nine at the top means: Cockcrow penetrating to heaven. Perseverance brings misfortune.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
牧羊稻田，聞虎喧讙。畏懼惕息，終无禍患。
Herding sheep in the rice field; hearing a tiger's roar and commotion. Frightened and holding breath; in the end no disaster comes.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Wind stirs above the lake as the shepherd tends sheep in the rice paddies and hears a tiger roaring nearby. Fear and trembling seize the heart, but in the end no disaster comes. The verse is a study in managed fear: the danger is real — a tiger among the fields — but the outcome is safe. The shepherd's alarm is proportionate; it is precisely his wariness that preserves him. From Inner Truth to Small Exceeding, sincerity meets thunder above the mountain, the image of the small bird that must not fly too high. Small Exceeding counsels caution and modesty in action. The shepherd who freezes at the tiger's roar and does nothing bold survives exactly because he exceeds in smallness — in restraint, in stillness, in the discipline of not provoking what he cannot fight.
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