既濟 → 復
Hexagram 63: After Completion → Hexagram 24: Return
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 2 changing lines (lines 3, 5).
Line 3
九三 高宗伐鬼方。三年克之。小人勿用。
Nine in the third place means: The Illustrious Ancestor Disciplines the Devil's Country. After three years he conquers it. Inferior people must not be employed.
Line 5
九五 東鄰殺牛。不如西鄰之禴祭。實受其福。
Nine in the fifth place means: The neighbor in the east who slaughters an ox Does not attain as much real happiness As the neighbor in the west With his small offering.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
心願所喜，今乃逢時。保我利福，不離兵革。
What the heart desires and delights in now meets its proper time. Protecting my fortune and blessing, yet not departing from arms and warfare.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
Water sits above fire, and one's heart's desire meets its moment — the time has finally arrived. Fortune and blessings are secured, yet they come entangled with weapons and warfare. The verse refuses easy optimism: joy is real but inseparable from conflict, and the protective blessing requires armed vigilance to maintain. From After Completion to Return, fire-and-water order transforms into thunder stirring beneath the earth — the first yang line re-entering from below. Return marks the solstice of renewal after a dark period, but this Return carries weapons. The completed state does not return to innocence; it returns to the world as it is, where blessings must be defended and the heart's desire is won through struggle, not granted as a gift.
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