III. How to Read the Hexagram Figures

For friends who have never seen a hexagram figure, here, in the fewest possible words, is how the symbols are read.

Everything begins with two symbols: the yang line "⚊" and the yin line "⚋." One solid, one hollow; one continuous, one broken. They are not writing; they do not denote any specific thing. Rather, they mark two complementary and opposing forces: yang is movement, expansion, firmness, manifestation; yin is stillness, contraction, yielding, concealment. Three lines stacked form the eight trigrams, each with its own name and basic image:

The Shuoguazhuan sums up the natures of the eight trigrams in eight phrases: "Qian is strength; Kun is yielding; Zhen is movement; Xun is penetration; Kan is danger; Li is clinging; Gen is stillness; Dui is joy." Heaven moves with firmness, the Earth's tendency is gentle yielding, Thunder governs stirring, Wind excels at entering things, Water's nature is to engulf, Fire must cling to fuel, the Mountain stands immovable, the Lake moistens and delights. The Shuogua further says that Qian is the father, Kun the mother, Zhen, Kan, and Gen the three sons, and Xun, Li, and Dui the three daughters -- the eight trigrams are like a single family: Heaven and Earth are the parents, the six children each partake of their parents' nature. Please remember this metaphor of "one family," friend from afar; we will need it again when we discuss "Heaven is high, Earth is low."

When two trigrams are placed one atop the other, we get the sixty-four hexagrams. The positions of the six lines, counted from bottom to top, are called chu (initial), er (second), san (third), si (fourth), wu (fifth), and shang (top) -- note that they are read from bottom to top, like a plant growing upward, like ascending a staircase. Yang lines are designated "nine," yin lines "six"; thus the first line of Qian is called "initial nine" (chu jiu), and the first line of Kun is called "initial six" (chu liu). The six positions are like six stages of a situation, six levels of standing: the initial line is the beginning of an affair, the commoner's obscurity; the fifth line is the affair's zenith, the sovereign's eminence; the top line is the place of extremity on the verge of reversal.

Take one hexagram as an example. Qian (Modesty): below is Gen (Mountain), above is Kun (Earth) -- the mountain lies beneath the earth. A mountain is by nature lofty, yet here it stations itself below the plain: that which is high places itself in a lowly position -- this is modesty. The Image Commentary for Qian says: "Within the earth there is a mountain: Modesty. The noble person reduces what is excessive and augments what is deficient, weighing things to distribute them equitably." The noble person observes this image and learns to diminish excess and increase what is lacking, measuring things to bestow them fairly. Among the sixty-four hexagrams, Qian alone has line statements that are entirely auspicious with no misfortune -- this book of anxiety and adversity that constantly speaks of "regret," "distress," "danger," and "misfortune" withholds nothing in its praise of a single virtue: humility. We shall return to this when we discuss "Heaven is high, Earth is low."

Now consider the hexagram Qian (the Creative, all yang). Its six lines are all yang, pure firmness; its six line statements compose the biography of a dragon: "The dragon lies hidden -- do not act" -- submerged at the bottom, one must not move rashly. "The dragon appears in the field" -- it shows itself on open ground, beginning to distinguish itself. "The noble person is active and vigilant all day; at nightfall he is still watchful, as though in danger" -- ceaselessly firm throughout the day, still alert with caution at night. "Perhaps leaping in the depths" -- testing a leap, neither advancing nor retreating decisively. "The flying dragon is in the heavens" -- soaring into the sky, fully exercising its powers. "The dragon that has overreached will have regrets" -- having flown too high, severed from the earth and from the multitude, regret follows. The six positions of a dragon from abyss to sky trace the complete arc of a life, a career, from concealment to zenith to excess.

Paired with Qian is Kun (the Receptive): six yin lines throughout, pure yielding. Its line statements offer a different landscape: "Treading on frost, solid ice is coming" -- when your feet meet the first frost, know that winter's hard ice is on its way; from the faintest sign, discern what is to come. "Upright, square, and great; without practice, nothing is unfavorable" -- upright, proper, and magnanimous, without any deliberate contrivance, nothing is unfavorable. "Containing elegance, one may remain steadfast" -- harboring refinement without flaunting it, one can hold to what is right. "A tied sack: no blame, no praise" -- the mouth of the sack is bound shut; speak and act with caution; there will be no disaster, but also no acclaim. "A yellow lower garment: supremely auspicious" -- wearing the yellow garment of the lower body, occupying the center while remaining below; great good fortune. At the top six: "Dragons battle in the wild; their blood is dark and yellow" -- yin swollen to its extreme contends with yang; both are wounded. The way of Qian is the measure of striving; the way of Kun is the measure of receptivity. Qian's peril lies in overreaching; Kun's peril lies in contention. Reading the two hexagrams side by side is like beholding the sun and moon, like hearing the qin and the se in concert -- the gateway to all sixty-four hexagrams is already within them.

There is one more basic convention in reading hexagrams that must be mentioned here; otherwise the divination records of the ancients will be unintelligible. When the ancients performed divination, they would often obtain a result in the form "such-and-such hexagram going to such-and-such hexagram" -- for instance, the example we will encounter later, "Kun going to Bi," meaning that the divination yielded Kun, with one of its lines being a moving line, which upon changing produces the hexagram Bi. In such a case, one reads the line statement of that moving line. So "Kun going to Bi" calls for reading Kun's line at the fifth position: "A yellow lower garment: supremely auspicious" -- because it is precisely the fifth line of Kun that, upon changing, yields the hexagram Bi. The hexagram has its fixed image, but the lines carry the potential for change; once a single line moves, the entire configuration is altered. This word zhi ("going to") best reveals the worldview of the Zhouyi -- no situation is static; within every situation lies a pivot leading to another situation. Reading hexagrams to this point, one understands: the sixty-four hexagrams are in truth sixty-four situations; the 384 lines are 384 moments of timing. The Zhouyi is a book about "situation and timing." It promises no once-and-for-all position -- hiding has its proper path, soaring has its perils; all fortune and misfortune depend on what position you occupy, what virtue you hold, and what advance or retreat you choose.