Hexagram 30 · 離 · lí
Hexagram 30. Lí · The Clinging, Fire
☲☲ Fire over fire: Lí above, Lí below.
Li indicates that, (in regard to what it denotes), it will be advantageous to be firm and correct, and that thus there will be free course and success.
Li indicates that, (in regard to what it denotes), it will be advantageous to be firm and correct, and that thus there will be free course and success.
Fire does not exist of itself — it shines only by clinging to what burns. So too the clarity of mind and talent needs a support: a work, a tradition, people. Accept your dependence on what feeds you with the docility of the cow — and your light will be steady, not a flare.
The Image
Fire upon fire: light that exists only by clinging to its fuel. Your talents and clarity need a support — a work, a tradition, a community, a source of commissions. To admit this dependence is no humiliation: it is the condition of steady burning. Tend what feeds you and shine evenly — flares are striking, but they burn out both the fuel and you.
Interpretation of hexagram 30
XXX. The Li Hexagram. acted in a manner worthy of his character. It is implied, though the Thwan does not say it, that he would get out of the danger.
The lines of hexagram 30
First line
The first line, undivided, shows one ready to move with confused steps. But he treads at the same time reverently, and there will be no mistake.
Line i is weak, at the bottom of the figure, and has no correlate above, no helper, that is, beyond itself. All these things render the case of its subject hopeless. He will by his efforts only involve himself more deeply in danger.
Second line
The second line, divided, shows its subject in his place in yellow. There will be great good fortune.
Line 2 is strong, and in the centre. Its subject is unable, indeed, to escape altogether from the danger; but he does not involve himself more deeply in it like the subject of 1, and obtains some ease.
Third line
The third line, undivided, shows its subject in a position like that of the declining sun. Instead of playing on his instrument of earthenware, and singing to it, he utters the groans of an old man of eighty. There will be evil.
Line 3 is weak, and occupies the place of a strong line. Its subject is in an evil case.
Fourth line
The fourth line, undivided, shows the manner of its subject’s coming. How abrupt it is, as with fire, with death, to be rejected (by all)!
Line 4 is weak, and will get no help from its correlate in 1. Its subject is not one who can avert the danger threatening himself and others. But his position is close to that of the ruler in 5, whose intimacy he cultivates with an unostentatious sincerity, sym- bolled by the appointments of the simple feast, and whose intelli¬ gence he cautiously enlightens. In consequence, there will be no error.
Fifth line
The fifth line, divided, shows its subject as one with tears flowing in torrents, and groaning in sorrow. There will be good fortune.
The subject of line 5 is on the eve of extrication and deliverance. The waters of the defile will ere long have free vent and disappear, and the ground will be levelled and made smooth. The line is strong, in a proper place, and in the place of honour.
Top line
The topmost line, undivided, shows the king employing its subject in his punitive expeditions. Achieving admirable (merit), he breaks (only) the chiefs (of the rebels). Where his prisoners were not their associates, he does not punish. There will be no error.
The case of the subject of line 6 is hopeless. When danger has reached its highest point, there he is, represented by a weak line, and with no proper correlate below. The ‘ thicket of thorns’ is taken as a metaphor for a prison; but if the expression has a history, I have been unable to find it.
Did hexagram 30 come up in your reading? The oracle itself gives the full reading, with changing lines and the second hexagram.
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