Lesson 4
One Gua, Many Layers: Family, Ranks, Nature and Related Gua
Read the same line through another layer and it gains another meaning. This lesson gives you five keys: the family, the ranks, nature and animals, related gua, and the path the six lines take from bottom to top.
Layer one: the trigrams are a family
The Discussion of the Trigrams (說卦傳) arranges the eight trigrams as one household: Qian is the father and Kun the mother; Zhen is the eldest son, Kan the middle son, Gen the youngest son; Xun is the eldest daughter, Li the middle daughter, Dui the youngest daughter. Every hexagram is two trigrams, one above the other, so every hexagram can be read as two members of a family living together.
Take Xian 咸, Influence: the youngest daughter (Dui) is above, the youngest son (Gen) below. When the young man is willing to put himself lower, feelings can flow, which is why Xian is about mutual response. Now compare Jiaren 家人, the Family, with Kui 睽, Estrangement. Both contain the middle daughter (Li). In Jiaren she lives with the eldest daughter (Xun); in Kui with the youngest (Dui). The only difference is whether there is an elder sister who runs the house and holds everyone together: one becomes a home, the other drifts apart.
When you read a hexagram, ask: who lives with whom? Who is above, who below? Who is missing? The character of many hexagrams appears at once.
Layer two: the six lines are an organisation
The six positions can also be read as places in a society or a company. The first line is the newcomer, or the start of the matter. The second is the official working out in the field. The third sits at the top of the lower trigram, like a manager caught in the middle, and is where trouble comes most easily. The fourth has entered the upper trigram: the minister close to the ruler. The fifth is the ruler's seat, responsible for the whole. The top line has left the front line, like a retired elder or an adviser.
The Great Commentary sums these places up: “The second is often praised, the fourth often anxious; the third often meets misfortune, the fifth often achieves.” The second is far from the centre of power, so good work is noticed; the fourth is at the boss's side every day, so it stays careful; the third sits at the boundary, passing things up and down, and carries the most pressure; the fifth holds the honoured seat, so success and failure are both credited to it.
Then look at how the lines relate. If the fifth and second answer each other as yin and yang, a ruler trusts an official far away; the fourth, right next to the fifth, is watched in every move. When you reach a line, ask yourself which position you hold right now, and the line stops being abstract.
Layer three: nature, the body and animals
The most basic images of the trigrams are natural: heaven, earth, thunder, wind, water, fire, mountain, lake. The Discussion of the Trigrams also links them to the body (Qian the head, Kun the belly, Zhen the feet, Xun the thighs, Kan the ears, Li the eyes, Gen the hands, Dui the mouth) and to animals (Qian the horse, Kun the ox, Zhen the dragon, Xun the rooster, Kan the pig, Li the pheasant, Gen the dog, Dui the sheep).
The animals and objects in the line texts often come from these images. Gen 艮, Keeping Still, says “keeping the toes still… the calves… the back”, because Gen means stopping, and the body is stilled section by section from the bottom up. In Kui, the top line sees “a pig covered in mud, a cart full of ghosts”: the upper trigram Li (the eye) looks down at the nuclear trigram Kan (pig, hidden things). Once you know this layer, a line text is no longer a strange picture but a grounded metaphor.
Readers in the past also took images from the trigrams hidden inside the hexagram (the nuclear trigrams). Some of these readings differ between traditions; where they do, this site says “one traditional reading is…”. Treat it as an angle, not a verdict.
Layer four: related gua: opposite, overturned, nuclear, swapped
Every hexagram has a few relatives, and each opens a different direction:
The overturned gua (綜): turn the hexagram upside down and you are standing in the other person's place. Tai, Peace, overturned is Pi, Standstill: your good fortune may be the other side's bad fortune. After Completion overturned is Before Completion: as soon as one thing is finished, a new unfinished one begins. The opposite gua (錯): change all six lines to see the reverse or hidden side. The opposite of Kui, Estrangement, is Jian, Obstruction: once people drift apart, things get stuck. The nuclear gua (互): take lines two to four and three to five as a new hexagram; it shows the process going on inside the matter, out of sight. The swapped gua (交): exchange the upper and lower trigrams. Pi (heaven over earth) swapped becomes Tai (earth over heaven): the same two trigrams, with a completely different result depending on which is on top.
On each gua page, under “Layers of images”, this site picks the one or two related gua that teach the most. When you cast a gua, ask: what if I turn it over? What is its opposite? What is going on inside?
Layer five: the six lines are a path from bottom to top
The six lines of a hexagram are not six unrelated sayings. Together they tell how one matter unfolds from start to finish, always read from the bottom up. The first line is the beginning, when strength is still small. The second is where things take shape and become visible. The third, at the top of the lower trigram, is the first risky turning point. The fourth steps into the upper trigram, a new situation that calls for care. The fifth is the peak or the core. The top line has reached the end, and going too far means it must change.
Qian is the clearest example: the hidden dragon, do not act; the dragon appears in the field; working hard all day; perhaps leaping in the deep; the flying dragon in the heavens; the dragon that went too high has regrets. One dragon, from hiding to flight, and on to regret for rising too high.
This path is especially useful when you receive two or more changing lines. Place them on it: the lower line is the earlier, more basic stage; the higher line comes later and shows more openly. If you get the first and fourth lines, for example, read them as your situation when starting out and your situation when entering new ground, two stations on one journey. The passage chosen by Zhu Xi's rules remains the main text; the other changing lines show which other stations lie on the way.
二多譽，四多懼……三多凶，五多功，貴賤之等也。
《繫辭下傳》
The second is often praised, the fourth often anxious… the third often meets misfortune, the fifth often achieves: such are the differences of rank.
- The trigrams are a family: Qian father, Kun mother; Zhen, Kan, Gen the eldest, middle and youngest sons; Xun, Li, Dui the eldest, middle and youngest daughters. Ask who lives with whom, and who is missing.
- The lines are an organisation: newcomer, field official, middle manager, minister, ruler, retired elder. “The second is often praised, the fourth often anxious; the third often meets misfortune, the fifth often achieves.”
- Nature, body and animals: the dragons, horses, pigs and pheasants in the line texts mostly have a basis in the trigrams.
- Related gua: overturned for the other side's view, opposite for the reverse, nuclear for the inside, swapped for who is on top.
- The six lines are one path from bottom to top; with two or more changing lines, read them as stations on that path.