Scryway

Hexagram 41

損 Sǔn · Decrease

Legge: Sun

☶ Mountain (Gèn) above ☱ Lake (Duì)

Scryway summary

Modern commentary written for Scryway. Not part of the classic text.

Taking away from below to add above. Simplify; sincerity matters more than display.

The judgment

In (what is denoted by) Sun, if there be sincerity (in him who employs it), there will be great good fortune:—freedom from error; firmness and correctness that can be maintained; and advantage in every movement that shall be made. In what shall this (sincerity in the exercise of Sun) be employed? (Even) in sacrifice two baskets of grain, (though there be nothing else), may be presented.

The image

(The trigram representing) a mountain and beneath it that for the waters of a marsh form Sun. The superior man, in accordance with this, restrains his wrath and represses his desires.

The lines, bottom to top

  1. Bottom line, solid

    The first line, undivided, shows its subject suspending his own affairs, and hurrying away (to help the subject of the fourth line). He will commit no error, but let him consider how far he should contribute of what is his (for the other).

  2. Second line, solid

    The second line, undivided, shows that it will be advantageous for its subject to maintain a firm correctness, and that action on his part will be evil. He can give increase (to his correlate) without taking from himself.

  3. Third line, broken

    The third line, divided, shows how of three men walking together, the number is diminished by one; and how one, walking, finds his friend.

  4. Fourth line, broken

    The fourth line, divided, shows its subject diminishing the ailment under which he labours by making (the subject of the first line) hasten (to his help), and make him glad. There will be no error.

  5. Fifth line, broken

    The fifth line, divided, shows parties adding to (the stores of) its subject ten pairs of tortoise shells, and accepting no refusal. There will be great good fortune.

  6. Top line, solid

    The topmost line, undivided, shows its subject giving increase to others without taking from himself. There will be no error. With firm correctness there will be good fortune. There will be advantage in every movement that shall be made. He will find ministers more than can be counted by their clans.

Quoted from James Legge (trans.), The Yi King, Sacred Books of the East vol. XVI, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1882. Public domain. The image is from Legge’s Appendix II. Words in parentheses are Legge’s additions.