Pi to Cui: talking business with an estranged friend in Tokyo

Date not recorded · A merchant in Yokohama · 中文版

The cast

Hexagram 12 Pǐ (Standstill), line 6 (top) moving, changing to Hexagram 45 Cuì (Gathering Together).

Original text

橫濱商人某來告曰。目下商業上。有一大事。欲謀之於東京友人。請占其成否如何。筮得否之萃。爻辭曰。上九傾否。先否後喜。斷曰。此卦天地之氣。塞而不通之時也。足下欲與人謀事。其人必因事疎遠。心氣不通。非知己之友也。今得上爻否之終。是將釋其前嫌。重尋舊好。傾談之下。彼此懽悅。謀必可就。謂之傾否。先否後喜。其後某來謝曰。東京之談。果如貴占。

In plain words

A Yokohama merchant came and said: there is a major matter in my business that I want to discuss with a friend in Tokyo; please divine whether it will succeed. The cast gave Pi with its top line moving, changing into Cui. The line reads: "Nine at the top: the blockage is overturned; first obstruction, then joy."

Takashima's judgment: this hexagram is a time when the breath of heaven and earth is blocked and does not flow. The person you want to deal with must have grown distant from you over something; your minds do not meet, and he is not a close friend. But you have drawn the top line, the end of the blockage: old grudges will be set aside and the friendship renewed. Talking frankly, you will both be glad, and the plan will surely go through. That is "the blockage is overturned; first obstruction, then joy".

Later the merchant came to thank him: the talks in Tokyo had gone just as Takashima said.

How Takashima read it

Only one line text is read: with one moving line, the top line of Pi is read.
The hexagram is read as blockage: heaven and earth not meeting becomes two people whose minds no longer meet.
The line's position is the end: the top line closes the hexagram, and blockage at its limit turns over, so old grudges can clear.
A word is taken two ways: the verb for "overturn" also means "pouring out", and Takashima reads it as a frank, heartfelt conversation.

About the outcome

The thanks came from the merchant afterwards, as recorded by Takashima. The claim that the two had drifted apart is drawn from the hexagram, but the man asking would know that best himself; how much of the judgment came from the lines and how much from reading the man in front of him, the book cannot tell us. This site does not treat it as evidence.

Applying it to your situation

When a relationship has stalled, "overturning the blockage" suggests going and talking it through rather than waiting for it to mend itself. Between you and that person, is there a frank conversation worth preparing for?

Original: Takashima Kaemon, Takashima Ekidan (expanded edition), recorded by Yanagida Ikusaku, Chinese text by Wang Zhiben, 1901. Translation, notes and reflection by this site.

These are historical records kept by the diviner himself. The outcomes are his own account; this site uses them to study how the lines were read, not as evidence that divination predicts events.

Cast a hexagram · All of Takashima's cases · The 64 hexagrams