Ding to Gou: the cauldron's handles, and knowing how to lift it

Date not recorded · A merchant · 中文版

The cast

Hexagram 50 Dǐng (The Cauldron), line 5 moving, changing to Hexagram 44 Gòu (Coming to Meet).

Original text

某商人來。請占氣運。筮得鼎之姤。爻辭曰。六五鼎黃耳。金鉉。利貞。斷曰。鼎者國之寶器。其用則能調五味。以供饗亨也。今足下占商業。得鼎五爻。觀爻辭之意。謂鼎有耳。必貫以鉉。可以擧動。喩言商業有利。必得其術。可以謀獲。黃耳金鉉。珍貴之品。喩言其利之厚也。足下得此爻。財運盛大。正可喜也。

In plain words

A merchant came to ask about his fortunes. The cast gave Ding with its fifth line moving, changing into Gou. The line reads: "Six in the fifth place: the cauldron has yellow handles and a bronze carrying bar; steadfastness is favourable."

Takashima's judgment: the cauldron is a treasure of the state; its use is to blend the five flavours for sacrifices and feasts. You asked about business and drew the fifth line of Ding. The line means that a cauldron has handles, but only when a bar is passed through them can it be lifted and carried. So too, a business may hold profit, but only someone who knows the method can take it.

Yellow handles and a bronze bar are precious things, a figure for rich profits. With this line, your fortunes in money are strong; it is something to be glad of.

How Takashima read it

Only one line text is read: with one moving line, the fifth line of Ding is read.
The hexagram is read as the cauldron: a treasure of the state that blends the five flavours.
The images are the handles and the bar: handles need a bar through them before the cauldron can be lifted, a figure for needing a method as well as an opportunity. The construction of an object is read straight as a principle of action.
"Yellow" and "bronze": precious colour and metal, read as rich profits.

About the outcome

The text records only Takashima's judgment, not what happened to the merchant. It is a typical reading of a favourable line, following the good sense of the text.

Applying it to your situation

"A cauldron has handles, but needs a bar through them": the opportunity is the handles, the method the bar; without the bar, however precious the cauldron, it cannot be lifted. For the opportunity you see now, which "bar" is missing?

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