Shi to Lin: founding a joint-stock company

Date not recorded · Someone organising an industrial company · 中文版

The cast

Hexagram 7 Shī (The Army), line 1 moving, changing to Hexagram 19 Lín (Approach).

Original text

或人以有組織工業會社。募集株金。設定欵。請占其社之成否。筮得師之臨。爻辭曰。初六師出以律。否臧凶。斷曰。此卦九二。一陽統衆陰。是必有剛健之人。爲社長指揮衆人之象。今定欵既完全無間。即見規律整肅也。然依此爻辭。此社之盛衰。全在作事之紀律。我國方今集合株金興會社者。皆以歐米各邦爲模範。歐米各邦舟車之便。非本邦之比。是以販運各種貨物。最爲適當。凡合衆資。購備器械。人力既省。製費亦廉。大得勝利。至於小本營生。獨立工業者。無不取敗。今我國倣之。欲設立會社。然集合衆資。洵非易易。且役員從事營業。亦難其人。故立會社。第一在社長得人。社長得人。則事可成。業可興。不得其人。即成亦敗。今初爻居事之始。未可以定欵判吉凶。必俟社長選擧既定。方可卜工業之興廢也。

In plain words

Someone planning to organise an industrial company had raised share capital and drawn up its articles, and asked Takashima whether the company would succeed. The cast gave Shi with its first line moving, changing into Lin. The line reads: "Six at the beginning: the army goes out in good order; if the order is not good, misfortune."

Takashima's judgment: in this hexagram the single yang line in the second place commands all the yin lines, so there must be a strong person who, as president, directs everyone. The articles are already complete and without gaps, which shows good order. But by this line, the company's rise or fall rests entirely on the discipline with which it does its work.

Our country now raises capital and founds companies on the model of Europe and America. Their transport by rail and ship is far beyond ours, which makes them ideal for moving all kinds of goods: pooling capital and buying machinery saves labour and lowers costs, and profits are large, while small independent manufacturers all fail. Now we copy them and set up companies, but pooling capital is truly not easy, and it is hard to find the right staff to run the business. So in founding a company, the first thing is to get the right president: with the right president the work succeeds and the enterprise grows; without one, even what is achieved will fail.

The first line stands at the start of the matter, so good or bad fortune cannot yet be judged from the articles. Only once the president has been chosen can the fate of the enterprise be divined.

How Takashima read it

Only one line text is read: with one moving line, the first line of Shi is read.
The ruling line is the second: in Shi one yang line commands five yin lines, the general, and Takashima maps it onto the company president.
The line's "good order" is read as discipline: an army depends on it, and so does a company; "if the order is not good, misfortune".
The first line is the start of the matter, so no verdict is given yet; judgment waits until the president is chosen. The passage on European and American companies is Takashima's view of the Meiji company boom, not something drawn from the lines.

About the outcome

The text does not say how the company fared. In fact Takashima gave no verdict at all here; he said outright that its fortune could not yet be judged from the articles. It was too early to say.

Applying it to your situation

However complete a plan is on paper, it is only half of "good order"; the other half is who carries it out. In your plan, has the key person been chosen, or is a polished document standing in for that decision?

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