颐 Nourishment
Upper trigram: Mountain (the mountain) · Lower trigram: Thunder (thunder)
What nourishes you? — watch what you consume.
Modern interpretation
Watch what you take in: food, media, company, ideas. Nourish yourself and others with what is truly wholesome, and examine what you hunger for — the mouth reveals the character. You become what you consume.
The Judgment · 卦辞
贞吉。观颐，自求口实。
“Î indicates that with firm correctness there will be good fortune (in what is denoted by it). We must look at what we are seeking to nourish, and by the exercise of our thoughts seek for the proper aliment.” — James Legge, The Yî King (1882)
The six lines · 爻辞
Read from the bottom line upward. Each line pairs the received Chinese text with Legge's English translation.
舍尔灵龟，观我朵颐，凶。
“The first line, undivided, (seems to be thus addressed), ‘You leave your efficacious tortoise, and look at me till your lower jaw hangs down.’ There will be evil.”
颠颐拂经于丘颐，征凶。
“The second line, divided, shows one looking downwards for nourishment, which is contrary to what is proper ; or seeking it from the height (above), advance towards which will lead to evil.”
拂颐，贞凶，十年勿用，无攸利。
“The third line, divided, shows one acting contrary to the method of nourishing. However firm he may be, there will be evil. For ten years let him not take any action, (for) it will not be in any way advantageous.”
颠颐，吉。虎视眈眈，其欲逐逐，无咎。
“The fourth line, divided, shows one looking downwards for (the power to) nourish. There will be good fortune. Looking with a tiger's downward unwavering glare, and with his desire that impels him to spring after spring, he will fall into no error.”
拂经，居贞吉，不可涉大川。
“The fifth line, divided, shows one acting contrary to what is regular and proper ; but if he abide in firmness, there will be good fortune. He should not, (however, try to) cross the great stream.”
由颐，厉，吉。利涉大川。
“The sixth line, undivided, shows him from whom comes the nourishing. His position is perilous, but there will be good fortune. It will be advantageous to cross the great stream.”
About changing lines
In a real I Ching reading, hexagrams are built by casting coins or yarrow stalks six times, bottom line first. Some lines come out “old” (unstable) — an old yin or old yang flips into its opposite, producing a second hexagram that shows where the situation is heading. The changing lines are the moving parts of your answer: read their individual line statements above, and they point to the direction of change.
Ask a question and cast the coins — free, with a plain-English interpretation grounded in the classical text.
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