未济 Before Completion
Upper trigram: Fire (fire) · Lower trigram: Water (water)
Not yet — the end is also a beginning; finish with care.
Modern interpretation
Almost there, but not done — stay as careful at the finish as you were at the start. The fox nearly crosses the river and then wets its tail. One more stretch of attention, and the crossing completes.
The Judgment · 卦辞
亨。小狐汔济，濡其尾，无攸利。
“Wei Zî intimates progress and success (in the circumstances which it implies). (We see) a young fox that has nearly crossed (the stream), when its tail gets immersed. There will be no advantage in any way.” — 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.
濡其尾，吝。
“The first line, divided, shows its subject (like a fox) whose tail gets immersed. There will be occasion for regret.”
曳其轮，贞吉。
“The second line, undivided, shows its subject dragging back his (carriage-)wheel. With firmness and correctness there will be good fortune.”
未济，征凶。利涉大川。
“The second line, undivided, shows its subject dragging back his (carriage-)wheel. With firmness and correctness there will be good fortune.”
贞吉，悔亡，震用伐鬼方，三年，有赏于大国。
“The fourth line, undivided, shows its subject by firm correctness obtaining good fortune, so that all occasion for repentance disappears. Let him stir himself up, as if he were invading the Demon region, where for three years rewards will come to him (and his troops) from the great kingdom.”
贞吉，无悔。君子之光，有孚吉。
“The fifth line, divided, shows its subject by firm correctness obtaining good fortune, and having no occasion for repentance. (We see in him) the brightness of a superior man, and the possession of sincerity. There will be good fortune.”
有孚于饮酒，无咎。濡其首，有孚失是。
“The topmost line, undivided, shows its subject full of confidence and therefore feasting (quietly). There will be no error. (If he) cherish this confidence, till he (is like the fox who) gets his head immersed, it will fail of what is right. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)”
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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