The Abysmal
- In Chinese
- 坎 kǎn
- Above
- The Abysmal, water
- Below
- The Abysmal, water
Did you get this hexagram?
Mark your changing lines and keep your cast.
Mark my castWhat hexagram 29 means
Hexagram 29 is water over water, the same trigram twice. Legge explains that this trigram “becomes symbolic of danger”, so the hexagram shows danger repeated.
The judgment speaks of sincerity. In Legge the doubled trigram shows “the possession of sincerity”, and in Wilhelm it reads “If you are sincere, you have success in your heart”.
Legge sums up what the text sets out to teach. It shows “how danger should be encountered, its effect on the mind, and how to get out of it”.
The six lines are harder than the judgment. The first and the top line end in evil, and only the fourth and the fifth are said to be without error.
The judgment and the image
The judgment
坎有孚，維心、亨。行有尚。
The Abysmal repeated. If you are sincere, you have success in your heart, And whatever you do succeeds.
success things flow and come through
The image
水洊至，《習坎》。君子以常德行、習教事。
Water flows on uninterruptedly and reaches its goal: The image of the Abysmal repeated. Thus the superior man walks in lasting virtue And carries on the business of teaching.
What the commentaries say
The commentary on the judgment begins with the picture. The doubled trigram “shows us one defile succeeding another”.
It then takes water as the model. Water “flows on, without accumulating its volume (so as to overflow)”, and it “pursues its way through a dangerous defile, without losing its true (nature)”.
The same commentary finds a use for danger. Heaven has its height and the earth has its mountains and rivers, and “Kings and princes arrange by means of such strengths, to maintain their territories”.
The image is water that keeps flowing. The commentary draws from it a rule of constancy. The superior man “maintains constantly the virtue (of his heart) and (the integrity of) his conduct, and practises the business of instruction”.
Wilhelm gives the same image a destination. In his version “Water flows on uninterruptedly and reaches its goal”.
Legge explains where the sincerity of the judgment comes from. The trigram has a strong line in the middle, between two divided lines. It stood for a person “whose mind was sharpened and made penetrating by contact with danger”. The old commentary points to the same line, since the penetrating mind “is indicated by the strong (line) in the centre”.
The six lines
First line
習坎，入于坎窞，凶。
Repetition of the Abysmal. In the abyss one falls into a pit. Misfortune.
misfortune it goes badly
The first line is already inside the danger and goes deeper into it. The commentary says “he has missed his (proper) way”, and the text ends in evil.
Legge notes that the line is weak, at the bottom, and has “no helper, that is, beyond itself”. Its subject “will by his efforts only involve himself more deeply in danger”.
When only this line changes, it becomes hexagram 60, Limitation
Second line
坎有險，求小得。
The abyss is dangerous. One should strive to attain small things only.
no verdict
The second line is whole and stands in the centre. It does not get out, but it gets something. Wilhelm turns it into advice, “One should strive to attain small things only”, and Legge notes that its subject “obtains some ease”.
The commentary is clear about the limit. It says “he will not yet escape from his environed position”.
When only this line changes, it becomes hexagram 8, Holding Together
Third line
來之坎坎，險且枕，入于坎窞，勿用。
Forward and backward, abyss on abyss. In danger like this, pause at first and wait, Otherwise you will fall into a pit in the abyss. Do not act in this way.
no verdict
The third line has danger in both directions. Wilhelm has “Forward and backward, abyss on abyss”, and both versions end with a call not to act. Legge's is “There should be no action (in such a case)”.
The commentary gives the reason. Of this subject it says “he will never (in such circumstances) achieve any success”.
Legge notes that the line is weak and “occupies the place of a strong line”. In Wilhelm the advice is to “pause at first and wait”, or else one falls “into a pit in the abyss”.
When only this line changes, it becomes hexagram 48, The Well
Fourth line
樽酒、簋貳、用缶，納約自牖，終无咎。
A jug of wine, a bowl of rice with it; Earthen vessels Simply handed in through the window. There is certainly no blame in this.
no blame there is no mistake in it
The fourth line is a plain meal, a bottle of spirits and a basket of rice served in earthenware. Legge reads it as closeness to the ruler in the fifth place, cultivated “with an unostentatious sincerity, symbolled by the appointments of the simple feast”. The text finds no error in the end.
Legge does not make this person a rescuer. He “is not one who can avert the danger threatening himself and others”. What he can do is speak to the ruler, “whose intelligence he cautiously enlightens”.
Wilhelm keeps the meal and adds a detail. The vessels are “Simply handed in through the window”, and he ends with “There is certainly no blame in this”. The commentary sees in the meal a meeting of those shown by “the strong and weak lines”.
When only this line changes, it becomes hexagram 47, Oppression
Fifth line
坎不盈，衹既平，无咎。
The abyss is not filled to overflowing, It is filled only to the rim. No blame.
no blame there is no mistake in it
The fifth line is the other whole line, and Legge places it “in the place of honour”. The water has not yet filled the defile, and the text says there is no error. Legge reads its subject as “on the eve of extrication and deliverance”.
The commentary is more reserved. For it the virtue of the central place “is not yet (sufficiently) great”.
Wilhelm reads the water another way. In his version the abyss “is filled only to the rim”. Legge's note looks ahead to the release, when the waters “will ere long have free vent and disappear”.
When only this line changes, it becomes hexagram 7, The Army
Sixth line
係用徽纆，寘于叢棘，三歲不得，凶。
Bound with cords and ropes, Shut in between thorn-hedged prison walls: For three years one does not find the way. Misfortune.
misfortune it goes badly
The top line is bound with cords and set among thorns, and it ends in evil. Legge calls the case “hopeless” and explains that the thicket of thorns “is taken as a metaphor for a prison”.
Both versions speak of three years. Wilhelm has “For three years one does not find the way”, and Legge has a subject who “does not learn the course for him to pursue”.
Legge gives the reasons in his note. Danger “has reached its highest point”, and the line is weak “with no proper correlate below”. He admits a limit about the thorns, writing “if the expression has a history, I have been unable to find it”.
When only this line changes, it becomes hexagram 59, Dispersion
Hexagram 29 unchanging
If none of your six lines is moving, you read the hexagram as a whole. That is the judgment and the image above, without any of the line texts.
The book gives the reason. Lines that do not move are “non-moving lines, which serve only as structural matter in the hexagram, without intrinsic meaning of their own”.
For hexagram 29 unchanging, what remains is the sincerity of the judgment, which gives action its value, and the image of water flowing on, which asks for virtue kept constant.
Questions people ask
What does hexagram 29 mean?
It shows danger repeated and the way through it. The judgment ties success to sincerity, and Legge says the text shows “how danger should be encountered, its effect on the mind, and how to get out of it”.
What does hexagram 29 unchanging mean?
With no moving lines you read only the judgment and the image. For hexagram 29 that is sincerity in the face of danger, and water that “flows on uninterruptedly and reaches its goal”.
What does hexagram 29 changing to 8 mean?
It is hexagram 29 with its second line moving. That line stands “in all the peril of the defile” and gets only a little of what it seeks, and when it changes the hexagram becomes number 8.
What does hexagram 29 changing to 7 mean?
It is hexagram 29 with its fifth line moving. That line shows the water of the defile “not yet full”, with no error, and when it changes the hexagram becomes number 7.
Is hexagram 29 a bad sign?
The hexagram is about danger, and two of its lines end in evil. The judgment itself is not a warning. In Legge it speaks of sincerity and of action that “will be of high value”.
Richard Wilhelm, translated by Cary F. Baynes. Khan in James Legge. The Abysmal in Wilhelm and Baynes.
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