Reading
Judgment
Fellowship with people in the open: success.
It is favorable to cross the great water.
Favorable is the noble one's perseverance.
True fellowship among people must come about on the basis of a cosmic participation. Not the private ends of the ego, but the aims of humanity bring forth lasting fellowship among people; therefore it is said: Fellowship with people in the open has success. When such unity prevails, then even difficult and dangerous tasks, like the crossing of the great water, can be accomplished. But in order to bring about such fellowship, there is need of a persevering and enlightened leader who has clear, compelling, and inspiring aims and knows how to carry them through with force. (The inner hexagram signifies clarity, the outer, strength.)
Image
Heaven together with fire: the image of Fellowship with People.
Thus the noble one orders the clans
and distinguishes among things.
Heaven has the same direction of motion as fire, and yet is distinct from it. As the luminous bodies in the sky serve for the ordering and division of time, so too human society and all things that truly belong together must be organically articulated. Fellowship should not be a mingling of individuals and a mingling of things; that would be chaos, not fellowship. Rather it requires articulated diversity in order to lead to order.
Commentary
The image of the upper primary hexagram, Ch'ien, is heaven; that of the lower, Li, is flame. The nature of fire is to blaze upward to heaven. This gives the idea of fellowship. The second line, through its central character, unites the five strong lines around itself. This hexagram is the counterpart of number 7, The Army. There: within, danger; without, obedience, as the essence of the warlike host, which requires for its cohesion the one strong among the many weak. Here: within, clarity; without, strength, as the essence of the peaceful union of people, which requires for its cohesion the one yielding among the many firm.
Changing Lines
Line 1
A nine at the beginning means:
Fellowship with people at the gate. No blame.
Commentary
The beginning of a union of people should take place before the door. All stand equally near to one another. No special ambitions yet exist. Thus one makes no mistake. The foundations of any union must be accessible in the same way to all participants. Secret agreements bring misfortune.
Line 2
A six in the second place means:
Fellowship with people in the clan: humiliation.
Commentary
Here is the danger of a special party based on personal and selfish interests. Such partisanships, which are exclusive and have no room for all, which must condemn a portion of people in order to gather the rest, arise from low motives and therefore lead in the long run to humiliation.
Line 3
A nine in the third place means:
He hides weapons in the thicket,
climbs the high hill before it.
For three years he does not rise.
Commentary
Here fellowship has turned into mistrust. One distrusts others, lays secret ambush, and seeks to spy out the others from afar. One is dealing with a hard opponent, who cannot be reached in this way. Here are shown the hindrances that stand in the way of fellowship with others. One has ulterior motives oneself and seeks occasionally to surprise the other. But just this makes one mistrustful; one seeks the same cunning in the opponent as well and seeks to spy it out. As a result, one moves ever further from true fellowship. The longer it lasts, the more one becomes estranged.
Line 4
A nine in the fourth place means:
He climbs his wall; he cannot attack. Good fortune!
Commentary
Here reconciliation after estrangement is drawing closer. To be sure, dividing walls are still present, on which one stands facing one another. But the difficulties are too great. One comes into distress, and through distress one comes to reflection. One cannot fight, but on this very fact rests the good fortune.
Line 5
A nine in the fifth place means:
People bound in fellowship first weep and lament,
but afterward they laugh.
After great battles they succeed in meeting.
Commentary
Here two people are outwardly separated but inwardly united. They are kept apart by their position in life. Between them rise many obstacles and hindrances that cause them to grieve. But they let no hindrance separate them, remaining true to each other. And although overcoming these obstacles costs hard battles, they will triumph, and then their sadness will turn into joy when they find each other.
Confucius says of this: "Life leads the serious man along richly interwoven paths. Often the force of their course is checked, then again it goes straight. Here an eloquent mind may pour itself freely out in words. There the heavy burden of knowledge must shut itself up in silence. Yet where two people are at one in their innermost hearts, they shatter even the strength of iron or bronze. And where two people understand each other entirely in their innermost hearts, their words are sweet and strong as the scent of orchids."
Line 6
A nine at the top means:
Fellowship with people in the meadow: no remorse.
Commentary
Here the warm attachment of the heart is lacking. One stands, strictly speaking, already outside of fellowship with others. But one joins up. The fellowship does not embrace all, but only those who dwell externally together. The meadow is the pasture before the city. The final goal of the uniting of humanity is not yet reached here. Yet one need not reproach oneself. One joins the community without special aims of one's own.