Hexagram 46: Sheng

Earth over Wind · 地风升 · Tendency: Auspicious

Structure

• Number: 46 (King Wen sequence)
• Symbol: ䷭
• Upper trigram: Kun (Earth)
• Lower trigram: Xun (Wind)
• Lines: yin yang yang yin yin yin (bottom to top)

The statement

元亨。用见大人，勿恤。南征吉。

——《周易》

What this hexagram indicates

This is a state of gradual ascent. Suitable for learning, promotion, business expansion, or seeking opportunities at higher levels. The key is to advance step by step, leveraging mentors or platforms to move up. Don't be greedy for quick jumps; if the foundation isn't laid, it's easy to go up and then become unstable.

A Buddhist reading

Sheng (Ascending) is a tree growing up out of the ground. Ouyi Zhixu is at his warmest on the image: the substance of the way has no large or small, yet a person accumulates virtue by going with the grain, from small to tall, the way a tree too wide to embrace begins as a filament. What matters is neither hacking at it nor tugging the shoots to hurry them. He also notes that wood rises by relying on soil while soil counts the growing of wood as its own achievement, so the two complete each other rather than one profiting from the other. At the top line, ascending in the dark, one might well stop; but with steadfastness that does not rest, he says, keep rising even in obscurity, and that is how one cultivates the nobility conferred by heaven rather than by rank.

After Ouyi Zhixu (1599-1655), whose Chan commentary on the Changes reads each hexagram as a stage of practice.

The statement is quoted from the Book of Changes, which is in the public domain. The English reading on this page was prepared for this library.

Related hexagrams

• Previous / Inverted: Hexagram 45: Cuithe whole figure turned upside down
• Next: Hexagram 47: Kun
• Opposite: Hexagram 25: Wu Wangevery line changed to its opposite
• Nuclear: Hexagram 54: Gui Meilines two to four below, three to five above

Related

• Liu Yao Divination ChartLiu Yao casts a hexagram about one specific matter and reads its structure. Unlike BaZi or Zi Wei, which describe a person, Liu Yao describes how a situation stands at a particular moment. This page walks through the full process from casting to attribution.
• Mei Hua Yi Shu CalculatorMei Hua Yi Shu is traditionally attributed to Shao Yong. What sets it apart is how freely it casts: a time, a spoken number, a direction or something noticed in passing will all serve. It attaches no stems and no relatives, reading the trigrams directly. This page covers casting through to the subject and object.