I Ching 23: Splitting Apart

Hexagram 23 has five broken lines beneath one solid top line: Mountain above Earth. Read its image as a prompt to examine what remains supported, rather than as a promise of disaster.

These operations answer different structural questions; none supplies missing moving-line information.

A cycle index identifies a stem-branch pair in a sixty-pair sequence. It is not a seventh line and does not give a casting date.

How each assignment was obtained

To reproduce an index, test n from 1 through 60: stem position = ((n - 1) mod 10) + 1; branch position = ((n - 1) mod 12) + 1; retain the n matching both positions.

B1, line 1: take Wei from the first place of lower Kun’s inner branch sequence and pair it with inner stem Yi; index 32 follows from stem position 2 and branch position 8 in the sixty-pair cycle; Wei is Earth, which generates palace Metal, so the label is Parents, with neither Self nor Response here.

B2, line 2: take Si from the second place of lower Kun’s inner sequence and retain Yi; index 42 matches stem position 2 with branch position 6; Si is Fire, which controls palace Metal, giving Officer/Ghost; the fifth-generation palace arrangement puts Response three positions from Self, here at line 2.

B3, line 3: take Mao from the third place of lower Kun’s inner sequence and retain Yi; index 52 matches stem position 2 with branch position 4; Mao is Wood, controlled by palace Metal, giving Wealth; this position carries neither marker.

B4, line 4: take Xu from the first place of upper Gen’s outer sequence and pair it with outer stem Bing; index 23 matches stem position 3 with branch position 11; Xu is Earth, generating palace Metal and giving Parents; this position carries neither marker.

B5, line 5: take Zi from the second place of upper Gen’s outer sequence and retain Bing; index 13 matches stem position 3 with branch position 1; palace Metal generates Zi’s Water, giving Offspring; the fifth-generation arrangement places Self at line 5.

B6, line 6: take Yin from the third place of upper Gen’s outer sequence and retain Bing; index 3 matches stem position 3 with branch position 3; Yin is Wood, controlled by palace Metal, giving Wealth; this position carries neither marker.

Candidate selection is not a finished reading

A category filter can list them, but cannot decide which is stronger, moving, void or month-broken without the omitted inputs. The eight rows below are controlled question filters, not eight competing traditions. A missing decision remains blank rather than becoming an invented rule.

What remains missing for each candidate

C1 and C6: lines 1 and 4 pass the Parents filter, but no casting date was supplied, so their month/day context and any date-dependent comparison remain uncalculated.

C2 and C7: lines 3 and 6 pass the Wealth filter, but the question-filter table contains no six casting values, so it cannot establish which candidate is moving; the separate D2 record must not silently supply that input.

C3: line 2 is the sole visible Officer/Ghost candidate, but being the only listed candidate does not establish its seasonal strength without the missing casting date.

C4: line 5 is the sole visible Offspring candidate; its Self marker identifies a position, not a supplied date or a strength calculation.

C5: no visible line has the Brothers label; this table does not contain a hidden-line lookup, so the empty cell cannot be read as proof that every possible Brothers candidate is absent.

C8: no void status is supplied for either Wealth candidate; without a casting day, this worksheet cannot determine which branches fall in that day’s void pair.

These are constructed calculation checks, not reported events or readings for real people. Under this recorded convention, six and eight start broken; seven and nine start solid. Only six and nine move.

Eight-step constructed example: from record to palace

1. Use constructed record D2: 6, 8, 8, 8, 8, 7, read from the bottom upward; this is a calculation input, not a reported casting by a person.
2. Convert the starting values to 000001: lower Kun, upper Gen, Hexagram 23, matching A1 and D2.
3. Start the palace check from Qian’s 111111 and change positions 1 through 5 in succession; the result is 000001, placing this figure in Qian palace’s fifth generation.
4. Assign Self to line 5 and Response to line 2, matching markers B5 and B2.
5. Apply lower Kun’s inner assignments Yi Wei, Yi Si and Yi Mao, then upper Gen’s outer assignments Bing Xu, Bing Zi and Bing Yin, matching B1 through B6.
6. Use palace Metal as the reference: B1 and B4 are Parents, B2 Officer/Ghost, B3 and B6 Wealth, and B5 Offspring.
7. Change only the old-yin value at line 1; the result is 100001, Hexagram 27, matching A5 and D2.
8. Stop before calendar-based judgments: no casting date was recorded, so this example supplies no void pair, seasonal strength or final useful-line selection.

Keeping those inputs visible prevents a resulting figure from being mistaken for a separately cast answer. The palace lookup places Self at five and Response at two; these markers do not change merely because a different question category is selected. No date, seasonal strength or final useful-line choice has been inferred.