Gnawing and biting through
Spiritual influence nourishing all.
Benefit from clear judgement of what benefits all.
Structure:
· Clarity of fire 7 above, and action 2 below: energetic and effective action with clarity, acting only after clear understanding.
· Movement and clarity. Union of thunder and lightning.
The hexagram has the image of an open mouth with an obstruction (4th line) between its jaws. The mouth can only close by energetically biting through the obstacle. Within nature, a thunder storm bites through the disturbing tension that precedes the storm.
Life, the great teacher, constantly offers lessons in the form of challenges or problems. When we successfully learn how to master one lesson, life reliably presents another set of problems and challenges. Our success with subsequent life lesson depends upon an ever deepening understanding of life and a growing capacity to respond well to whatever we encounter.
The obstructions of self-cherishing block our unity with the spirit. Life motivates us to bite through our self-cherishing and hostility for others by imposing ever greater levels of suffering until we finally exert ourselves to put an end to our problem behavior and return to the ways of the spirit that benefit all. The first time that we intentionally harm others for self-benefit, life administers a mild penalty as a warning to halt in time on the path of wrong-doing. If this rebuke prevents further wrong-doing, we free ourselves of blame. Yet if we persistently ignore a life lesson, we suffer increasingly severe consequences from our wrong-doing.
For example, caring for our physical well-being is a basic life lesson. If we neglect this responsibility and persist in unhealthy habits, we gradually experience increased suffering caused by failing health. However, if we finally decide before it is too late to master the lesson of caring for ourselves, then we might still reverse much of the damage we inflicted upon ourselves. In our time, the life lesson which has the steepest penalties should we continue to ignore it, is learning how to live with others in ways that benefit all and the Earth.
Every life lesson has a similar pattern to successfully move through it. Self-cherishing and hostility for others block our awareness of the spirit. Once we understand the root problem of the life lesson, we can then energetically remedy it. Failure to solve and move through life lessons leads to irreversible harm and loss of the Way.
The wise transform these negative behaviors by experiencing their tangle of reactive thoughts, bodily sensations, beliefs, prejudices, emotional projections, stories, agendas, uncomfortable feelings, hopes, confusions. We strip off layer after layer of self-cherishing and hostility for others until we come to a deeply rest with them within the loving spirit.
This hexagram urges us to exert ourselves and bite through whatever perpetuates our identification with the I, the wave instead of the ocean. Applying the fundamental laws of interbeing and Earth care must be firm and consistent until they lose their influence over us.
A lethargic mind and complicity with corrupting influences undermine our resolve to undo the harmful behavior patterns. Negative behaviors do not vanish on their own as they emerge out of self-cherishing. We must vigorously act to overcome our inherent complacency and inertia to resist what harms within ourselves and in the world.[1]
The wise vigorously remove obstructions to unite with the spirit. Yet exerting ourselves does not mean gritting our teeth and pushing through to the other side. We stay present with what obstructs us, which takes resolve and courage. We naturally incline toward leniency with ourselves, but we must make every effort to apply truth and impartiality inwardly to effectively transform ourselves.
Sages proceed in the right way with knowing what benefits all and action. Action without knowing would be too harsh. Knowing without action would not remove the obstruction. When balanced, the sage create brings the force of action together with the knowing of what benefits all.
The sage remains hard as metal and straight as an arrow and does not weaken even when tempted to indulge one’s feelings. Attainment of the spiritual path depends upon us remaining firm and straightforward, applying the knowledge we have gained from one life lessons to the next, persistently biting our way through our self-cherishing to what benefits all.
Lines: Lines 1 and 6 suffer the punishment. The others lines inflict the punishment.
Line 1: The line gets caught as soon as it begins to harm and receives a light punishment. Applying discipline at the beginning of development restrains behavior and prevents further wrongdoing.
Confucius: “Inferior people are not ashamed of unkindness and do not shrink from injustice. If no advantage beckons, they make no effort. If not intimidated, they do not improve themselves. But if they are made to behave correctly in small matters, they are careful in large ones. This is fortunate for these people.”
Line 2: In this situation, the line easily discerns right from wrong. Yet the line faces a great injustice, and, aroused by anger, goes too far in correcting it. Indignation blots out its sensibility, but no great harm results because its actions were just.
Line 3: When abuses of human freedom have lasted a long time and seem to have become normal, efforts to address and remedy the suffering caused by self-cherishing and hostility for others stir up poisonous hatred, putting the wise who remedy the abuses in a precarious position. Yet the time requires the unjust to stop their wrongdoing, and so the wise remain free of blame.
Line 4: Upon investigating principle, the line sees the truth and understands what it must do. This is clarity of action. Steadfastly keeping an inner discipline makes it possible to accomplish a difficult task.
The line has great obstacles to overcome and opponents to punish. It succeeds in this arduous effort. It remains hard as metal and straight as an arrow to surmount the difficulties. The firmly decisive and wise line has the responsibility to bite through injustice.
Line 5: The line makes the right and appropriate decision and impartially acts to resolves the problem successfully. It clearly discerns right from wrong, true from false. Those who assume the responsibility to correct a problem must remain conscious of the dangers that grow out of such a responsibility to avoid acting unjustly.
Line 6: The accumulated harms of the line are so great that release from them is impossible. The line receives a severe punishment. Confucius says, “If good does not accumulate, it is not enough to make name for someone. If evil does not accumulate, it is not enough to destroy someone. Therefore, inferior people think goodness in small things has no value and so neglects them. They think small sins do no harm and so do not give them up. Thus, sins accumulate until they can no longer be covered up, and their guilt becomes so great that it can be no longer wiped out.”
[1] World does not refer to the Earth but to how people live on Earth. The world – civilization, culture, history, society, science, economy, education, technology – is embedded as a subsystem within the natural system. People create their world through the choices they make.
