Hexagram 3 · Upper canon
Zhun · Difficulty at the Start
Beginnings are hard because they are tangled, not because they cannot work.
The figure
- Number
- 3 (Upper canon)
- Upper trigram
- Water (Kan)
- Lower trigram
- Thunder (Zhen)
- Keywords
- start · roots · companions
- Reversed hexagram
- Ding · The Cauldron
- Inverted hexagram
- Meng · Youthful Folly
The meaning
What the name means Zhun is a sprout pushing out of the soil: hard, and alive.
The picture Thunder under cloud: the cloud has gathered and the thunder is still muffled, and no rain has fallen yet.
The sense of the whole The whole hexagram is about the muddle at the start. Conditions are not all there and the direction is not clear, which is normal. Do not spread out in a hurry; set your roots first, find a few people who walk with you, and grow step by step.
In plain words: what this hexagram says
Every beginning is a muddle. Like a seed holding its breath in the soil: do not spread out yet, set roots first and find a few who walk with you.
The upper trigram is Water and the lower is Thunder: Water above, Thunder below. When you read it, first picture the two together as a scene, then set it against the original below. The plain words speak only of stance and do not foretell.
The judgement
元亨利貞，勿用有攸往，利建侯。
The image
雲雷屯，君子以經綸。
The six lines
From the bottom up, the first line is the lowest. When you cast this hexagram and a line is changing, read the matching one. The original is classical Chinese.
- 初九磐桓，利居貞，利建侯。
- 六二屯如邅如，乘馬班如。匪寇婚媾，女子貞不字，十年乃字。
- 六三即鹿無虞，惟入於林中，君子幾不如舍，往吝。
- 六四乘馬班如，求婚媾，往吉，無不利。
- 九五屯其膏，小貞吉，大貞兇。
- 上六乘馬班如，泣血漣如。
To learn how to read a hexagram, see "How to read a hexagram"; for changing lines, see "Changing lines and the resulting hexagram".