EN (English)
䷼
Hexagram 61 of 64
Inner Truth
中孚 · Zhōng Fú
Two open lines at the heart of the figure, an empty centre. The hexagram is about sincerity that reaches things it has no way of reaching, and it contains the book's most quoted line about resonance.
sincerity
trust
inner truth
resonance
- King Wen number
- 61 of 64
- Above
- ☴ Xùn · Wind
- Below
- ☱ Duì · Lake
- Composition
- Wind over Lake
- Lines, bottom to top
- Solid · solid · broken · broken · solid · solid
- Chinese
- 中孚 · Zhōng Fú
The Judgment
Pigs and fishes. Good fortune. It helps to cross the great water. It rewards holding to the course.
Pigs and fish were the least responsive of sacrificial animals. If sincerity moves even these, it moves anything.
The Image
Wind over the lake: Inner Truth. So the noble person reviews criminal cases and delays executions.
The one place where the classic applies sincerity to law. Truth at the centre means a case is looked at again before it is closed.
What it means
Zhong Fu means truth in the centre, and the figure shows it: two open lines at the heart of the hexagram, hollow like a drum or an empty cup. Something with nothing in the middle of it can resonate.
The second line is the passage the Great Treatise stops to discuss, and it is the most beautiful thing in the book. A crane calls somewhere out of sight, and its young answers. I have a good goblet, and I will share it with you. The commentary draws out the point: words spoken sincerely are answered from a thousand miles away, and words spoken otherwise are rejected from the same distance.
The Judgment's pigs and fish make the same claim from the other end. These were the dullest of the sacrificial animals, and the classic says that if the sincerity is real even they respond.
The Image is the one place in the book where sincerity is turned on the legal system: review the criminal cases, delay the executions. Inner truth applied institutionally means looking again before something becomes irreversible.
The top line is the counterfeit. A cock crowing toward heaven: loud, carrying, and nothing behind it.
In a reading
Inner Truth as an answer says the matter turns on sincerity rather than on technique. What you actually mean will carry further than what you arrange.
Its counsel is to clear out any second agenda, since the first line makes hidden intentions the thing that spoils it. If you are trying to reach someone who seems unreachable, the second line is the hexagram's promise, and the top line is its warning about volume standing in for substance.
The six lines
Read a line's text only when the cast made it a moving line. They are listed from the top of the figure down, the way the hexagram is drawn.
-
Nine at the top
Cockcrow rising to heaven. Steadfastness brings misfortune.
Sound with no substance underneath it, carrying further than it should. The hexagram's failure, placed last.
-
Nine in the fifth place
He possesses a truth that binds things together. No blame.
The ruling line. Sincerity as a force that holds a structure, not merely a private quality.
-
Six in the fourth place
The moon nearly full. The team horse goes astray. No blame.
Letting go of the partner you were paired with, at the point just short of fullness. Deliberate and blameless.
-
Six in the third place
He finds his counterpart. Now he beats the drum, now he stops; now he weeps, now he sings.
Emotional life entirely dependent on another person. The classic describes it without a verdict.
-
Nine in the second place
A crane calls in the shade and its young answers. I have a good goblet; I will share it with you.
The most quoted line in the book. Sincerity is heard where it cannot be seen, and answered by something that was not addressed.
-
Nine at the beginning
Being prepared brings good fortune. If there are hidden intentions, it is unsettling.
Trust starts with having no second agenda. Anything held back disturbs the whole arrangement.
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