Upper trigram
☶
Mountain · Gen
Stillness and limit.
FamilyYoungest son
ElementEarth
Hexagram 27 of 64
☶☳ Nourishment
Hexagram 27 of the 64, Nourishment, is mountain above, thunder below — read as what you take in, and what you say. Its six lines are 001100, counted from the bottom up, where a broken line is yielding and a solid one firm.
Lower trigram
☳
Thunder · Zhen
Arousal and shock.
FamilyEldest son
ElementWood
From the Book of Changes itself
The Judgement and the Image
The Judgement
Nourishment. Perseverance brings good fortune. Pay heed to what a person seeks to fill their own mouth with.
The Image
At the foot of the mountain, thunder. The superior person is careful of their words and temperate in eating.
These two texts are the hexagram. Everything else — the trigram analysis, the line positions, the modern keyword — is commentary built on top of them. The Judgement states the situation and its outlook; the Image draws the practical conclusion, and by convention begins with what the trigrams show in nature.
Rendered in plain English from the canonical text rather than copied from any one translation. If you want a specific scholarly version, Wilhelm-Baynes and Lynn are the two usually recommended.
The six lines
Read from the bottom up. This figure runs yin yin yang yang yin yin — what each position means.
| Line | This hexagram | What the position means |
|---|---|---|
| 6 | ▬▬ ▬▬ yin | the situation past its peak — completion, or overreach |
| 5 | ▬▬ ▬▬ yin | the ruling position, usually the most favourable in the hexagram |
| 4 | ▬▬▬▬▬ yang | entering the outer sphere — proximity to authority, exposure |
| 3 | ▬▬▬▬▬ yang | the transition point, and the most dangerous position in the figure |
| 2 | ▬▬ ▬▬ yin | the inner sphere — home, private life, what you are among your own |
| 1 | ▬▬ ▬▬ yin | the beginning of the situation, still hidden and barely formed |
What the two trigrams do to each other
Inner and outer
The lower trigram is the inner situation — Thunder, arousal and shock. This is what is happening in you, or in the private side of the matter.
The upper trigram is the outer situation — Mountain, stillness and limit. This is the world the inner position meets.
The five-element relation
Wood below controls Earth above. The inner position restrains the outer, which reads as holding back circumstance rather than being carried by it.
Read as a family
Read as family, this is Youngest son above and Eldest son below. Two siblings, which reads as relationship between equals rather than hierarchy.
The eight trigrams are traditionally assigned family roles — Heaven is the father, Earth the mother, and the remaining six are three sons and three daughters. Which one sits above which is part of how a hexagram is read.
Calculated from the lines
Hexagrams connected to this one
Nuclear hexagram
61 · Inner Truth
Built from lines 2-3-4 and 3-4-5 of this figure — the hexagram hidden inside it. Read as what is happening beneath the surface of the situation.
Opposite hexagram
28 · Great Exceeding
Every line flipped. The same situation turned inside out — useful for seeing what you are not currently considering.
Inverse hexagram
Symmetrical
This hexagram reads the same upside down. Only eight of the sixty-four do — a small, distinctive group.
None of these are assigned by an author — each follows from the arrangement of lines.
The image
Mountain above, Thunder below.
Mountain over Thunder: stillness and limit meeting arousal and shock.
That combination is the whole meaning of hexagram 27. Nothing about it is arbitrary — change either trigram and you get a different hexagram with a different reading, which is why the 64 form a system rather than a list.