Upper trigram
☶
Mountain · Gen
Stillness and limit.
FamilyYoungest son
ElementEarth
Hexagram 52 of 64
☶☶ Keeping Still
Hexagram 52 of the 64, Keeping Still, is mountain above, mountain below — read as the mountain doubled — stopping completely. Its six lines are 100100, counted from the bottom up, where a broken line is yielding and a solid one firm.
Lower trigram
☶
Mountain · Gen
Stillness and limit.
FamilyYoungest son
ElementEarth
From the Book of Changes itself
The Judgement and the Image
The Judgement
Keeping still. Keeping the back still so that they no longer feel the body. Going into the courtyard and not seeing the people there. No blame.
The Image
Mountains standing close together. The superior person does not permit their thoughts to go beyond their situation.
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 yang yin yin 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 | ▬▬ ▬▬ yin | 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 | ▬▬▬▬▬ yang | 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 — Mountain, stillness and limit. 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
Both trigrams are Earth, so nothing in the figure pulls against anything else. That makes the reading unusually single-minded — and unusually short of internal correction.
Read as a family
Read as family, this is Youngest son above and Youngest son below. The same figure doubled — the purest form of what the trigram describes.
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
3 · Difficulty at the Beginning
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
58 · The Joyous
Every line flipped. The same situation turned inside out — useful for seeing what you are not currently considering.
Inverse hexagram
51 · The Arousing
The same figure turned upside down — traditionally read as the situation seen from the other party's side.
None of these are assigned by an author — each follows from the arrangement of lines.
The image
Mountain above, Mountain below.
Mountain over Mountain: stillness and limit meeting stillness and limit.
That combination is the whole meaning of hexagram 52. 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.