Kan to Bi: a head clerk asks about his employer's shop

Date not recorded · The head clerk of a wealthy Tokyo merchant · 中文版

The cast

Hexagram 29 Kǎn (The Abysmal Water), line 2 moving, changing to Hexagram 8 Bǐ (Holding Together).

Original text

有東京某富商甲幹。來請占其店氣運。筮得坎之比。爻辭曰。九二坎有險。求小得。斷曰。九二以陽居陰。位得中正。爲內卦之主。與五相應。五位居尊。必是五爲主店。二爲分店也。今占得坎二爻。曰坎有險。必兩店共際險難。一時商運衰微。動遭虧耗。非人力之咎。是氣運使然也。足下既代主人而占。必能盡心於店事。惟當至正至中。不涉偏私。竭力圖謀。雖無大利。必有小得也。後果如所占。

In plain words

The head clerk of a wealthy Tokyo merchant came to ask about the fortunes of the shop. The cast gave Kan with its second line moving, changing into Bi. The line reads: "Nine in the second place: in the pit there is danger; seek small gains, and they will come."

Takashima's judgment: the second line is yang in a yin place, central, the ruler of the inner trigram, and it answers the fifth line. The fifth holds the place of honour, so the fifth must be the main shop and the second the branch. You drew the second line of Kan, "in the pit there is danger", so both shops will face difficulties together: trade will be poor for a time, with losses at every turn. This is not anyone's fault; it is the way the times are running.

Since you have come on your employer's behalf, you will surely give yourself fully to the business. Keep strictly to what is fair and balanced, show no favouritism, and plan with all your effort; there will be no large profit, but there will be small gains.

It turned out as the reading said.

How Takashima read it

Only one line text is read: with one moving line, the second line of Kan is read.
Lines stand for the business: the fifth, in the place of honour, is the main shop; the second, central in the inner trigram, is the branch; the two correspond, so the two shops share one fate.
The hexagram is read as danger: pit upon pit, both shops in trouble at once, and put down to the times rather than to anyone's mistakes.
"Seek small gains", together with the second line's central place, becomes: stay fair and balanced, work hard, and aim for small profits, not large ones.

About the outcome

"It turned out as the reading said" is Takashima's own record. "Danger, but small gains" is a broad forecast; hard trading with modest returns is how many shops get through a slump. This site does not treat it as evidence.

Applying it to your situation

"Seek small gains" is a practical stance in hard times: not a dramatic turnaround, but something gained at each step. In your present difficulty, what small progress could you secure right now?

Original: Takashima Kaemon, Takashima Ekidan (expanded edition), recorded by Yanagida Ikusaku, Chinese text by Wang Zhiben, 1901. Translation, notes and reflection by this site.

These are historical records kept by the diviner himself. The outcomes are his own account; this site uses them to study how the lines were read, not as evidence that divination predicts events.

Cast a hexagram · All of Takashima's cases · The 64 hexagrams