Yi Jing · Chinese tarot
Great Power
Hexagram 34 of the Yi Jing · 大壮 Dà Zhuàng
The figure
Thunder above Heaven: movement carried by the creative force, the thunderclap in the sky. The image of great power.
What this figure illuminates
Power of the Great lights up moments of full strength, when you can do much. The danger is not lack but excess: power that runs away turns against itself.
For a decision, the figure questions the use of force: “do I have mastery over this power, or is it pushing me to force where rightness is needed?”.
The classical text
The Judgment
Great power. It furthers only to be firm and upright — strength is trustworthy only when it is right.
The Image
Thunder rolls high above heaven — power at its height. Seeing this, the noble person takes no step that is not in keeping with what is right.
The Six Lines
- First line
Strength showing only in the toes, eager to charge. To push forward now surely ends in misfortune.
- Second line
Held firm and correct, strength kept within its bounds. Good fortune.
- Third line
The small spend all their strength; the wise hold theirs in check. Force everything, and you are the ram whose horns catch in the hedge.
- Fourth line
Firm and correct: good fortune, regret gone. The hedge gives way, the horns come free — power now finds its clear road.
- Fifth line
You let the ram's blind force go, at ease in your place. No cause for regret.
- Sixth line
The ram butts the fence and is stuck — unable to go back or on. Nothing furthers; but grasp the fix you are in, and good fortune can still come.
Daoa's wording, written after the classical reference translations, now in the public domain: James Legge (1882) and Charles de Harlez (1889).
A question to keep
Do you have mastery over this force, or is it pushing you to force?
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