Hexagram 50: Ding (鼎)

The cauldron is turned upside down, its feet upward, so that the dregs may be emptied out; one obtains a concubine and with her a son. No blame. Changes into Hexagram 14 (Da You).

The bottom line describes an inversion that is deliberate and useful. A new cauldron has to be tipped and emptied before it is used, and the ancient line explains it with a plain domestic image - a household that took in a woman and later had a son, which was irregular then and is the reason no blame attaches. 颠趾 is the shape of a thing turned out to be cleared. If this is your line, the reading favours emptying something out in order to begin properly, even if the process looks disreputable to observers.

The cauldron has something in it; my rival has an illness and cannot come near me. Good. Changes into Hexagram 56 (Lu-Wanderer).

The cauldron is full, and that is the entire content of the line - 有实, it has substance. The rest describes the effect: someone who opposes you is occupied with their own difficulty and cannot reach you. 九二 is the strongest yang in the lower trigram and it is not doing anything at all; it is holding position with contents in place, which the text treats as the good outcome. The line to work from if you are over-committed: the cauldron's virtue is what is inside it, not how hard you are stirring.

The cauldron's handles have changed and the carrying is blocked; the fat of the pheasant goes uneaten. Only when the rain comes is the regret spoiled, and in the end good. Changes into Hexagram 64 (Wei Ji).

The most instructive line in the hexagram because it is a mechanism, not a mood. The handles have been altered, so the vessel cannot be lifted, so the food nobody eats; and the damage to the food is only confirmed once the weather clears and you can see it. 方雨 means at the time of rain, when everything is obscured. 终吉 states the outcome flatly. If this is your line, something in your equipment or your setup has changed such that the work cannot be lifted or delivered, and the result is still good - but not yet verifiable.

The cauldron's leg breaks and the ruler's food is spilled, the whole thing lying in a heap. Bad. Changes into Hexagram 18 (Gu).

The bad line, and unusually concrete. A three-legged vessel standing on one leg fails, and 覆公餗 means what was set aside for the ruler spills across the ground - the failure is not merely personal but distributive. 渥 is the mess it makes. The position is wrong for the yang it carries, sitting on the top yang of the lower trigram with nothing above it bearing the load. If this is your line, the reading is about capacity and load-bearing: the structure holds you up until the day you put something on it that it was never built to carry.

The cauldron has yellow ears and a metal carrying-bar, and it benefits from holding correctly. Changes into Hexagram 44 (Gou).

Purely a description of quality fittings, which is the hexagram's way of saying that the right components have been selected. 黄 is the colour of the central earth, 金 the metal of the bar, and a soft line presiding over both because the ruler does not have to force anything - the vessel is well made and simply works. 利贞 is the instruction that keeps the line from being pure flattery: hold correctly, and the quality of the fittings does the rest. This is the settled, workable middle of the hexagram.

The cauldron has a jade carrying-bar: great good fortune, and nothing unfavourable. Changes into Hexagram 32 (Heng).

The climax, and the replacement is telling: bronze handles and a metal bar have become a jade one. Jade is what the cauldron was never made from, and it is the most valuable material in the classical inventory, so the final line is the vessel at the highest quality it can reach - 大吉, 无不利, nothing left to argue against. The classical correction is worth keeping here: read it as the fittings achieving their proper form rather than as a rare treasure, because the emphasis is still on the functional part.