I Ching trigram
Fire
Fire (☲, Lí) is one of the eight trigrams of the I Ching — the natural forces the 64 hexagrams are built from. Its essence: clarity · light · clinging. Fire appears in 16 positions within the 64 hexagrams: as the upper trigram in eight and as the lower trigram in eight, and carries itself twice in hexagram 30 (Radiance).
Atlas context
Fire
A visual symbol used as context for reading change.
Fire as the upper trigram
The eight hexagrams with Fire on top.
- 14. Great PossessionGreat possession asks first not for pride, but for a dignity that can carry what fell to it.
- 21. Biting ThroughWhat is stuck in the passage asks not for discussion, but for one clean bite.
- 30. RadianceClarity burns well only when it can cling to something that keeps bearing it.
- 35. RisingWhat truly advances does not only rise, but comes into the light to be seen.
- 38. OppositionNot every opposition asks to be resolved; sometimes difference must first be allowed to be pure difference.
- 50. The CauldronWhat makes a vessel worthy is not its shine, but what it can hold in the right heat.
- 56. The WandererWhoever has no firm ground must handle their bearing all the more carefully.
- 64. Before CompletionJust before completion, it is not speed that decides, but the power not to grab too soon.
Fire as the lower trigram
The eight hexagrams with Fire at the bottom.
- 13. CommunityCommunity begins where your own circle stops being the measure of everything.
- 22. GraceForm can make a thing visible, but it must never pass itself off as substance.
- 30. RadianceClarity burns well only when it can cling to something that keeps bearing it.
- 36. DarkeningWhen the light keeps burning visibly in the wrong time, it must learn to take cover without going out.
- 37. The FamilyWhere the closest circle keeps no true form, every larger order soon wears thin.
- 49. RevolutionRevolution becomes true only when the old skin can no longer be carried along.
- 55. AbundanceAbundance lights much at once, and for that very reason one must not go blind on its fullness.
- 63. After CompletionJust when everything seems to stand, the hardest task begins: holding what is right without freezing it.
The eight trigrams
Each hexagram is a stacking of two trigrams. See all eight natural forces or all 64 hexagrams.
Start small
Read what is moving in your own situation.
A trigram takes on meaning within the hexagram it appears in, and a hexagram in relation to your own question. Ask one and read what appears.