Hexagram 60 · Jié 節 Moderation

節，亨。苦節，不可貞。

Jie: success. Bitter restraint cannot be held to as correct and firm.

節 means a limit at which one stops: a lake can hold only so much water. Restraint has its own way of going through, Zhu Xi says, and here yin and yang lines are evenly balanced, three and three, while the second and fifth lines are both yang, so there is success. But restraint pushed too far becomes bitter, and the text warns against holding to that as if it were the correct course. A limit is useful only while it can still be borne.

澤上有水，節。君子以制數度，議德行。

Water above the lake: Jie. The noble person, accordingly, fixes quantities and standards and weighs virtue and conduct.

There is no note from Zhu Xi on this sentence. In keeping with his judgment note, the lake's limited capacity suggests measure: the noble person sets quantities and standards, and considers what virtue and what conduct are fitting. The six lines then trace restraint from the closed door of the first line to the bitter extreme of the top.

Line 1, yang (初九)changing line in the shared reading

不出戶庭，无咎。

Not going out into the yard beyond one's door. No blame.

Firm yang in a correct position at the very start of the hexagram: it is not yet time to act, and this line can restrain itself and stay in. Zhu Xi glosses 戶庭 as the yard just outside the inner door (戶); not even that far does it go, and there is no blame.

Line 2, yang (九二)changing line in the shared reading

不出門庭，凶。

Not going out of the courtyard inside the gate. Misfortune.

門庭, Zhu Xi explains, is the courtyard inside the main gate. Now the time to move has come, but the second line has lost its firmness, is not correct, and has no correspondent above. It knows how to restrain itself but not how to get through, so staying in, right for the first line, brings misfortune here. The same restraint can be wise at one moment and a failure at the next.

Line 3, yin (六三)changing line in the shared reading

不節若，則嗟若，无咎。

Without restraint, then sighing. No blame.

Soft and neither central nor correct in a time that calls for restraint, the third line is not one that can restrain itself, so it ends in sighing. Zhu Xi offers no more than this. The lament grows out of its own lack of restraint.

Line 4, yin (六四)changing line in the shared reading

安節，亨。

Restraint at ease. Success.

Yielding, compliant and correct, the fourth line serves the fifth directly above. Restraint comes naturally to it, Zhu Xi says, so it rests easily within its limits and things go through. Limits that are lived in rather than imposed are the ones that hold.

Line 5, yang (九五)changing line in the shared reading

甘節，吉，往有尚。

Sweet restraint. Good fortune. Going forward wins esteem.

Zhu Xi describes this line with a familiar phrase: in its proper place, it sets limits; central and correct, it gets through. Here restraint is sweet rather than bitter, so the text judges it good fortune, and going forward wins esteem. Its sweetness stands against the bitterness the judgment warns of and the top line embodies.

Top line, yin (上六)changing line in the shared reading

苦節，貞凶，悔亡。

Bitter restraint. Even being correct and firm, misfortune. Regret vanishes.

At the far end of the hexagram, restraint has turned bitter. Having gone to the extreme, Zhu Xi says, even correctness cannot avoid misfortune. Yet in ritual it is better to be sparing than lavish, so although there is regret, it vanishes in the end. The two verdicts stand side by side: misfortune for going too far, and a regret that passes because the excess leans toward frugality.