Lu / The Wanderer

above: Ch^ en The Arousing, Thunder
below: Li The Clinging, Flame

Lu intimates that (in the condition which it denotes) there may be some little attainment and progress. If the stranger or traveller be firm and correct as he ought to be, there will be good fortune.

Overall Meaning

Wanderer, the symbol of wandering

The name Lu denotes people travelling abroad, and is often translated by 'strangers'. As early as the time of King Wan, there was a class of men who went about from one state to another, pursuing their business as pedlars or travelling merchants; but in Mencius II, i, chap. 5.3, it is used for travellers generally, whatever it was that took them out of their own states. Confucius himself is adduced as a travelling stranger; and in this hexagram King Wan is supposed to have addressed himself to the class of such men, and told them how they ought to comport themselves. They ought to cultivate two qualities: those of humility and integrity (firm correctness). By means of these they would escape harm, and would make some little progress and attainment. Their rank was too low to speak of great things in connection with them. It is interesting to find travellers, strangers in a strange land, having thus a place in the I.

For the manner in which the component trigrams are supposed to give the idea that is in Lu, see Appendix II. In Appendix I there is an endeavor to explain the Thwan by means of the lines and their relation to one another.