Cast & Chart

Omikuji lot 60 of 100

Level Wall, High Peaks

小吉 Sho-kichi, Small good fortune

高危安可涉

平垣是延年

守道當逢泰

風雲不偶然

High and dangerous places: how could they be crossed?

A level wall is what lengthens the years.

Keep to the Way and you are bound to meet with ease;

wind and cloud do not come by chance.

What this lot says

A high and risky place is judged impossible to cross, and a level wall is named as the thing that adds years. Holding to the proper road leads to a time of ease, and the last line says that wind and cloud do not arrive by accident. The 1684 printing reads level ground in place of wall.

Sho-kichi, Small good fortune, is what the book prints, and a modest grade suits a poem that prefers a level wall to the summit. Printings differ on it, since a note credits Han-kichi, Half good fortune, to one edition and Sue-kichi, Good fortune later, to another.

In everyday modern life, this is the case for the unexciting option over the dramatic one. Which of your current choices looks dull mainly because it carries so little risk?

A lot is a prompt for reflection. It cannot promise a result, and it is no substitute for medical, legal or financial advice.

The printed text

Where the 1684 printing differs

  • Line 2, character 2: 1684 printing has 坦.

Marginal note as printed: 大本小作未坦作垣 / 百籖作半吉

The 1813 printing is cut as 垣, although its own margin note reads as if its text had 坦 and only 大本 had 垣.

Credits

The verse and grade were read from the two scanned printings named here. The title, translation and reading are our own and modern.

Our own English. The kana commentary printed under each verse in the old books was not read.