The Three Yearly Evil Spirits for the Year

I was distracted by a recent Feng-shui job in Braemar Hill Mansions, picking birthday for twin boys in Hong Kong, and a nomenclature job for a new born baby in Taiwan which of course I picked the date together with my Tudi, Anna. Sorry that I really can’t putting on a blog every day. Second thought, a blog a day in Chinese metaphysics actually is quite heavy for me. Anyway, will try to put up as many as I could.

Every turn of the year, we are curious to know what is good or bad for us in the coming year. Most people will just look into the Yearly Flying Stars to determine especially which directions would bring them fortune of career, money, health, and sometimes even just to look for way to improve people relationship. Most of them will look up through the Flying Star Chart for next year. But, let’s first look at where the Tai-sui (太歲, or Governing Emperor of the Year) is.

For the year of 2009, it is a Ji-Chou 己丑 in terms of Sexagenary Cycle, so the Tai-sui is located at the direction of Chou. Hence, the Three Yearly Evil Spirits (or 三煞 “San-Sha”) are located at the directions of 寅 Yin, 卯 Mao, and 辰 Chen. You may want to ask, what is San-Sha and how to determine the San-Sha?

San-Sha in fact is a combination of 劫煞 “Jie-Sha”, 災煞 “Zai-Sha”, and 歲煞 “Sui-Sha”. Since they always show up in either the direction of East, South, West, or North every year, so people used to call them “San-Sha” rather than call their individual names. The directions of San-Sha is determined by the Year Branch. For the year of Chou, it’s part of the Trine of Metal 三合金局 (“Si-You-Chou” 巳酉丑). Metal is for the West, so the San-Sha has to be in the East which is represented by 寅 Yin, 卯 Mao, 辰 Chen.

According to 《協紀辨方》(“The Definition of Spirits”), 劫煞 “Jie-Sha” is considered as the negative “Qi” of Tai-sui and represents slaughter. No renovating nor building of house should be attempted in the direction of Jie-Sha. 災煞 “Zai-sha” is considered as the negative “Qi” of Wu-xing and represents illness and disease. No attempt of renovating nor building house should be carried out in this direction. Finally 歲煞 “Sui-Sha” is the negative “Qi” of the four seasons which is usually referred as 四季, the Four Ji and represents physical damage to children or husbandry. Again, no attempt for renovating nor building of house, immigration, or tunneling.
In terms of the 24 Sittings which normally used in Feng-shui, Yin, Mao, and Chen are interlaced with 甲 Jia and 乙Yi. Therefore, Jia and Yi are also not good for renovating and building of house as well.

Now, let’s us take a look at the Year Flying Star Chart for the Year 2009.

As the Winter Solstice of 2008 approaches, the Yearly Flying Star #9 for the year 2009 will be entering the centre chamber, and as such the Yearly Flying Star #1 which people normally relate to relationship with others will be in the chamber of Qian, and #6 which people normally relate to fortune of career will be in the chamber of Kun, and #8 which people normally relate to fortune of money will be in the chamber of Xun. Last but not the least, the most trouble maker Flying Star #5 which is considered as by most of the people, Flying Star #5 will be in the chamber of Kan.

Finding the Flying Star for the Month

Thought I could drop the Sexagenary Cycle and Luo-shu for a while and ready to introduce “Wen-Wang Gua” (文王卦, or WWG in short), a friend of mine asked me if I could spend some time in introducing the Flying Star for the Month.

In fact, the Flying Star for the Month has been introduced in my book titled “Introductory to Qi-men Dun-jia” (《奇門遁甲入門》). To recap in English is not really difficult at all, but to introduce the concept of how Chinese Astronomical Calendar was calculated in a blog does.

As mentioned in my earlier blog that there are two types of calendars in China: the Astronomical and the Civil. The Astronomical Calendar is what the Government official calculated, the Civil Calendar is what the Government announced to the general public.

The Astronomical Calendar in ancient China uses Winter Solstice (冬至) as a reference point. Using modern astronomy, it is 270 degrees in Cartesian Coordinates whereas 0 degree is referred as the Vernal Equinox (春分), or Aries. As such, the first year Jia-zi of the Sexagenary Cycle starts in fact since Winter Solstice of the previous year Gui-hai. In “24 Solar Segments” (二十四節氣), Winter Solstice is the “Central Point” (氣) of the Month of Zi and hence called “Zi-zheng” (子正).

Ideally, it will be most perfect if the calendar was being calculated under the conditions of: 1) Year of Jia-ji, 2) Month of Jia-zi, 3) Day of Jia-zi which happened to be both the Winter Solstice and the first day of the Lunar Month, and 4) The “Chen” (辰) of Jia-zi which referred as midnight, or also Zi-zheng. Obviously, this is for the sake of calendar recording. We haven’t discussed other astronomical parameters like tropical year, lunation, and alignment of planets, etc.

Using the same method as we used to determine the Flying Star for the Year, we will have the following table, through which the Flying Star of the Month can be easily determined.

Remember, the Civil Calendar starts with the “Segment Point” (節) as a new month, but the Flying Star for the Month will be changed only when it reaches the Central Point of the Month.

Applications of the Sexagenary Cycle: #1

Other than just recording time, there are numbers of applications in Chinese metaphysics in which the adoption of the Sexagenary Cycle into “Luo-shu” plays an important role. I will be talking a few of these applications in the coming blogs.

Application #1: Finding the dominating Flying Star of the Year

As shown in the diagram of my last blog, the first Jia-zi (甲子) starts in grid #1 of the magic square, so the dominating Flying Star is obviously 1. Applying the sequential order, we will have the Flying Star Chart for the Year Jia-zi as shown. As we move on to the second year, Yi-chou (乙丑) is located in grid #9 of the magic square, so the dominating Flying Star will then be 9. Again, applying the sequential order, we will have the Flying Star Chart for the Year Yi-zhou.

As seen in the diagrams, the dominating Flying Star 1 of the first year of Jia-zi is placed in the centre grid. As we move on to the next year, the Flying Star 1 will then be moved to grid #6, during which the centre grid is replaced by the Flying Star 9. Since the year follows Jia-zi is the year of Yi-chou, therefore Yi-chou is in grid #9 when Jia-zi is in grid #1. That’s why in my last blog, the diagram demonstrates how the Sexagenary Cycle works with “Luo-shu” in reverse order.

It looks pretty simple and easy, right?

Let’s imagine that we are about to finish the first Sexagenary Cycle, which will be ending with the year of Gui-hai (癸亥). The question now is: Where does the year of Jia-zi (甲子) of the next Sexagenary Cycle start? Which also leads to the next question: Where does the year of Jia-zi (甲子) of the Sexagenary Cycle which follow, and so forth, start?

And above all, the most important question is: Which cycle we are in today? What is the dominating Flying Stars for this year and the next?