Opening the chapter
Loading the text. Please wait.
Bushi Zhengzong · The Orthodox Tradition of Divination
Golden Counsels · House and Household
Read in English. Switch to Original for word notes, or select text to ask a question.
House and Household
Though founding an estate depends on a person’s planning, sheltering wind and gathering qi begins with each dwelling.
Reading note: The compressed closing 故 in the supplied opening is not expanded into an unrecorded rule.
To know the rise or decline of people and dwelling, examine inner and outer in the hexagram lines.
Inner is the dwelling and outer the people: examine carefully what is genuine or false in the lines.
Combination is a gate and Clash a road, regardless of whether they appear within the hexagram.
Dragon Virtue and Noble Person riding strength means a lofty noble gate. Officer and Parents at Birth means a deep, spacious minister’s residence.
A fresh appearance at the gate comes when crossing or heavy lines combine with Green Dragon. Old dimensions of hall and house come when White Tiger repeatedly encroaches.
Earth and Metal moving is the foundation of new building. Parents in Void is a rented dwelling.
Wealth and Officer at Imperial Peak makes the entrance busy. Blessing and Emolument at Birth makes the household flourish.
Crossing or heavy lines generating or controlling means rebuilding and replacing halls. Self and Response of harmonious like phases means two different door leaves in one opening.
Gate and road separated by the day means crooked coming and going. The house foundation overlapping with Self and Response means exchanging places.
Self and the day controlling the dwelling means damage to the ancestral estate and unrest. The dwelling in Month Break controlling Body brings calamity without end.
Response Flying into the dwelling and combining brings people of another surname to live together. The dwelling moving to generate Body must mean moving residence in recent years.
The gate meeting three breaks means decline and collapse. Emptiness meeting double Void means deserted, idle abandonment.
Self in the outer dwelling means leaving the ancestral home to live separately. Response entering the central courtyard means outsiders living together.
The dwelling combining with a favorably related Dark Warrior means a gate in the willow lanes and flower streets. Wood with a qi-less Soaring Snake means a thatched house and rough door.
Ghost assisted without restraint means Ghost strong and people declining. The dwelling unbroken and receiving generation means the house flourishes and Wealth is strong.
Wealth without Ghost brings many kinds of dispersal and expense. Ghost without Wealth brings ceaseless calamity.
If someone restrains Ghost, its moving does no harm. If Wealth assists Ghost to injure Body, what benefit is there in much Wealth?
Ghost crossing or heavy with White Tiger is unwelcome: guard against penalty and injury to household members.
Reading note: The supplied 人春 phrase is read through its household-injury context; no spring season is added.
The Corpse-Hastening baneful influence sends Body and life to the Yellow Springs. Opening and closing of the Tomb gate is greatly feared.
Wood or Metal annual natal allotments most dislike Fire lines in Qian or Dui hexagrams. Water or Fire natal people do not fear Metal Ghost in Zhen or Xun palaces.
Officer wearing a seal in the Jade Hall describes a salaried official. Noble Person and Blade with penalty, controlling a fine horse, must mean a commander of troops.
Wealth changing into Blessing often brings delay on entering public offices. Noble Person and seal added to Officer must bring transfer or promotion on the official path.
A son inheriting his father’s work has the manner of surpassing him. A wife taking the husband’s authority shows ability in managing the household.
Reading note: The unusual 跨襤 is read through the son-and-father succession context; no additional achievement is supplied.
A younger brother twists his elder brother’s arm: Body and life injure each other. A wife oversteps the parents-in-law’s lines: the family’s reputation is evident.
The wife encountering her husband’s household baneful influence damages his household. The husband occupying the wife’s Emolument line lives on her support.
Brothers crossing or heavy controls the Wife Body: the strings must be set again. Descendants inside and outside generating Self attracts much property.
Reading note: Resetting the strings retains the verse’s remarriage image.
Self as the day Flying into the dwelling is a dove occupying the magpie’s nest. Response with Parents moving to generate Body is a dragon born from a snake’s belly.
Self and Response separated by differing Brothers often means two surnames.
Response approaching Wife in combination means an outsider enters the house as husband. Descendants Flying from a borrowed palace means someone of another surname is adopted as heir.
Wife carrying Descendants at the husband’s position means taking a child into a marriage. The husband’s Body rising to combine with Wife means going to join the woman’s household.
A Wood natal allotment with empty Descendants within means seeing a child late. Body meeting Wife at a place of combination means marrying early.
Husband and wife combining in a line that shows Ghost means the match is unclear. Descendants at Extinction receiving penalty or injury means many children fail to be reared.
Husband and wife turn against each other when penalty and clash meet mutually. Brothers lack affection when they oppress and restrain one another.
The day generating Self and Body indicates twins. Body and natal allotment sharing a line with Self and Response often means two surnames.
Wife and Wealth moving is intolerable when Parents rests or is imprisoned. Parents crossing or heavy most fears Descendants at Death or Extinction.
Wife controlling Self and Body and again combining with Response must marry again. Husband penalizing the Wife natal allotment and twice meeting Wealth should take another wife.
Wife combining with Response means private intimacy outside. A man and woman crossing mutually means much sexual desire within.
Green Dragon with Water or Wood at the Wife position brings much dowry wealth. Dark Warrior and Peach Blossom intruding on the natal allotment means excess of wine and sexual pleasure.
Self, Response and Wife combining brings a husband in a principal or secondary relationship. Wealth with Self and Response in Six Clashes must describe a woman separated while living.
Self and Response separated by Wife and meeting Clash must bring someone from another commandery. Husband and wife meeting Blessing and Virtue with combination must mean a woman from nearby kin or neighbors.
Natal allotment meeting death qi most dislikes an ominous Avoided influence directly upon it. Ghost entering the Tomb especially dislikes the Body line shedding blood.
Nothing is worse than the Three Penalties with Blades piled up. Nothing is more ominous than four Tigers intermingling.
Reading note: The repeated contrast is retained without supplying new definitions for the four Tigers.
Four Ghosts close to Body requires guarding against disaster. The Three Transmissions controlling Self easily draws calamity.
Robbery and Destruction, the two thieves, injuring Body describes a ghost beneath a grassy grave mound. Body and natal allotment both empty and meeting a baneful influence describes a person on the road to the Yellow Springs.
Gouchen injuring Dark Warrior Wife and Wealth brings many disasters to the woman. White Tiger damaging Green Dragon Officer and Ghost makes death feared for the husband.
Newly Added Refined Household Judgments, Distinguishing the Six Lines
If the first line is not Water, do not speak of a well. When You Metal is involved, speak of chickens and geese. Meeting Clash above breaks the foundations. No Officer or Ghost leaves the children peaceful.
A grave beside the dwelling means Ghost’s Tomb at the first line. Water with White Tiger breaks the bridge. Yin Wood means a good cat, with no loss to rats.
Dark Warrior with Water concerns water channels. Wood Officer and Ghost makes a tree act as a weapon. Wood Ghost at the second means a beam across the hearth. Parents holding it governs the hall’s inner recess.
Reading note: The supplied 溝利瀹 phrase is compressed, so no additional drainage outcome is invented. 橫肓 is read through the corresponding household transcription’s 橫灶, a beam across the hearth.
Vermilion Bird Fire with Officer means fire disaster. Earth and Metal transformations favor building. Wood clashed by Metal damages the pot lid. Metal configurations destroying it breaks the pot.
Dark Warrior with Earth means an unclean hearth. Earth meeting clash or control makes the hearth collapse. Self together with Ghost means it is not an ancestral house. Blessing and Wealth controlled means hardship follows.
Reading note: The supplied 奭 is read as hearth through the corresponding 灶 wording; the Chinese text is unchanged.
Xu Earth involved is discussed as a dog. Response Flying to this place means someone shares the lodging. This line does not judge the household mother alone: distinguish the relationship in divining safety or danger.
Hai Water at the third is judged as pigs. Brothers at the line alone permits speaking of a door. Brothers at Mao is discussed as bed and couch. Without Officer, do not recklessly judge a household spirit.
Metal Officer occupying it means the incense burner is broken. Wood Ghost with Green Dragon means a new spirit tablet. If the fourth moves to clash or control, doors face doors as though piercing the heart.
The third and fourth both occupying Brothers means many doors, few rooms and expense of money. A moving line clashing with their position means coming and going through a side entrance.
Mao Wood at the line governs bed and curtains. Wood with Snake Ghost brings groundless alarm to a woman. If the third is not Brothers, Officer moving and Parents sinking begins the unrest.
Brothers at the fourth alone is spoken of as a door. The fourth combining with the second governs the main gate. Wei changing into Ghost at the fourth harms sheep rearing and brings trouble.
Dark Warrior Officer and Ghost means a damaged, leaking door. Green Dragon with Wealth and Blessing welcomes renewal. Vermilion Bird with Officer governs litigation and imprisonment. Dark Warrior riding Brothers brings encroaching water.
Brothers and Soaring Snake at the position means a neighbor’s pit latrine obstructs the household. Cycle Void or Month Break at the line means a broken door, not no door.
Clash and control together means using a side entrance; this should not be judged as an outside clan. Wealth controlling with Descendants present injures Parents: distinguish the two judgments of yin and yang within.
Reading note: The supplied 則 opening of the second clause is read through the corresponding 財 wording; no extra relationship or affected parent is invented.
The fifth controlling the second leaves household members peaceful. Officer linked with Snake Ghost makes the senior branch rebellious. Meeting White Tiger’s penalty, clash or control means fright and convulsions, with life not sustained.
Reading note: The supplied peaceful 寧 outcome is retained, without inserting a negative.
Self at a yin position means a woman governs. Wealth holding Self means a husband entering the wife’s family. If the second is clashed, controlled or broken, the managing couple has little affection.
Water at Self in combination means water surrounding the house. Brothers present means hollows in the wall. Chou Earth controlled or clashed is unfavorable for oxen. Seek the father’s good or ill in Parents.
Reading note: The supplied 永 in the surrounding-water clause is read through its water context.
At the sixth, Wealth is discussed as servants; Parents as ancestors and elders. Yang Wood is roof beams and yin Wood pillars. An Officer Storehouse encroaching means a grave.
Parents belonging to Earth governs walls. Mao Wood is the fence for determining good or ill. Body and Self at the sixth means one certainly leaves the ancestors to establish a household.
A moving line clashing with the You position reveals a broken pot. Vermilion Bird Ghost at the line is judged as a disturbed woman. Distinguish each line rather than confusing them.
Use ← / → or swipe left or right to change chapters