Terminology Directory

The Day Master (Ri Zhu) is the central coordinate in a Bazi chart. It represents the "Self" and the foundational element of the chart owner. Other elements are interpreted in relation to it.

Seven Killings (Qi Sha, or Indirect Officer) is one of the more forceful and challenging Ten Gods. It represents pressure, ambition, competition, risk, and disruptive power.

Yong Shen (Useful God) is a core concept in Bazi. It names the element or star a traditional reader treats as most helpful for balancing the overall chart.

The Hurting Officer represents overwhelming talent, pride, rebellion, and the destructive power to break traditional conventions.

The Eating God is a gentle and generally favorable star representing culinary enjoyment, longevity symbolism, artistic appreciation, and pure, unforced expression.

The Direct Officer represents discipline, rules, reputation, official status, and in a female chart, the traditional husband.

The dual nature of money: Direct Wealth represents stable, hard-earned income; Indirect Wealth represents speculation, big investments, and sudden windfalls.

Peach Blossom represents intense interpersonal attraction, aesthetic charm, and uncontrollable romantic encounters. It is the most famous symbolic star (Shen Sha) in Bazi.

Represents knowledge, education, the mother, and protective barriers. Direct Resource is orthodox knowledge; Indirect Resource signifies intuitive genius, esoterica, and paranoia.

The amplification of ego. Represents peers, competitors, and partners. It brings independence while acting as a double-edged sword for wealth retention.

The temporal engine of destiny. The Bazi chart is the static factory specs of a car; the Decade and Annual Pillars are the actual road conditions determining the ride.

The four Earthly Branches: Chen, Xu, Chou, Wei. They function bilaterally as dark tombs burying decayed elements, or as vaults securing stored resources and wealth.

A highly intense Shen Sha. It is symbolized as a sharp blade, representing strong execution, conflict, and elevated risk at the same time.

The gearbox for geographical displacement. Signifies non-stop traveling, relocating, immigration, job transfers, and sometimes kinetic accidents.

The Eight Trigrams (Bagua) are the fundamental structural units of the I Ching, each composed of three Yin or Yang lines representing the eight primordial forces of nature: Heaven, Earth, Thunder, Water, Mountain, Wind, Fire, and Lake.

The Yang line (⚊, solid) and Yin line (⚋, broken) are the most fundamental elements of the I Ching — the binary "0" and "1" of cosmic encoding. Their permutations generate the entire system of Changes.

Every hexagram in the I Ching is composed of an Upper (Outer) Trigram and a Lower (Inner) Trigram. The lower represents the internal situation and self; the upper represents the external environment and others. Their interaction forms the first layer of hexagram interpretation.

The Nuclear Hexagram (Hu Gua) is a "hexagram within a hexagram" extracted from lines 2-3-4 and 3-4-5 of the original, revealing hidden dynamics and potential turning points beneath the surface of events.

The King Wen Sequence is the classical ordering of the 64 hexagrams attributed to King Wen of Zhou, from Qián (Hexagram 1) to Wèi Jì (Hexagram 64), encoding a complete philosophical narrative of "creation, development, culmination, and inevitable renewal."

The Yarrow Stalk Method is one of the most representative traditional I Ching casting techniques, using 50 yarrow stalks through three rounds of division to mathematically determine each line's Yin/Yang nature and Old/Young state, with a probability distribution that differs from the coin method.

Gua Shen (Hexagram Body) represents the core substance or the physical body of the subject in traditional Liuyao (I Ching) divination, indicating whether a matter has tangible clues.

An Dong (Secret Movement) occurs when a static line in a hexagram is clashed by the Day Branch while possessing high strength. It signifies hidden events or unexpected, fast-acting changes behind the scenes.

Xun Kong, often translated as "Void" or "Emptiness", stems from the offset between Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches. It indicates the absence, illusion, or delay of specific energies during a given cycle.

Yue Po (Month Rupture) occurs when a hexagram line is clashed by the Month Branch. It signifies macro-environmental pressure and foundational obstacles.

The Changing Line (Dong Yao) is a critical variable in a hexagram. It points to where the situation is under pressure to shift and where the reading may develop next. "Stillness remains, Movement transforms."

When the specific entity you are divining for does not appear in the casted hexagram, this method looks beneath the surface layer (Flying Spirit) for a hidden reference point (Hidden Spirit).

The Self Line represents the diviner (or the party issuing the question), while the Object Line represents the specific subject, event, or the opposing party. This forms a basic Yin-Yang interaction framework in a reading.

Azure Dragon, White Tiger, Vermilion Bird, Black Tortoise, Hooked Spirit, and Flying Serpent. They do not dictate winning or losing in a reading, but they help profile atmospheric details, psychological states, and hidden qualities of the event.

A metadata tagging system for Liuyao. Instead of reading only raw elements, we read the assigned "Six Kins" tags to map a hexagram to human questions.

The starting coordinate and later trajectory. The Primary Hexagram maps the present structure, while the Relating Hexagram shows the new state that may form after changing lines transform.

The supportive and obstructive forces behind the curtain. While your focus is on the frontline objective (Useful God), the reading also checks supply lines (Supporting Spirit) and hidden constraints (Hostile Spirit).

The calculus of momentum. It helps describe whether a situation is expanding, gaining force, or gradually losing momentum.

A macro-level view of separation and cohesion. A Clash Hexagram emphasizes disruption, sudden change, and opposition; a Harmony Hexagram emphasizes bonding, entanglement, and stability.

A radar for deep psychology and geographical anchors. It describes liminal, indecisive mental states and the tendency to return to a base or origin.