BaZi 八字
八字 ba zi: the eight characters, four pillars of two characters each.Eight characters, four pillars, one per unit of time you were born into. BaZi reads a life through the five elements in relation to one another.
What it is
BaZi takes the year, month, day and hour of a birth and writes each as two characters, a heavenly stem above an earthly branch. The stem of the day pillar is the day master, and it is the reference point everything else is measured against.
What the system is good at is balance and timing. What do you have too much of, what are you short of, and which stretches of time support you. That focus is why a BaZi reading tends to arrive at a decision rather than a description.
The ten day masters and the ten gods
Two reference sets carry most of the weight. The ten heavenly stems, one of which is your day master, and the ten gods, which name what each other character is to you: support, rivalry, output, pressure, opportunity.
What BaZi is made of
3 setsThe ten day masters 十天干
10 entriesThe ten gods, in plain English 十神
10 entriesThe five elements 五行
5 entriesReadings built on BaZi
5 readingsChart Legend
The full readings answer what your chart means. Read the page →BaZi Reading 八字
You already know how you operate. Read the page →Career Path, BaZi 八字
Careers advice is written for the average person. Read the page →Hehun Compatibility 合婚
Two charts in one house. Read the page →The Year Ahead
A yearly forecast usually tells you what will happen. Read the page →Also draws on BaZi: Qi Men Dun Jia Divination.
Method and sources
Charts are computed with deterministic libraries, corrected for true solar time at the birth longitude, and interpreted against the classical texts listed below.
Read against the classical commentaries on stem strength and chart structure:
- 滴天髓 Ditian Sui Drops of Heavenly Marrow
- 子平真詮 Ziping Zhenquan The True Interpretation of Ziping
- 淵海子平 Yuanhai Ziping The Deep Sea of Ziping
- 三命通會 Sanming Tonghui A Comprehensive Treatise on the Three Fates
- 窮通寶鑑 Qiongtong Baojian The Precious Mirror of Seasons