Yin-Yang and the Five Elements

Yin-yang

Yin and yang are two qualities that come as a pair, like brightness and darkness, movement and stillness, showing and hiding. Neither is good or bad; they lean on each other and form a balance. Every heavenly stem and earthly branch belongs to either yin or yang.

The Five Elements: five kinds of energy

Generating: the order in which they help each other

Wood feeds fire (wood generates fire, 목생화); the ash left when fire burns becomes earth (fire generates earth, 화생토); metal comes out of the earth (earth generates metal, 토생금); droplets gather on cold metal (metal generates water, 금생수); and water nourishes wood (water generates wood, 수생목). Each energy gives birth to the one that follows it.

Restraining: the order in which they press on each other

Tree roots dig into the soil (wood restrains earth, 목극토); earth dams water (earth restrains water, 토극수); water puts out fire (water restrains fire, 수극화); fire melts metal (fire restrains metal, 화극금); and metal cuts wood (metal restrains wood, 금극목). Restraining is not only a bad thing. It also trims an excessive energy and makes it useful.

Reading too much and too little

Counting how many of each element appear among the eight characters shows where the energy of a chart leans. An element that is plentiful stands out in its character; an element that is missing is either made up from outside or met when its time comes (Luck Cycles (대운) and Yearly Luck (세운)). Missing does not mean bad, though, and the season of birth and the relation to the Day Master (일간) matter more than the count. Counting the hidden stems (지장간) changes the numbers, so Halmeoni counts the eight characters that appear on the surface.

How Halmeoni counts the elements

Each upper and lower character of the four pillars is counted once, by the element of that character itself. If the hour of birth is known there are eight characters; if not, there are six, without the hour pillar. The Day Master also counts as one character, so there is always at least one of the element the Day Master belongs to. A lower character is also counted as just one surface element: 巳 (sa) counts once as fire, 申 (sin) once as metal, 辰 (jin) once as earth.

Hidden stems are not added to the count. If they were, a single branch would split into two or three energies, the total numbers would change a lot, and schools also differ on what ratio to split them by. Halmeoni counts only the surface characters and checks the hidden stems separately when looking at the Ten Gods (십신). So even when an element comes out as 0, that energy may be hidden in a hidden stem, and in the reading Halmeoni describes this as "hidden only in the hidden stems".

Combinations between characters do not change the count. Even when 丙 (byeong) and 辛 (sin) meet in a combination that heads toward water energy, 丙 is still counted as fire and 辛 as metal. Whether the combined characters have actually turned into another energy is judged differently by different schools, so Halmeoni does not reflect it in the count.

How are "many" and "none" decided?

The element with the most characters is read as the chart's prominent energy, and an element with 0 as a missing energy. There is no fixed line for how many make it "too many" (과다). Instead, a checker makes sure the reading text does not contradict the numbers. If the text calls an element lacking when there are three or more of it, or plentiful when there is one or none, the sentence is sent back to be rewritten. Two can be called either many or few depending on the whole chart, so that is left to the reading.

How many of each element there are leads on to the Ten Gods. The element that is the same as the Day Master is Companions (비겁), the element the Day Master generates is Output (식상), the element it restrains is Wealth (재성), the element that restrains it is Officer (관성), and the element that generates it is Resource (인성). So "there is a lot of metal" can mean "many on my side" or "a lot of pressure" depending on the Day Master. When four or more Companions show among the characters other than the Day Master, Halmeoni points this out separately as too many companions (비겁과다).

Conversely, when a whole group of Ten Gods is absent from the surface characters, it is called no wealth star (무재, no Wealth) or no officer star (무관, no Officer), for example. In that case Halmeoni also looks at the hidden stems and says whether the group is completely absent there or present only in the hidden stems. If it is only in the hidden stems, it is taken to show less on the surface rather than to be absent, and its weight in the reading is lowered a little.

Making up for what is missing: is filling the gap the answer?

It is often said that a missing element should be filled in, but Halmeoni separates a missing energy from a needed energy. The needed energy (favourable element) is decided not by counts but by the strength of the Day Master. If the Day Master is on the strong side, the favourable side is the one that lets its strength go outward: Output (식상), Wealth (재성) and Officer (관성). If it is on the weak side, it is the side that adds strength: Resource (인성) and Companions (비겁) (balancing by strength, 억부). If the energy is balanced (중화), none is set.

So a missing element may or may not be among the favourable elements. In a chart that is already strong, the lack of an energy that helps the Day Master does not mean that adding it would improve the balance.

Filling in mostly comes with time. When a Luck Cycle or the year's characters bring a Ten God that does not appear in the birth chart (원국), the reading says something like "fills in the Wealth missing from the birth chart", and it notes separately when a favourable element is brought in. The lucky colour and direction on the daily fortune card are set from the first element among the favourable elements, or, for a balanced chart with no favourable element, from the element with the fewest characters. Wood is green and east, fire is red and south, earth is yellow and near home, metal is white and west, and water is black or navy and north.

There is a tradition that pairs the Five Elements with the organs of the body and with illness, but Halmeoni speaks of the balance of the elements only in terms of daily rhythms and habits. If you are worried about your body, talk to a doctor.

Seeing it in examples

Counting the chart (辛巳, 丙申, 庚申, 丙子) of a person born in Seoul at 00:50 on 25 August 2001 gives 4 metal (辛, 申, 庚, 申), 3 fire (巳, 丙, 丙), 1 water (子), and no wood or earth. The Day Master 庚 (gyeong) is metal, so a lot of metal means a lot of energy like one's own, and three fire means the Officer that restrains the Day Master is clear.

The two missing elements are in different positions. For a 庚 Day Master, wood is Wealth, and even when the hidden stems are checked there is no wood character (甲 or 乙) at all, so it is read as no wealth star. Earth is Resource, but 戊 (mu) is hidden inside 巳 and the two 申, so it is read as "present only in the hidden stems". In this chart the month branch 申 helps the Day Master, so it is calculated as strong, and the favourable elements are, in order, fire (Officer), water (Output) and wood (Wealth). The missing wood is among the favourable elements, but the missing earth is Resource, which would make the Day Master stronger still, so it is not.

Looking at it by time, the year 2026, 丙午 (byeong-o), is calculated as a year that brings the favourable fire, and the year 2027, 丁未 (jeong-mi), as a year that brings fire together with Resource, which does not appear in the birth chart. There are also charts where the elements pile up on one side. A person born in Seoul at 23:30 on the night of 10 October 1988 (戊辰, 壬戌, 戊戌, 癸亥, the 亥 hour after the longitude correction) has 5 earth and 3 water, and no wood, fire or metal. Much earth, the same as the Day Master 戊 (mu), produces too many companions (비겁과다), and the favourable elements are wood (Officer), metal (Output) and water (Wealth). Here too the missing fire is Resource, which helps the Day Master, so it is not among the favourable elements.