Academic star
In Chinese: 文昌
The star of letters, a branch found from the Day Master: learning, writing, clear thinking, and a gift for study and for expression.
Meaning
The Academic star is the star of letters: learning, writing, clear thinking, and a gift for study and for expression. Its Chinese name, 文昌 wénchāng, means “culture flourishing”, and it is also the name of a group of six stars beside the Northern Dipper and of the god of literature, Wenchang, to whom candidates for the imperial examinations once prayed. In a chart it marks a branch where the mind is at ease with words and ideas.
The tradition reads an aptitude rather than a destiny: the pleasure of learning, a good memory for what interests you, the knack of saying things clearly, often a taste for writing or teaching. A Day Master with its Academic star in a pillar is read as finding study and expression natural in the part of life that pillar stands for; in a luck pillar or a year it is read as a good time to learn, to write and to sit an exam.
Like every star it is a nuance. It adds to a chart already read through its gods: a chart with a strong Eating God or Direct Resource, the gods of expression and of learning, makes the most of it, and a chart without it learns as well by other roads.
In practice
- Found from the Day Master: one branch for each stem, sought in every pillar: Jia in Si, Yi in Wu, Bing and Wu in Shen, Ding and Ji in You, Geng in Hai, Xin in Zi, Ren in Yin and Gui in Mao.
- With the life stages: for a yang Day Master the Academic star falls in its Retreat branch, the stage the tradition reads as thoughtful and attentive; for a yin Day Master in its Birth branch, the stage of fresh beginnings.
- On the board, the star is listed with the pillars whose branches hold it; its reading says what it stands for and which branch the Day Master looks for.
- In time, a luck pillar or a year whose branch is the Academic branch brings the star for its while; the full table shows it in that row.
- Beside the gods: the reading of the Eating God, talent shared with ease, and of the Direct Resource, learning and support, say more about study than the star does; the star colours them.
Across traditions
- In Japan, Korea and Vietnam the star is bunshō kijin, munchang gwiin and Văn Xương, the star of study there too.
- In Chinese religion Wenchang is the god of literature and examinations, whose temples students still visit before their exams, and whose cult grew from a local god of Sichuan into an imperial one under the Yuan.
- In Feng Shui, a different star carries the same hope: the 4 Green of the Flying Stars, which popular books also call the Wenchang star, is placed by students’ desks.
- In Western astrology study and expression belong to Mercury and to the third and ninth houses, read from a planet and places rather than from a branch.
Origin and history
The Academic star comes from the tables of the Song and Ming books of the Zi Ping school, the Yuanhai Ziping and the San Ming Tong Hui, which teach it by a verse: “Jia and Yi, Si and Wu, let me tell you; Bing and Wu in the Monkey’s palace, Ding and Ji in the Rooster; Geng the Pig, Xin the Rat, Ren meets the Tiger; Gui sees the Rabbit and climbs the ladder to the clouds.” The ladder to the clouds is success in the examinations, the dream of every scholar’s family under the empire. The god Wenchang, whose cult Terry Kleeman traces from a local god of Zitong, in northern Sichuan, to the patron of the examinations, gave the star its name and its reputation.
How Ulune calculates it
Ulune reads the Academic star from the Day Master, with the verse’s table: Si for Jia, Wu for Yi, Shen for Bing and Wu, You for Ding and Ji, Hai for Geng, Zi for Xin, Yin for Ren and Mao for Gui. It looks for that branch in every pillar, the day’s own included, and in the branch of a luck pillar or a year. The star is shown with the pillars it falls in; its reading says it is read from the Day Master, and that the stars are secondary signs.
Correspondences
| Correspondence | Academic star |
|---|---|
| Characters, pinyin | 文昌 wénchāng, “culture flourishing” |
| Read from | The Day Master |
| For each Day Master | Jia → Si, Yi → Wu, Bing → Shen, Ding → You, Wu → Shen, Ji → You, Geng → Hai, Xin → Zi, Ren → Yin, Gui → Mao |
| Stage of the same branch | Retreat for the yang stems, Birth for the yin |
| In the sky | Wenchang, six stars beside the Northern Dipper |
| Its god | Wenchang, patron of letters and examinations |
| Ulune’s reading | Learning, writing, clear thinking, a gift for study and expression |
| Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese | Bunshō kijin, munchang gwiin, Văn Xương |
Related
- Symbolic starsThe traditional signs BaZi finds by fixed tables, the Nobleman, the Peach Blossom, the Travelling Horse and others: nuances read after the gods and the balance.
- Day MasterThe Heavenly Stem of the day of birth, the self in BaZi: the character every other stem and branch of a chart is read against, as one of the Ten Gods.
- Nobleman starThe most valued of BaZi’s symbolic stars, two branches found from the Day Master: help that arrives when it is needed, people of good will, a way through.
- Retreat stageThe seventh of the twelve life stages, where a phase draws back like sap at the turn of autumn: sensitivity, thoughtfulness, an eye for what others miss.
- Birth stageThe first of the twelve life stages, where a stem’s phase begins, like a seed breaking ground: a fresh start, promise, and support from where things begin.
- Eating GodThe phase the Day Master produces, of its own polarity, Bing for Jia: talent expressed with ease, enjoyment, creativity and a generous, relaxed way of giving.
Sources
- Xu Sheng (ed.), Yuanhai Ziping, Song dynasty
- Wan Minying, San Ming Tong Hui, 16th century
- Shen Xiaozhan, Ziping Zhenquan, 18th century
- Ho Peng Yoke, Chinese Mathematical Astrology, 2003
- Terry F. Kleeman, A God’s Own Tale: The Book of Transformations of Wenchang, 1994