Heavenly Virtue star

Meaning

Heavenly Virtue is a star of protection: kindness returned, difficulties softened, a good nature that others trust. Its name, 天德 tiāndé, “the virtue of heaven”, is the old word for the generosity of the sky that makes things grow without asking anything back; in a chart it marks a stem or a branch that shares in that generosity, found from the month of birth, the season one was born into.

The tradition reads a gentle, steady help: a temperament that inclines towards good faith and is met with good faith, hard moments that pass more easily than feared, a certain grace in difficulty. It is one of the most welcome of the stars, read with its companion, Monthly Virtue, as the two virtues of heaven and of the month.

It is still a nuance, and a quiet one. Ulune reads it as a good nature and the good will it draws, never as protection guaranteed: the virtue the star describes is one that grows by being practised.

In practice

• Found from the month branch, in the stems or branches of the other pillars: in a Yin month the stem Ding; Mao, the branch Shen; Chen, the stem Ren; Si, the stem Xin; Wu, the branch Hai; Wei, the stem Jia; Shen, the stem Gui; You, the branch Yin; Xu, the stem Bing; Hai, the stem Yi; Zi, the branch Si; Chou, the stem Geng.
• A stem or a branch: in eight months the virtue is a Heavenly Stem, looked for among the stems of the year, day and hour; in the four middle months of the seasons, Zi, Mao, Wu and You, it is a branch, looked for among their branches.
• On the board, the star is listed with the pillars where it falls, by their stem or their branch; its reading says it was found from the month branch.
• In time, a luck pillar or a year whose stem or branch is the month’s Heavenly Virtue brings it for its while; the full table shows it in that row.
• With the other stars: Monthly Virtue is its companion from the same month, and the Nobleman the other great helping star, found from the Day Master.

Across traditions

• In Japan, Korea and Vietnam the star is tentoku kijin, cheondeok gwiin and Thiên Đức, a helping star there too.
• In the Chinese almanac, the tongshu, the days of Heavenly Virtue and Monthly Virtue in each month are marked as good days to begin things: the same virtues, read for days rather than for people.
• In Western astrology the nearest idea is the protection the tradition gives the benefics, Jupiter and Venus, when they touch a chart’s key points: help read from planets rather than from the season of birth.

Origin and history

Heavenly Virtue comes from the calendar before it comes to birth charts: the almanacs of the Tang and Song set out the virtues of each month for choosing days, and the books of the Zi Ping school, the Yuanhai Ziping and the San Ming Tong Hui, carried them into the reading of a birth. Their verse runs month by month from the first: “The first month Ding, the second the palace of Shen, the third Ren and the fourth Xin; the fifth Hai, the sixth Jia; the seventh Gui, the eighth meets Yin; the ninth Bing, the tenth Yi; Zi has Si and Chou has Geng.” Richard Smith’s study of Chinese almanacs shows how such day signs lived on in every household’s calendar.

How Ulune calculates it

Ulune reads Heavenly Virtue from the month branch alone, with the verse’s table: a stem for Chou, Yin, Chen, Si, Wei, Shen, Xu and Hai months (Geng, Ding, Ren, Xin, Jia, Gui, Bing and Yi), a branch for Zi, Mao, Wu and You months (Si, Shen, Hai and Yin). It looks for the stem among the stems of the other pillars, or the branch among their branches, the month’s own pillar aside. For a luck pillar or a year, it looks for the same stem or branch in it.

Correspondences