6 and 9 · Fire at heaven’s gate
In Chinese: 火燒天門火烧天门
The 6 White and the 9 Purple: fire at heaven’s gate, the middle daughter and the father, ambition and authority to keep in balance.
Meaning
Qian, the 6’s trigram, stands at the north-west, the corner Chinese cosmology calls the gate of heaven, 天門, and the 9 brings fire to it: hence the pairing’s name, 火燒天門. With the 9 timely in Period 9, ambition finds recognition more easily; the counsel is warmth between generations rather than heat.
The classics call it fire at heaven’s gate: the 9’s fire against the 6’s metal, the middle daughter against the father, passion against authority. In season, ambition that wins recognition; out of season, friction with those in charge, and heated words between generations.
In practice
- In a home’s chart: a palace whose mountain star and water star are the 6 and the 9, in either order, holds this pairing; the palace’s reading names it and gives the text above, then how the two phases meet and which face applies.
- The 6 as mountain star, the 9 as water star: the water star checks the mountain star, as fire checks metal: what comes in presses on the people of the home.
- The 9 as mountain star, the 6 as water star: the mountain star checks the water star, as fire checks metal: the people hold back what flows in, a restraint that can steady or slow.
- In Period 9 (2024–2043), the 9 is in season and the 6 is not: read “in season” for what the 9 speaks for and “out of season” for what the 6 speaks for, the people of the home when a star is the mountain’s, what comes in when it is the water’s.
Correspondences
- The stars: the 6 White (Wu Qu) and the 9 Purple (You Bi)
- Their phases: Metal and Fire
- Their trigrams and homes in the Lo Shu: Qian ☰, in the north-west; Li ☲, in the south
- The 6 with the other stars: 1 and 6, 2 and 6, 3 and 6, 4 and 6, 5 and 6, 6 and 6, 6 and 7, 6 and 8
- The 9 with the other stars: 1 and 9, 2 and 9, 3 and 9, 4 and 9, 5 and 9, 7 and 9, 8 and 9, 9 and 9
Related
- 6 White starThe sixth of the nine stars, Metal and the trigram Qian, heaven, the father, at home in the north-west: authority, leadership and support from above.
- 9 Purple starThe ninth of the nine stars, Fire and the trigram Li, at home in the south: celebration, recognition and joy, the star of the present period.
- Pairs of starsThe 45 meetings of a mountain star and a water star in one palace of a Flying Star chart, each with the reading the classics give it, in season and out.
- MetalThe phase of gathering in and giving form, of autumn and the west: the harvest, the clear line, the edge that decides.
- FireThe phase of warmth, light and full expression, of summer and the south: growth at its height, everything most visible.
- Flying Star chartA home’s chart in the Flying Stars: nine palaces, each with a mountain star, a water star and a period star, cast from the home’s period and facing.
Sources
- Zi Bai Jue (Verse of the Purple and White), Xuan Kong school
- Xuan Kong Mi Zhi (Secret Meaning of the Profound Void), Xuan Kong school
- Fei Xing Fu (Rhapsody of the Flying Stars), Xuan Kong school
- Shen Zhureng, Shen shi Xuankong xue, published after 1906