What is Lu Feng Jie Kong (Lu Meets Jie Kong)?

Lu Feng Jie Kong (Lu meeting Jie Kong) describes a very common gap: an opportunity, a benefit or a resource is right in front of you, and somewhere in the negotiating it never actually lands. Lu is gain; Jie Kong is "the road cut off." Put the two together and the ancients sounded a particular warning. Everyone born in a Bing or Gui year has Lu Cun in Jie Kong, but the ancients only took it seriously in the Life, Body and Wealth Palaces. To see where your Lu stars are, draw your chart.

What Jie Kong is and how it is placed

Jie Kong's full name is Jie Lu Kong Wang, "the road cut off, empty and lost," and it is placed by the birth-year stem. The verse in volume two of the Quan Shu is short:

Jia and Ji: Shen and You. Yi and Geng: Wu and Wei. Bing and Xin: Chen and Si. Ding and Ren: Yin and Mao. Wu and Gui: Zi and Chou.

So people born in Jia or Ji years have Jie Kong in Shen and You; Yi or Geng years in Wu and Wei; and so on. Everyone's chart has Jie Kong, always occupying two adjacent palaces. Xingge's chart labels the two as "Jie Lu" and "Kong Wang," and both count as Jie Kong when detecting patterns.

One small regularity: Jie Kong never lands in Xu or Hai.

How Lu Feng Jie Kong forms

The condition is: Lu Cun or a Hua Lu sits in the Life, Body or Wealth Palace, and that palace is within Jie Kong.

Both Lu Cun and Jie Kong depend on the birth-year stem, so in two kinds of year Lu Cun is always in Jie Kong:

• Born in a Bing year: Lu Cun is in Si and Jie Kong in Chen and Si, so Lu Cun always falls in Jie Kong.
• Born in a Gui year: Lu Cun is in Zi and Jie Kong in Zi and Chou, so Lu Cun always falls in Jie Kong.

In other words, people born in twelve years out of every sixty, roughly 1 person in 5, have Lu Cun in Jie Kong from birth. But the palace still has to be the Life, Body or Wealth Palace for the pattern to count; in other years it depends on where the star taking Hua Lu sits. Together, about 1 chart in 12 has Lu Feng Jie Kong.

What the classics say

The very first line of the Tan Xing Yao Lun in volume three of the Quan Shu addresses this:

In reading the Body and Life, Lu and Ma should not fall into voidness; Tian Kong and Jie Kong matter most, Xun Kong less.

When reading a chart, the ancients first checked whether Lu Cun and Tian Ma had fallen into voidness; among the kinds of voidness, Tian Kong and Jie Kong matter most, Xun Kong a grade less. Elsewhere in volume three, on Lu and Ma galloping together, it also says the worst is meeting challenging stars and "Jie Lu Kong Wang, which mostly means toil and hardship."

So in the ancients' ranking, Jie Kong weighs a little more than Lu Feng Xun Kong.

That line speaks of the "Body" and "Life." Volume one also says "sources of wealth fear voidness," so Xingge only detects Lu Feng Jie Kong in the Life, Body and Wealth Palaces. A Lu star in Jie Kong in other palaces isn't marked as a pattern: in Bing and Gui years every chart has Lu Cun in Jie Kong, and reporting it in every palace would lose the point.

How to read it today

The "cut off" in Jie Kong is more like being stopped halfway. Today, common signs of Lu Feng Jie Kong are:

• A done deal changes at the last step. A partnership, a project, a raise: everything goes smoothly until the final step stalls.
• Gains that stay on paper. The plan looks beautiful, and what actually comes in is less than expected.
• Rewards that come late. Not none, but you have to take a longer road to get them.

Xingge reads Lu Feng Jie Kong as: gains you can see, but not easily pocket; when an opportunity comes, take the concrete part first, and don't let it stay only in the plan.

In the Life or Body Palace, it concerns your overall gains; in the Wealth Palace, income and money coming in.

What loosens it

• Jie Kong's force fades with time. Many practitioners hold that Jie Kong shows more clearly in youth and gradually weakens from middle age. This is a later view that the Quan Shu doesn't state, so take it as a reference.
• Hua Quan, Hua Ke, Zuo Fu, You Bi, Tian Kui or Tian Yue in the same palace or the San Fang. When things stall, someone or something pushes them through.
• Only one Lu star is cut off. Lu Cun in Jie Kong with Hua Lu in another palace (or the other way round) leaves another route to gains.

On the other hand, if the same palace also has Di Kong or Di Jie, it is also Lu Feng Kong Jie, and getting things safely in hand matters even more.

How to check whether you have Lu Feng Jie Kong

1. Use the birth-year transformations lookup or draw your chart to confirm your birth-year stem.
2. Using the verse above, find the two palaces of Jie Kong.
3. Check whether Lu Cun or Hua Lu is in one of them, and whether that palace is your Life, Body or Wealth Palace.

If you do have it, the most practical habits are: put agreements in writing, set aside a share of income first, and don't rely only on the numbers in the plan. The Lu Cun and Tian Ma and Hua Lu lessons help you read the Lu stars themselves.

Common questions

What does Lu Feng Jie Kong mean?

Lu Cun or Hua Lu sits in the Life, Body or Wealth Palace, and that palace happens to be Jie Kong (Jie Lu Kong Wang). Jie Kong is placed by the birth-year stem and occupies two palaces on everyone's chart. With a Lu star in it, the ancients said gains are easily "cut off"; the modern reading is to confirm gains one more step and not let them stay only in the plan.

Whose Lu Cun always falls in Jie Kong?

People born in Bing and Gui years. In Bing years Lu Cun is in Si and Jie Kong in Chen and Si; in Gui years Lu Cun is in Zi and Jie Kong in Zi and Chou, so in both, Lu Cun always falls in Jie Kong. The stem follows the lunar year; if you were born before Lunar New Year, use the previous year.

What is the difference between Lu Feng Jie Kong and Lu Feng Xun Kong?

Both are a Lu star falling into voidness, placed differently: Jie Kong by the birth-year stem, Xun Kong by which ten-year cycle the birth year's stem-branch belongs to. Volume three of the Quan Shu says "Tian Kong and Jie Kong matter most, Xun Kong less," so the ancients considered Jie Kong somewhat heavier.

Does Lu Feng Jie Kong last forever?

Its position on the birth chart doesn't change, but many practitioners hold that Jie Kong acts more clearly in youth and weakens from middle age. This is later experience that the Quan Shu doesn't state. In practice, it also depends on which Decade and Annual Luck you are in.