Ranking Patterns and Stars

The core of this chapter is grading the 'stars' and the 'numbers' separately. The stars are what sits in the Life Palace and its San Fang Si Zheng; the numbers are more abstract, roughly whether the chart's own yin-yang and elements are in harmony. The opening first places Zi Wei and Tian Fu: Zi Wei is the emperor star above both dippers, Tian Fu the lord of the southern dipper, so a discussion of high and low patterns starts with these two. The Quan Shu lists which dipper each star belongs to in Star Elements and the Northern and Southern Dippers, a grouping volume three uses again when it discusses the luck periods. On a Xingge chart, the positions of Zi Wei and Tian Fu are the skeleton of the whole chart; every other main star is placed from these two.

「陰陽相伴」 is usually read as the birth year's yin or yang matching the Life Palace's: someone born in a yang year (Jia, Bing, Wu, Geng, Ren) with the Life Palace on a yang branch (Zi, Yin, Chen, Wu, Shen, Xu), or born in a yin year with it on a yin branch, has them 'going together'; the reverse is 'not going together'. 「數不相生」 means that the Five Elements Bureau, the Life Palace and the birth year overcome rather than generate one another. A Xingge chart shows the birth year's stem, the stem and branch of the Life Palace, and the Five Elements Bureau. The Quan Shu only says that both being bad is the lower grade, and does not say what happens when only one is bad; the next line takes that up.

「陰陽純駁」 is yin and yang partly matching and partly not, which is the middle grade. Then the Quan Shu turns back to the 'stars': all lucky stars in the San Fang Si Zheng is the upper grade. In effect it gives two rulers at once, one for the numbers (yin-yang and elements) and one for the stars (how good or bad the San Fang Si Zheng is), and the nine ranks that follow are made by crossing the two. Modern teaching mostly uses only the second ruler, and the yin-yang matching scheme is little used, but it is the Quan Shu's original framework and should not be skipped.

The middle grade for stars: lucky and malefic stars both guard or shine on the Life Palace and its three palaces. Most real charts look like this: a decent main star in the Life Palace with one or two malefic stars in the three palaces, or malefic stars in the Life Palace rescued by lucky stars from the three palaces. The line echoes 「吉凶相伴者」 being 'the middle grade' in Essentials of Reading the Stars; the two chapters use the same standard. There is no need to treat every malefic star as bad news: good and bad together is simply the normal state of a middle-grade chart.

The lower grade for stars: the Life Palace and its three palaces all hold malefic and killing stars, judged as a 「凶徒」. In the old books a ruffian is someone who does evil, of violent temper; that is the translation by the original meaning. Note that this is a verdict on the stars ruler alone, not on the whole life, because it is crossed with the numbers later: lower stars with upper numbers can rank as high as seventh, as rich as Tao Zhu. So this line is not a final verdict, only one coordinate on the three-by-three grid.

From here come the nine ranks. First: upper stars, upper numbers, the highest rank of office. The nine ranks can be drawn as a three-by-three table: upper stars with upper, middle or lower numbers are ranks one to three; middle stars with the three grades of numbers, four to six; lower stars, seven to nine. The ordering rule is that the stars weigh more than the numbers: upper stars with lower numbers (third) still rank above middle stars with upper numbers (fourth). 「極品」 is the top grade of officialdom; today it can be read as the top position within a system.

Second: upper stars, middle numbers, one of the Three Dukes. The Three Dukes were nominally the three highest posts at court, just below the highest rank. Here one can see what the ancients asked of the numbers: with the stars already upper-grade, the numbers dropping from upper to middle costs only one rank, so the numbers are a correction, not the leading term. That means top-flight ability and circumstances, falling short only in how well the inborn factors fit together.

Third: upper stars, lower numbers, one of the Six Ministers, roughly the head of a central ministry. Notice that with the numbers already lower-grade, upper-grade stars still hold up the third rank, higher than any chart with middle-grade stars. This is the chapter's clearest conclusion: the stars of the Life Palace and its three palaces are the main body, and the fit of yin-yang and the elements comes second.

This line groups the first three ranks: all upper-grade and long-lived. Here the Quan Shu ties nobility and long life together: people with upper-grade stars are not only high in office but long-lived. The old books often link verdicts like this, because a good fate was thought to be good in every respect. A fair modern gloss is strong all-round circumstances and plenty of resources; it should not be stretched to say that everyone with upper-grade stars will live long.

Fourth: middle stars, upper numbers, regional inspector, a senior supervisory official in the provinces. From this rank on, the posts drop clearly to local level. That confirms the ordering above: however good the numbers, middle-grade stars reach only the middle tier. It can correspond to reaching management in a regional or mid-sized organisation.

Fifth: middle stars, middle numbers, county magistrate, the head of a county. This is the very middle of the nine ranks, and where most people land. A county magistrate was a full official and counted as a real achievement in his day; a modern reading need not see this as mediocre, but as a solid middle class with some standing.

Sixth: middle stars, lower numbers, 「異路前程」. The proper road to office in old China was the imperial examinations; an 'irregular path' meant any other start, such as a purchased post, rising from the clerks, military merit or a craft. The Quan Shu is measured here: still 'noble and distinguished', only by a different road. This can mean rising not through degrees and regular promotion but through professional skill, starting a business or another route.

This groups ranks four to six: middle-rank people who enjoy blessings. Compared with the previous group's 'upper-grade and long-lived', this mentions only blessings, not long life or nobility. The wording is precise: the upper group is about office, the middle group about blessings, and the next group about livelihood and wealth, the focus stepping down from rank to blessings to a living.

The seventh rank is the most interesting line in the chapter: lower stars and upper numbers, yet ample livelihood, as rich as Tao Zhu, many descendants and long life. The Quan Shu's reason is 「星雖凶而命入格合局」: good numbers can turn malefic stars into wealth. Fan Li left office and grew rich by trade, so this rank is about wealth rather than nobility, unlike the first six, which are about office. The last phrase, 「再否虛名虛利」, is a reservation: if the numbers are not upper-grade after all, it is only empty fame and profit. This can be set beside Patterns of Wealth to see how the Quan Shu speaks of wealth from star combinations elsewhere.

Eighth: lower stars, middle numbers, never short of food and clothing. The verdict is down to a basic living here, but 「無虧」, nothing lacking, is still positive. It shows that the Quan Shu does not condemn every chart with lower-grade stars: where the numbers still hold, at least life is free of want.

Ninth: lower stars, lower numbers, toil and rushing about, poverty and early death. This verdict is given as the original states it. The condition is both rulers at the bottom: malefic stars throughout the Life Palace and its three palaces, and yin and yang not matching, the numbers not generating. In practice, neither inborn conditions nor surroundings give much support, so more of life depends on later effort and on how the Decade Luck runs. As the Quan Shu says in Poor First, Rich Later, a person of humble birth can still rise from the flat ground when a good luck period comes.

The closing line widens the use of the nine ranks to ancestors and descendants: above, the source of one's forebears; below, the fortunes of one's offspring. The ancients saw a life as one link in a family line: a person of high rank was thought to have virtuous ancestors and flourishing descendants. One can take it to mean that a chart reflects the family circumstances a person inherits and the resources they can pass on. In practice, ancestors are read from the Parents and Fortune Palaces and descendants from the Children Palace; this line is a general statement, not a specific technique.