What Does Qi Sha Govern?

Qi Sha's image in the Quan Shu is 「斗中之上將」 and also 「成敗之孤辰」: a senior general can win a battle and can also be utterly routed, and he always stands alone at the front. It belongs to fire and metal, and metal stands for severity, hence 「其威作金之靈」; 「其性若清涼之狀」 says Qi Sha is cool-headed and decisive, never sluggish.

「在命宮若限不扶夭折」 is a heavy line, but its condition is clear: the luck periods do not support it. A person with Qi Sha in the Life Palace needs the luck periods to cooperate with the natal drive; when they are poor, drive turns into risk-taking. 「在官祿得地，化禍為祥」 shows that Qi Sha fits best in the Career Palace; a general belongs on the battlefield. Read today, Qi Sha suits high-pressure, pioneering work that requires standing on one's own.

This passage goes palace by palace through Qi Sha's bad signs: few and lonely children; in the Spouse Palace, 「鴛衾半冷」; meeting Tian Xing and Lian Zhen in the Property or Parents Palace, harm to the parents; meeting Tian Xing, Hua Ji and malefic stars in the Travel or Health Palace, disability; with Lian Zhen in the Body or Life Palace, broken arms and injured thighs; meeting Lian Zhen and Po Jun in the Travel Palace, death on the road. The last is the same thing as the Tai Wei Fu's 「七殺廉貞同位，路上埋屍」 (see Tai Wei Fu).

On the chart, Qi Sha shares a palace with Lian Zhen only in Chou and Wei, and elsewhere often meets it from the San Fang. 「會囚耗於遷移」 is Qi Sha in the Travel Palace meeting Lian Zhen and Po Jun, and since Qi Sha, Po Jun and Tan Lang always sit in trine with one another, the condition is not hard to meet. Today such verdicts are reminders about safety when travelling, on the roads and on business trips, and should not be read literally as a violent death. The note in the section on star combinations also says it is especially bad in a fallen place with Hua Ji, and lighter without it.

The wording of this passage has come down in a garbled state, as the notes explain. Two layers of meaning can be made out. The first is the yin or yang of the palace Qi Sha is in: in 「陷弱之宮」 the harm is lighter, in 「正陰之宮」 the trouble is deep, perhaps meaning that Qi Sha is yang and is out of place in a palace of a yin branch.

The second is Qi Sha met twice: the natal San Fang has Qi Sha, the Annual Luck piles malefic stars on top, and the Decade and Minor Luck reach it as well; only with all three layers stacked does it mean 「陣亡掠死」. The Quan Shu has a separate chapter, Qi Sha Met Twice, which says it more clearly: when the natal trine has Qi Sha and the year brings the annual Qing Yang and Tuo Luo clashing on it, that is meeting twice. The last line, 「合太陽巨門會帝旺之鄉則吉」: Di Wang is one of the twelve stages of growth, marked in every palace on a Xingge chart.

This passage holds the Quan Shu's harshest verdict on Qi Sha: 「乃數中之惡曜，實非善星也」. The premise is that the luck periods join the Body or Life Palace and meet Qi Sha; then neither Zi Wei's restraint nor a Lu star has any effect. 「蓋世英雄為殺制，此時一夢南柯」 is vividly put: however strong a person is, a collapsing luck period where Qi Sha stacks up with bad stars brings total defeat.

This passage should be read with segments 5 and 6. Master Xiyi says Qi Sha 「遇紫微則化權降福」 and 「遇帝祿而可解」, yet here it says 「雖帝制也無功」 and 「雖祿亦無力」. A reasonable reading: a natal Zi Wei or Lu star can subdue Qi Sha, but when three layers of luck periods stack up badly they can no longer hold it down. 'A collapsing luck period' means luck failing at this point; when reading the Decade Luck, watch the relation between the Decade Luck Life Palace and the natal Qi Sha; see Decade Luck.

Master Xiyi lists four ways Qi Sha changes: meeting Zi Wei, turned into power and blessings; meeting Huo Xing and Ling Xing, its killing force grows; meeting bad stars in the place of birth, a butcher; meeting Wen Chang and Wen Qu in a key place, a stubborn and unruly temperament. The last is unusual. One might expect civil stars to make the general star refined, but here they make it stubborn, probably because the civil stars' ideas joined to Qi Sha's hardness make someone full of opinions who will not listen to advice.

Zi Wei and Qi Sha share a palace only in Si and Hai, where Qi Sha's brightness is Ping, its weakest position on a Xingge chart, which is exactly what lets Zi Wei hold it down; see the Zi Wei chapter's 「帝降七殺為權」. As for 「祕經云：七殺居陷地，沉吟福不生」: by the brightness table Xingge uses, Qi Sha is never Xian in any of the twelve palaces, its lowest being Ping in Si and Hai, so 'fallen place' on a chart has to be read as its relatively weakest position.

「守身命作事進退，喜怒不常」 is the other side of Qi Sha's character: great drive, but its direction shifts and its feelings come out directly. 「左右昌曲入廟拱照，掌生殺之權」: power over life and death meant military command or penal authority in old times; today it can be read as a position holding decision-making, personnel or enforcement power.

「若四殺忌星沖破，巧藝平常之人」 is Qi Sha's fallback: living by technical skill. The Quan Shu thinks well of Qi Sha in a woman's chart: 「旺地，財權服眾，志過丈夫」, the same 'ambition beyond a man's' used for Tian Xiang in a woman's chart. In old times saying a woman had ambition beyond a man's was praise for her capability; today it reads as leadership and independence.

This line continues the topics of women and religious life: the four malefic stars clashing and breaking it mean harm to family and unchastity, and it suits monks and Daoists; but monks and Daoists meeting gathered malefic stars also drift about and return to lay life. The Quan Shu often treats 'suits monks and Daoists' as a remedy for a bad pattern, yet here it says even the religious life cannot be kept, which shows how strong Qi Sha's restlessness is when malefic stars gather.

「刑剋不潔」 follows the lines on women, and as written reflects old ideas of chastity. For a reader now, the point is that love and family life tend to be turbulent and hard to settle.

This verse is the Qi Sha Chao Dou (Qi Sha facing the Dipper) pattern: Qi Sha in the Life Palace in Yin, Shen, Zi or Wu. In Yin or Shen, the opposite palace holds Zi Wei and Tian Fu; in Zi or Wu, Wu Qu and Tian Fu. Qi Sha's opposite palace is always Tian Fu, and 'facing the Dipper' means the general star faces the emperor's seat and the treasury star in the Dipper. The Gu Sui Fu also says 「七殺朝斗爵祿榮昌」 (see Gu Sui Fu).

On a Xingge chart, Qi Sha is Miao in Yin and Shen and Wang in Zi and Wu, all strong positions. 「魁鉞左右文昌會」 is a bonus condition: the original wants the general star to have civil ministers and noble helpers at its side. Note that the same verse in the Qi Sha nature chapter ends 「科祿名高」 instead of 「權祿名高」; that one-character difference shows how verses changed as they were copied.

This verse follows the last and gives Qi Sha's other extreme: 「殺居陷地」 and 「殺強無制伏」, like sleeping with a tiger in one's arms, with the risk of an unnatural death in youth. It is the Quan Shu's most frightening line about Qi Sha, and it has two conditions: a fallen place, and nothing to restrain it.

On the chart, Qi Sha has no true fallen position; its weakest is Ping in Si and Hai, and Qi Sha in Si or Hai always shares the palace with Zi Wei, so it is restrained instead. So what this line actually corresponds to on a Xingge chart is closer to Qi Sha in a strong position with heavy malefic stars and no Zi Wei or Lu star to restrain it. The restraint can be Zi Wei, Lu Cun or Hua Lu, or Tian Fu in the opposite palace. The practical warning is about impulsive risk-taking when young, which calls for particular care about safety and limits.