What Does Wu Qu Govern?

This passage lays out Wu Qu's nature all at once: metal, the sixth star of the Northern Dipper, master of the Wealth Palace, and a character that is 'firm, resolute and decisive'. Metal stands for severity and decision, so Wu Qu people act crisply, but 'with joy and with anger', their feelings come out directly. Then come the pairings: with Tian Fu in the same palace, long life; fallen and meeting Lian Zhen in Mao, ruin and being stuck; Lu and Ma galloping together, wealth made far away; with Tan Lang in the same degree, stinginess; with Po Jun in the Wealth Palace, money coming and going.

On a chart, Wu Qu shares a palace with Tian Fu only in Zi and Wu, with Tan Lang only in Chou and Wei, and with Po Jun only in Si and Hai. One point about 「陷囚會於震宮」 needs explaining: in Mao, Wu Qu shares the palace with Qi Sha, and its brightness on a Xingge chart is Li, not Xian; Lian Zhen always falls in Wu Qu's trine, so 'meets' here means meeting from the trine. The Quan Shu's section on star combinations says the same thing, 「武曲破貞於卯地木壓雷驚」 (see Star Combinations: Wu Qu), which shows that Wu Qu in Mao is a fixed bad position throughout the book.

Master Xiyi's 「在天司壽，在數司財」 makes Wu Qu's two sides clear: it is a star of longevity as well as of wealth, which is why segment 1 says that with Tian Fu in the same palace there is long life. 「喜祿存而同政」 is the wealth star gaining Lu, so money has a source. 「天府、天相為佐貳」 names Wu Qu's helpers; Wu Qu shares a palace with Tian Fu in Zi and Wu and with Tian Xiang in Yin and Shen. 「與太陰以互權」 is more an echo of nature, since both govern wealth; under the placement rules Tai Yin never enters Wu Qu's San Fang Si Zheng.

'Crushed by a tree or struck by thunder' and 'throwing oneself into a river or drowning' are typical old-book verdicts of accidental death, reasoned from the Five Elements: Wu Qu is metal and Mao is wood, so metal and wood fight; Zi is water, and metal feeds water and is drained. Today such verdicts should be read as a call to watch for accidents and safety in particular luck periods, such as travel, outdoor activities and being near water, not as a prophecy of how one dies. The Kan palace combination cannot be completed on a chart, as the note explains.

「武曲守命福非輕，貪狼不發少年郎」 is a famous line in the Quan Shu, and it says the same thing as the Gu Sui Fu's 「貪武墓中居三十才發福」 (see Gu Sui Fu): Wu Qu and Tan Lang share a palace in Chou and Wei (two of the four tomb positions), and they bloom late. The old logic is that Wu Qu is hard and Tan Lang is desire; together in youth there is plenty of drive but too little steadiness, and things improve only after middle age as experience builds up. This is the Tan Wu Tong Xing (Tan Lang and Wu Qu travelling together) pattern.

The lines after that sort the bad meetings: with peach blossom stars in the same palace, benefiting oneself and harming others; with Qi Sha and Huo Xing, being robbed over money; with Qing Yang and Tuo Luo, loneliness; with Po Jun, hard to become prominent. Wu Qu shares a palace with Qi Sha only in Mao and You, and 'robbed because of money' can be read as being prone to having money taken, being cheated, or getting into conflict over money. 'Loneliness and harm' is Wu Qu's own solitary streak made heavier by Qing Yang and Tuo Luo, leaving relationships more distant.

This passage adds a condition by year stem: 「甲己生人福厚」, because in Jia years Wu Qu takes Hua Ke and in Ji years Hua Lu, both years when Wu Qu gains a lucky transformation; by contrast, in Ren years Wu Qu takes Hua Ji, and those years are not on the list. 「更得貪火沖破，定為貴格」 is unusual: clashing and breaking is normally bad, but here it is a noble pattern, because Tan Lang meeting Huo Xing is an explosive combination of the Huo Tan (Huo Xing and Tan Lang) kind; Wu Qu's hardness plus the force of Huo Xing and Tan Lang was, in old times, the pattern of a general.

「喜西北生人，東南生人平常」 judges fortune by birthplace: metal belongs to the west and the north is water, so metal and water support each other; the south-east is wood and fire, and fire overcomes metal. This kind of directional reasoning is rare in the Quan Shu and is generally not used today; it is enough to understand it as written. 「破相延年」 means that a Wu Qu person with malefic stars who carries a scar or has had surgery offsets a greater disaster, a common folk idea of 'resolving' bad fortune.