What is Twelve Year Gods (Sui Qian)?

In the corner of each palace there are often tiny names like Sui Jian, Sang Men, Bai Hu and Tian De. These are the Twelve Year Gods (Sui Qian). They are counted from that year's Tai Sui (the Grand Duke who rules the year), change position once a year, and show the rhythm of each area of life that year and the small things to watch. Names like Sang Men (Mourning Gate), Bai Hu (White Tiger) and Bing Fu (Illness Charm) can give you a start at first sight, but they are the lightest layer on the chart, read only after the main stars, the transformations, the auxiliary stars and the minor stars. To find which palace this year's Sui Jian falls in, draw your chart.

The twelve, in order

Starting from Tai Sui's palace, one god per palace, going clockwise:

1. Sui Jian (Year Seat): the palace Tai Sui itself sits in. The year's home ground, where things big and small often start.
2. Hui Qi (Gloom): you tend to feel stuck and things don't flow; a change of angle clears it.
3. Sang Men (Mourning Gate): your mood tends to sink and you want to withdraw; give yourself some time.
4. Guan Suo (Binding Rope): you tend to get tied up by obligations to people or by responsibilities; let go where you should.
5. Guan Fu (Official Tally): more disputes and rules to deal with; put things in black and white.
6. Xiao Hao (Minor Drain): small sums and odd bits of time slip away unnoticed; keep accounts and you'll see them.
7. Da Hao (Major Drain): spending and social outlay jump; sleep on any big expense.
8. Long De (Dragon Virtue): people often step in to help, and there's room to turn things around.
9. Bai Hu (White Tiger): conflicts and bumps come easily; slow down and rein in your temper.
10. Tian De (Heavenly Virtue): a protective blessing; trouble often turns back around.
11. Diao Ke (Mourning Guest): you tend to worry over other people's affairs; look after yourself first.
12. Bing Fu (Illness Charm): your energy is easily overdrawn; put sleep and rest ahead of the schedule.

Of the twelve, Long De and Tian De are the two most comfortable to read. Xingge reads all the other heavy names as rhythm, reminders and putting things in order, never as something that will happen.

How the Twelve Year Gods are placed

The starting point is that year's branch, which is Tai Sui. Whatever the year's branch is, Sui Jian goes in that branch's palace on the chart, and the rest follow clockwise one per palace, through to Bing Fu. So gender and the Five Elements Bureau make no difference: anyone born in the same year, or looking at the same Annual Luck, has all twelve in the same positions.

Volume two of the Zi Wei Dou Shu Quan Shu (The Complete Book of Zi Wei Dou Shu), in its verse for placing the four flying stars Sang Men, Bai Hu, Diao Ke and Guan Fu, includes only four of them:

Two places ahead of the annual Tai Sui is Sang Men; two places behind is Diao Ke. Opposite Sang Men place Bai Hu; opposite Diao Ke place Guan Fu.

Two palaces ahead of Tai Sui is Sang Men, two behind is Diao Ke, and their opposite palaces hold Bai Hu and Guan Fu. This matches the full set in use today. The Quan Shu writes Guan Fu with a character meaning "office," while today's charting software writes it with one meaning "tally," keeping it distinct from Guan Fu in the Twelve Erudite Gods (Bo Shi). As for the other eight, the Quan Shu lists only these four in its placement verse, with no entry for each god; the full set was completed later, and Xingge puts it on the chart by the standard placement. This placement shares its source with the twelve Tai Sui of the Tong Shu (the traditional Chinese almanac). Counting from Tai Sui, the almanac has Sang Men third, Guan Fu fifth, Sui Po seventh, Long De eighth, Bai Hu ninth, Diao Ke eleventh and Bing Fu twelfth, all in the same positions as here, with only a few names different. The San Ming Tong Hui (a Ming-dynasty classic of Bazi) likewise puts Sang Men "two branches ahead of the life branch," Diao Ke "two branches behind it," and Bing Fu "one branch behind Tai Sui."

Once placed, a few patterns are easy to remember:

• Da Hao is always opposite Sui Jian. Wang Tingzhi's Zhongzhou-school book Tan Xing calls this position Sui Po (Year Breaker), as does the almanac's list of twelve Tai Sui. If you switch on the Zhongzhou school in the chart settings, the chart shows Sui Po instead.
• Three per group, making exactly four trines: Sui Jian, Guan Fu and Bai Hu; Hui Qi, Xiao Hao and Tian De; Sang Men, Da Hao and Diao Ke; Guan Suo, Long De and Bing Fu.
• In the Annual Luck, the positions line up with the annual twelve palaces. The Annual Life Palace is the year's own branch, so Sui Jian always sits in the Annual Life Palace, Guan Fu in the Annual Career Palace, Bai Hu in the Annual Wealth Palace, Diao Ke in the Annual Spouse Palace, Sang Men in the Annual Fortune Palace, Long De in the Annual Health Palace, and Tian De in the Annual Children Palace.

How much weight this set carries

The Twelve Year Gods are gods, not stars. They weigh even less than the minor stars, adding just a small label to a palace. When reading a palace's Annual Luck, look at its main stars and transformations first, then the auxiliary and minor stars, and only last the Year Gods and General Gods. The main stars and transformations give the year's theme; the Year Gods give the weather around that theme: busy, heavy, helped along, or a sign to pay more attention to paperwork and your daily rhythm.

So a palace holding Sang Men or Bai Hu doesn't mean that palace is having a bad year, and one holding Long De or Tian De doesn't mean everything will go smoothly. The names only tell you where to put your attention.

How it differs from the other three sets

There are four twelve-god sets on the chart in all, each started differently and used differently:

• Twelve Life Stages (Chang Sheng): by the Five Elements Bureau, yin and yang, and gender. Shows which stage a palace's energy is in. Natal.
• Twelve Erudite Gods (Bo Shi): counted from Lu Cun. Shows a palace's small way of getting things done. Natal.
• Twelve General Gods (Jiang Qian): counted from Jiang Xing on the year branch's trine, changing each year. Shows the year's momentum.
• Twelve Year Gods (Sui Qian): counted from the year branch itself, changing each year. Shows the year's atmosphere.

The Year Gods and the Erudite Gods both include Xiao Hao, Da Hao and Bing Fu. The names are the same and the meanings close, but the starting points are entirely different: the Erudite Gods follow Lu Cun and never move for life; the Year Gods follow Tai Sui and move once a year. When a palace has the same name from both sets, Xingge's reading gives only the annual line, without repeating it. For an introduction to all three of these sets, see the Bo Shi, Jiang Qian and Sui Qian lesson.

Natal and annual, read separately

The Twelve Year Gods appear on one chart in two sets:

• The natal set: placed by the branch of the year you were born, so Sui Jian sits in the palace of your birth-year branch. Xingge treats it as background on the chart, with no separate palace reading.
• The annual set: placed again by the branch of the year you're looking at. Switch the chart to an Annual Luck, and the Year Gods in the corners move to that year's positions; the "this year" part of the reading uses this set.

The year changes on the first day of the first lunar month, not on January 1 and not at Li Chun (the start of spring). Take 2027, a Ding Wei year: from February 6, 2027, Sui Jian moves to Wei, with Hui Qi in Shen, Sang Men in You, Guan Suo in Xu, Guan Fu in Hai, Xiao Hao in Zi, Da Hao in Chou, Long De in Yin, Bai Hu in Mao, Tian De in Chen, Diao Ke in Si and Bing Fu in Wu. Which of your palaces is in Wei differs from person to person; once you draw your chart you'll see. For how to read the Annual Luck, see the Annual Luck lesson.

The heavy-named ones

Sang Men, Diao Ke, Bai Hu, Guan Fu, Bing Fu and Hui Qi were named by the ancients after the most extreme cases. In volume one of the Quan Shu, the Tai Wei Fu says of the Annual Luck that "Qing Yang and Tuo Luo ride on Tai Sui to lead the way," and then names Bing Fu and Guan Fu alongside them. The point is that these gods are read together with that year's challenging stars; on its own, a single one can't support any conclusion. Xingge reads them like this:

• Sang Men and Diao Ke: your mood and matters at home. Leave more time for yourself and your family.
• Bai Hu: your movements and your temper. Slow down, rein it in.
• Guan Fu: contracts, documents, rules. Put things in writing.
• Bing Fu: your daily rhythm. Rest first, then push.
• Hui Qi: a heavy mood. A change of scene lets in some air.