What is BaZi? The four pillars, explained

What do the four pillars mean?

Each pillar is one pair from a cycle of sixty: one of ten heavenly stems (天干) on top, and one of twelve earthly branches (地支) beneath it. Every stem and every branch belongs to one of the five elements and is yin or yang, so a chart is eight characters, each with an element.

Tradition gives each pillar its own part of life. The year pillar is read for family background and early years, the month pillar for upbringing and the season you were born into, the day pillar for you and your partner, and the hour pillar for children and later life. Schools weigh them differently, but all four are read together.

A chart worked out by the same engine as the app, for someone born on 10 February 1991 at noon in Singapore:

Day Master: 辛 Yin Metal

Each pillar changes on its own clock: the year at Li Chun, the month at each of the twelve 节 solar terms, the day at midnight and the hour every two hours. How Auspica calculates a chart sets out every rule.

What is the Day Master?

The Day Master (日主) is the heavenly stem of your day pillar. BaZi reads it as you, the person the chart is about, and reads every other character by how it relates to it.

In the example the day pillar is 辛亥, so the Day Master is 辛 Yin Metal. There are ten possible Day Masters, one for each stem, and yours comes from your birth date. Look up your own Day Master.

What are the five elements in a chart?

Wood, fire, earth, metal and water (五行) are five phases that feed and check one another. In the producing cycle each element feeds the next: Wood → Fire → Earth → Metal → Water → Wood. In the controlling cycle each one checks the element two steps on: Wood → Earth → Water → Fire → Metal → Wood.

A chart counts how much of each element its eight characters hold, including the stems hidden inside each branch (藏干). In the example, three of the eight characters are metal, the Day Master’s own element. The balance, and above all how much support the Day Master has, decides which elements are read as helpful and which as too much. That judgement is where schools differ most; Auspica uses a named method and shows its reasons.

What are the Ten Gods?

The Ten Gods (十神) name the relationship between the Day Master and every other stem in the chart. There are five relations: the same element, the element it produces, the one it controls, the one that controls it and the one that produces it. Each splits in two by whether the pair share yin or yang, which gives ten. The names are traditional labels for roles such as peers, expression, wealth, authority and support, not spirits.

• 比肩Companion
• 劫财Rob Wealth
• 食神Eating God
• 伤官Hurting Officer
• 偏财Indirect Wealth
• 正财Direct Wealth
• 七杀Seven Killings
• 正官Direct Officer
• 偏印Indirect Resource
• 正印Direct Resource

In the example, the month stem 庚 is Rob Wealth 劫财 to the 辛 Day Master, and the hour stem 甲 is Direct Wealth 正财. Branches are read through the stems hidden inside them. All ten in the glossary.

What are luck pillars?

Luck pillars (大运) are ten-year periods that step on from the month pillar through the cycle of sixty, forward or backward by the year stem’s yin or yang and the person’s gender. The age the first one begins depends on how far the birth fell from the next 节 solar term, or from the last one when they run backward. Each period is read against the birth chart for the themes of that decade.

In the example they run forward: 辛卯 from age 8 in 1999, then 壬辰 and 癸巳.

Is BaZi the same as the Chinese zodiac?

No. Your zodiac animal is one character of the eight: the branch of the year pillar. BaZi reads all four pillars, and the day pillar counts for more than the year.

The BaZi year also turns at Li Chun (立春) in early February, not at Chinese New Year. The example was born on 10 February 1991, after Li Chun on 4 February 1991 and before Chinese New Year on 15 February 1991. Their year pillar is 辛未, the Goat, while a calendar that counts from New Year would call them a Horse. Why the year starts at Li Chun.

What do I need to get my chart?

Your birth date, the time on the clock when you were born, and the place. The place gives the time zone that applied there on that date, including daylight saving and historical changes, so the hour lands in the right pillar.

Without a birth time you still get three pillars, the year, month and day, with the hour marked unknown. If a new month began on your birth date, the month pillar can be uncertain too, and the chart says so. The Day Master needs only the date, except for a birth between 23:00 and midnight, where conventions differ. Get your free chart.

Is BaZi fortune telling?

Not as Auspica uses it. A chart describes tendencies and timing in the language of a long tradition. It does not say what will happen, and nothing in it is guaranteed. Clashes and harder years are watch-outs, not verdicts.

Many people use their chart as a prompt for reflection: what suits them, which years to build in and which to consolidate, and how they differ from the people close to them. Readings are cultural guidance, not medical, legal or financial advice.

Questions about BaZi