Ming Gua (Person Trigram) 命卦 Glossary

Your personal trigram in Eight Mansions feng shui — computed from the Lichun-rule birth year and sex, with four favourable and four unfavourable directions attached to each of the eight values.

Ming Gua · 命卦 · mìng guà · 命卦 (traditional) · Kua number · Life Gua

Source credibility (S/A/B/C/X): B    Rule computability (A/B/C): A

What it is

Eight Mansions （八宅） assigns every person one of eight trigrams — Kan 1, Kun 2, Zhen 3, Xun 4, Qian 6, Dui 7, Gen 8, Li 9 — the "five yellow" 5 being substituted into one of the corner trigrams by convention. The value groups you into the East Four （東四命） or West Four （西四命） set, and each value carries four favourable directions (Stability 伏位, Prosperity 生氣, Longevity 延年, Heavenly Doctor 天醫) and four unfavourable ones (Mishap 禍害, Five Ghosts 五鬼, Six Killings 六煞, Total Loss 絕命).

The formula is arithmetic, but the year boundary is where tools go wrong: the year is the Lichun-rule year — the year flips at the exact Lichun instant (around February 4), not at January 1 or Chinese New Year. Every early-February birthday computed with the calendar year is wrong.

School differences

Two transmissions coexist for female Kua 5: substitute into Gen （寄艮） or into Kun （寄坤）. The engine implements the Gen convention as default and labels the substitution in its output rather than hiding it. The star assignments themselves are computed twice — by the Dayou-nian verse （大遊年歌） and by the six-line transformation （六爻變） — and the two independent paths agree on all 8 palaces; any future disagreement would be surfaced, not silently resolved.

How this engine computes it

• Formula: male (2000 − Lichun-year) mod 9, female (Lichun-year − 2000 + 6) mod 9; remainder 0 counts as 9. The result is asserted against the kernel on all 200 year pages before generation.
• The boundary instant comes from the solar engine (HKO-verified 1901–2100); the output prints the exact instant applied.
• Direction stars come from two classical methods cross-checked in-kernel (8/8 agreement), with the ruleset id and input_digest attached to every result.

Related entries

Xuan Kong Flying Star · 24 Mountains · Year Pillar (Lichun boundary) · Nine Stars

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