Classical Feng Shui

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stem branch), which is linked to different Stems for the days. For the current year, 2016, the heaven stem of the year is Bing.

In a Bing year, a Yearly Virtuous Day is any day with a heaven stem of Bing.

The following year, 2017, is a Ding year, and its Yearly Virtuous Days fall on days with a heaven stem of Ren, and so on.

The same principles apply when identifying Virtuous Consort Days. Referring to Table 1, again taking 2016 as an example where the heaven stem of the year is Bing, you will see that any day with the heaven sten Xin is a Yearly Virtuous Consort Day.

There is another shortcut to selecting auspicious dates, known as the Grandmaster Dong method (Dong Gong Ze Re). Grandmaster Dong was a renowned Ming dynasty astrologer (and author).

His methodology accurately predicted the stars (or auspicious shen) for the different months of the year. Even today, his system is widely used, either on its own, or in conjunction with other renowned date selection methods.

For many people the Chinese method of date selection can be summed up in one single calendar. Known simply as the Chinese calendar, it is based on astronomical and seasonal factors.

The calendar begins from one winter solstice to the next, a time of measurement known as a Chinese Solar year, which consists of four seasons.

The first season is Spring, which starts on or around Feb 4 (according to conventional Western calendars) each year. Every season is sub divided into 6 sub-seasons.

In Spring, these sub-seasons are known as Start of Spring, Rain Water, Insects Awaken, Vernal Equinox, Pure Brightness and Grain Rice.

Two of the sub-seasons make a month. For example, the first month includes Star of Spring and Rain Water. The second month includes Insects Awaken and Vernal Equinox while the third month includes Pure Brightness and Grain Rice.

In the Grandmaster Dong method, there are days in each month that are highly auspicious, which he called Superior Days. Each has a particular stem branch combination.

During the sub-seasons of Star of Spring and Rain Water, all days with the Jia Wu, Bing Wu, Wu Wu, Geng Wu, Ren Wu, Wu Zi, Bing Zi and Geng Zi stem branch pairs are Superior Days.

In the second and subsequent months, there are other stem branch combination days that are superior.

Henry Fong is an electronic engineer by qualification and he approaches feng shui with the same analytical and investigative approach he uses in his training. Readers can write to him at lifestyle.henryfong@thesundaily. com.