Earth: the center, four branches, Yang and Yin

Wood east, Fire south, Metal west, Water north: where does Earth go?

Wood sits in the east, Fire in the south, Metal in the west and Water in the north, one direction each. Where does Earth go? The Sanming Tonghui (三命通会), a Ming-era compendium, gives an unusual answer: the center, and it "lodges at the four corners".

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Position sketch: the twelve branches run around a ring and the colored ones are the four that this site's element table gives to Earth; the grouping follows how the Sanming Tonghui separates Dragon-Goat from Dog-Ox.

The picture sets the twelve branches on a ring and colors the four that belong to Earth: Dragon (辰) and Goat (未) in brown, Dog (戌) and Ox (丑) in green. The book has a reason for that grouping, given below. The stems of Earth are Yang Earth (戊) and Yin Earth (己).

Earth rules the center and also holds the southwest, answering to the long summer. The word earth means to disgorge: it holds and gives out the ten thousand things, letting what is about to be born come out and what is about to die return, the home of all things. So it grows at the end of summer, generated by Fire. When Earth overcomes Water, Water in turn rebels against Earth: such is the natural meaning.

The word "disgorge" (吐) is the key. Earth holds all things and also gives them out: what is about to be born comes out of it and what is about to die goes back into it, so it is called the home of all things. "Grows at the end of summer, generated by Fire" gives its season: the Earth of late summer is what Fire produced. The last sentence leaves a second move in reserve: if Earth overpowers Water, Water turns round and washes Earth away. The book also gives Earth a number. Water is one, Fire two, Wood three, Metal four, and Earth five; the others have a completed number, but of Earth the book says it "does not wait for ten to be complete" and stays at five.

Everything relies on it

The book quotes Master Zhu (Zhu Xi) for the fullest statement of where Earth stands among the elements:

Earth is where Water and Fire lodge and where Metal and Wood draw their supplies; it sits in the center and steadies the four directions, one body carrying ten thousand kinds.

Water and Fire lodge in Earth, Metal and Wood take their supplies from it, and in the center it steadies the four sides while carrying every kind of thing. The chapter "On the Five Elements" breaks this into four sentences, one for each of the other elements:

"Lodging at the four corners" can be counted directly in this site's hidden-stem table: eight of the twelve branches hide Yang Earth or Yin Earth (Ox, Tiger, Dragon, Snake, Horse, Goat, Monkey, Dog), and only the Rat, Rabbit, Rooster and Pig do not. So counting Earth cannot stop at the four Earth branches.

Dragon, Goat, Dog, Ox: four Earth branches, one element named in each

In the chapter "On the Five Elements" the book names what each of the four hides: the Dragon holds Water, the Goat holds Wood, the Dog holds Fire and the Ox holds Metal. This site's hidden-stem table is fuller, with three stems per branch.

Check the table and the element the book names is found in the engine's three stems for every branch: Water of the Dragon, Wood of the Goat, Fire of the Dog, Metal of the Ox. The last column belongs to another table: in the twelve-stage table each of these four branches is the Storage of several stems. The book also calls them "treasuries" and the Dog "the storehouse of the great furnace". How the stage table runs is set out in the full twelve-stage table.

Earth of spring and summer, Earth of autumn and winter

The book does not keep the four branches together. The Sanming Tonghui splits them by season into two groups:

Both groups are justified by the element hidden inside: the Water in the Dragon and the Wood in the Goat nourish things, while the Fire in the Dog and the Metal in the Ox become the harsh forces of autumn and winter. Elsewhere the same book gives another split: of the four, Dragon and Dog are yang, Ox and Goat are yin. The two splits cross: the Dragon is yang and belongs to spring-summer, the Dog is yang and belongs to autumn-winter, the Goat is yin and spring-summer, the Ox is yin and autumn-winter, so each branch in the picture above falls in its own cell.

Yang Earth is a city wall, Yin Earth is farmland

Of the ten stems two are Earth. The book's chapter on the ten stems writes Yang Earth (戊) as "in the sky mist, on the earth mountain", called yang earth, fierce and hard to offend, "its image is a city wall". It writes Yin Earth (己) as the primal qi of heaven and the true earth, called yin earth, "its image is farmland", and likens it to a matchmaker between heaven and earth: without it yin and yang cannot be paired.

The five stage rows will look familiar: Yang Earth sits exactly where Yang Fire does, and Yin Earth exactly where Yin Fire does. The book gives its reasons. Yang Earth likes Yang Fire to generate it and Yin Earth likes Yin Fire, and elsewhere it says "Earth has no qi of its own and lives by Fire". So in this site's twelve-stage table Earth follows Fire: Yang Earth with Yang Fire and Yin Earth with Yin Fire.

The four lines of Earth

Back to the start. Earth has four lines: Fire generates Earth, Earth generates Metal, Earth controls Water and Wood controls Earth. The book quotes Xu Dasheng with one sentence for each:

In the same place the book has a sentence for each element on "what to do with the strong": a strong element is drained by the next element it generates. For Earth it reads "strong Earth needs Metal to check its harm": when Earth is too strong, call on the Metal it generates. Put side by side, these sentences give a remedy of borrowing strength, not of adding pressure.

When you meet the word Earth, ask three things

1. 1

   First tell Yang Earth from Yin Earth

   The two Earth stems have different images, wall and farmland, and different starting points in the twelve-stage table: Tiger for one and Rooster for the other.

2. 2

   Then identify which of the four branches

   Dragon and Goat are spring-summer Earth, Dog and Ox autumn-winter Earth; by the other split Dragon and Dog are yang, Ox and Goat yin. Know which one it is before talking about the element it hides.

3. 3

   Finally check the hidden stems

   Eight of the twelve branches hide Yang Earth or Yin Earth, so Earth need not appear in the four Earth branches at all. For the division of labor among main qi, hidden stems and month command, see how hidden stems unfold.

The element before Earth is Fire and the one after is Metal; for the effect of the seasons on strength, see month command and element strength.