Meaning
The 滴天髓 gives each stem a verse of eight short lines. For 丁 it reads, in the 輯要 text:
丁火柔中，內性昭融，抱乙而考，合壬而忠，旺而不烈，衰而不窮，如有嫡母，可秋可冬。
In our translation: Dīng fire is soft and centred, its inner nature bright and warm. Embracing 乙 it is filial; combining with 壬 it is loyal. Strong, it is not fierce; weak, it is not exhausted. With a proper mother beside it, it does well in autumn and in winter.
Its filial care is for 乙, which it shelters from 辛; its loyalty is to 壬, its partner in combination, which it protects from 戊. The "proper mother" is 甲, the yang wood that feeds it. The Wikisource text of the 輯要 prints 考 where 任鐵樵's edition has 孝, filial, and the commentary beside it confirms the second reading.
The 三命通會 sets 丁 among the stars in heaven and as the lamp on earth: "living fire" (活火), soft fire that lives on 乙 as a lamp lives on oil, bright when night falls (酉) and outshone at dawn (寅). Its sky image is the stars. The 窮通寶鑑 pictures the 丁 of the first month facing a strong 甲 mother: without 庚 to split the wood, the flame cannot be drawn from it.
Our chart calls 丁 a candle flame: focused, perceptive, devoted and thoughtful, with intensity and overthinking as its cost. That is EsoTerrier's modern image, not the classical meaning; the texts' stars and lamp stand beside it, each labelled.
In a chart
A 丁 day master has roots wherever 丁 is hidden in a branch: 午 Wǔ (main qi), 未 Wèi (residual qi), 戌 Xū (middle qi). Its 祿, the branch where its qi comes into office (臨官), is 午. In the Ziping rule only the yang stems have a blade, though the 三命通會 reports an older rule that gave 丁 one in 未. It is born (長生) in 酉 and, as a yin stem, runs the twelve stages backward from there, the rule every tool prints and the classics dispute; the stages are phases of its qi.
It combines with 壬 Rén (天干五合), a pair the 三命通會 calls 淫慝之合 (the improper match), leaning to Wood; it clashes with 癸 Guǐ. Its own phase is strongest in summer.
To a 丁 day master the ten stems are: 甲 Direct Resource (正印); 乙 Indirect Resource (偏印); 丙 Rob Wealth (劫財); 丁 Friend (比肩); 戊 Hurting Officer (傷官); 己 Eating God (食神); 庚 Direct Wealth (正財); 辛 Indirect Wealth (偏財); 壬 Direct Officer (正官); 癸 Seven Killings (七殺). A second 丁 elsewhere in the chart is a Friend; the day stem itself is the Day Master and is not one of the Ten Gods.
What this page leaves out
The classical chapters on 丁 also say, in the idiom of their age, what such a chart means for rank, kin, marriage and fortune. We record that they do and repeat none of it. Nor do we say whether a 丁 day master is strong or weak, or which useful god it needs: the tradition weighs both, and EsoTerrier computes neither.
Correspondences
Each item with how it stands: “sourced” is in the work cited, “our construction” is EsoTerrier’s own, and “disputed” means the sources disagree.
- Opening of the 滴天髓 verse
- 「丁火柔中」 sourced
- Sky image, 三命通會
- The stars (星) sourced
- In heaven and on earth, 三命通會
- In heaven the stars, on earth the lamp (在天為列星，在地為燈火) sourced
- The first month, 窮通寶鑑
- In the first month 丁 faces a strong 甲 mother; without 庚 to split the wood the flame cannot be drawn (正月丁火) sourced
- Combination, 三命通會
- With 壬: 淫慝之合 (the improper match) sourced
- Nobleman star (天乙貴人)
- 亥 and 酉; a symbolic star we do not chart yet sourced
- Academic star (文昌)
- 酉; a symbolic star we do not chart yet sourced
- Blade under an older rule
- 未, a rule the 三命通會 reports and the Ziping method drops disputed
- Our image, traits and challenge
- Candle flame: focused, perceptive, devoted and thoughtful; its challenge: intensity, and overthinking our construction
- Candle flame as the classical meaning
- A modern image; the classics give the ones above disputed
- First meaning of the character
- Uncertain; the stems are first attested as day names of the Shang week disputed
How the schools read it
- 滴天髓, the verse
- Gentle, centred fire: filial to 乙, loyal to 壬, lasting through autumn and winter with 甲 beside it. Attributed to 京圖 of the Song or to Liu Bowen; one edition study dates the text mid-Ming or later.
- 任鐵樵, 滴天髓闡微 (after 1820)
- Reads 抱乙而孝, "embracing 乙 it is filial", where the Wikisource 輯要 has the slip 考.
- 三命通會 (Ming)
- The stars and the lamp; living fire that burns on 乙 as on oil.
- 窮通寶鑑 (Qing)
- A flame that needs 庚 to split the 甲 wood that feeds it.
- Modern English teaching
- The one-word image, a candle flame, a simplification of the classical images.
- EsoTerrier
- Shows a candle flame as its own image, labelled, beside the texts.
Claims about it
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"Candle flame" is the traditional meaning of 丁.
disputedWhat the record shows: It is a modern teaching image, and ours on the chart. The 三命通會 gives the stars and the lamp; the 滴天髓 gives a temper rather than an object.
-
The day stem is itself a Ten God, the Friend (比肩).
falseWhat the record shows: A 丁 in another pillar is a Friend to a 丁 day master; the day stem itself is the reference point, labelled Day Master (日主) by every tool we surveyed.
-
丁 runs the twelve stages backward, born (長生) in 酉.
disputedWhat the record shows: The 三命通會 says so and every tool prints it. The 滴天髓's older commentary already questions it, and 任鐵樵 rejects separate yin stages. We print the backward rule and label it.
-
A 丁 day master can be scored strong or weak, and its useful god computed.
disputedWhat the record shows: The classics ground the useful god in at least four different ways. EsoTerrier computes neither the strength nor the useful god.
-
The classical chapters on 丁 tell a person's rank, marriage and length of life.
told as loreWhat the record shows: The texts do make such pronouncements, in the idiom of their age. We take only their images and the logic of the phases.
Elsewhere on EsoTerrier
- Bǐng 丙, yang Fire the other Fire stem; to a 丁 day master, Rob Wealth
- Rén 壬, yang Water combines with 丁; to a 丁 day master, Direct Officer
- Guǐ 癸, yin Water clashes with 丁; to a 丁 day master, Seven Killings
- Friend 比肩 what a second 丁 in the chart is to a 丁 day master
- Direct Officer 正官 what 壬, its partner in combination, is to a 丁 day master
