Meaning
偏印 is the stem that produces the day master and shares its polarity. Water produces wood, so for a 甲 day master it is 壬, yang water; for a 乙 day master 癸; for a 丙 day master, produced by wood, 甲.
No god collects more names. The 淵海子平 uses 偏印 only in its opening table, beside 倒食 and 梟神, and its essay calls the god 倒食, the overturned food, and explains the chain. 壬 controls 丙; 丙 is 甲's Eating God; the Eating God is what produces 甲's wealth. So a stem that supports the day master also overturns its food, and a chart that relies on its food or its wealth, the book says, should dread it. The same essay calls it 吞啗煞, the devouring killer.
The owl in 梟神 is old lore. The 說文 dictionary called the owl the unfilial bird, and a Han writer asked whether it really ate its mother; the tenth-century encyclopedia 太平御覽 collects both lines. A god that produces the day master yet devours the day master's own child earned the name.
The 三命通會 shows the other side of the same god. 甲, it says, prefers to be produced by 壬, still water that keeps dead wood sound, rather than by 癸, rain that rots it; so the "indirect" resource is not always the worse one. Modern English teaching reads unconventional knowledge, and our chart's one-line nature, labelled as ours, is "unconventional learning, intuition, solitude".
In a luck pillar
An Indirect Resource pillar has a stem that produces the day master in its own polarity. The tradition reads it as a decade of support of the unconventional kind. The 三命通會 says the seal wants a luck that strengthens it and not one that weakens it (「印欲運旺，不欲運衰」), and, from the other side, that the food dreads the owl's luck (「食欲運生，不欲運梟絕」). So a chart that leans on its Eating God is read with care in such a decade, and a chart that needs support is read the other way.
Which applies is a judgment of the chart's strength and needs, and EsoTerrier does not make it. Our chart names the pillar and gives its branch, hidden stems and relations with the natal pillars; what the decade holds for anyone is not something we state.
Indirect Resource for each day master
The producing element, in the same polarity.
| Day master | Indirect Resource |
|---|---|
| 甲 Jiǎ (yang wood) | 壬 Rén |
| 乙 Yǐ (yin wood) | 癸 Guǐ |
| 丙 Bǐng (yang fire) | 甲 Jiǎ |
| 丁 Dīng (yin fire) | 乙 Yǐ |
| 戊 Wù (yang earth) | 丙 Bǐng |
| 己 Jǐ (yin earth) | 丁 Dīng |
| 庚 Gēng (yang metal) | 戊 Wù |
| 辛 Xīn (yin metal) | 己 Jǐ |
| 壬 Rén (yang water) | 庚 Gēng |
| 癸 Guǐ (yin water) | 辛 Xīn |
In the classical texts
The 滴天髓's verse on 丁 says that "embracing 乙 it is filial" (「抱乙而孝」; the Wikisource text of one edition prints 考). 乙 is 丁's Indirect Resource, and the older commentary adds that 乙 is "not 丁's proper mother" (「乙非丁之嫡母」): the proper mother is 甲, its Direct Resource.
The 淵海子平's family table makes 偏印 the step-mother and the grandfather, and its opening table attaches harms to kin that we do not repeat. 任鐵樵 read both Resource gods simply as the parents (「生我者為父母」). All of it is history, labelled disputed, and never applied to a family.
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.
- Other classical names
- 倒食, the overturned food; 梟神, the owl spirit; 吞啗煞, the devouring killer, all in the 淵海子平 sourced
- Why "overturned food"
- For 甲, 壬 controls 丙, which is 甲's Eating God, so the food can no longer produce wealth sourced
- Why "owl"
- Old lore called the owl the unfilial bird, said to eat its mother; the 太平御覽 collects the lines sourced
- Family role in the 六親 table
- The step-mother and the grandfather; 任鐵樵 reads both Resource gods as the parents. Recorded as history disputed
- In the stem verses
- The 滴天髓 on 丁: embracing 乙 it is filial (「抱乙而孝」); 乙 is 丁's Indirect Resource, "not its proper mother" in the commentary sourced
- Other English names
- Indirect Seal, Owl, Unconventional Resource sourced
- Our one-line nature
- Unconventional learning, intuition, solitude our construction
How the schools read it
- *淵海子平* (Song material, Ming printing)
- Calls it the overturned food and warns that a chart which uses its food or its wealth should dread it.
- *三命通會* (Ming)
- Shows its other side: 甲 prefers to be produced by 壬, still water that keeps wood, rather than by 癸, rain that rots it.
- 任鐵樵 on the *滴天髓* (Qing)
- Reads both Resource gods as the parents, setting aside the step-mother reading.
- Modern English teaching
- Unconventional knowledge; the step-mother in older readings.
- EsoTerrier
- Our chart's line, a modern reading of our own: unconventional learning, intuition, solitude.
Claims about it
-
Indirect Resource is the Resource stem of the opposite polarity.
falseWhat the record shows: The classical rule puts it on the same polarity as the day master; English Wikipedia's table has this pair reversed.
-
The owl spirit harms the children of whoever has it.
told as loreWhat the record shows: A pronouncement of the 淵海子平's table, in the idiom of its age, recorded as history and never applied to a person.
-
Indirect Resource is a fixed personality type.
unverifiedWhat the record shows: A modern branded profile, not the tradition; the texts read a relation between stems.
