Meaning
Eight White Earth is the north-east palace, the place of the 艮 trigram, the mountain. The Shuogua closes its circuit of the year here: "成言乎艮", things are completed in 艮, the trigram in which all things come to their end and make their beginning, on the turn from winter to spring. The trigram's family role is the youngest son.
Japanese practitioners read a person whose year star is 八白 as honest, hard-working and persevering, someone who builds by accumulation; some add that the type flourishes after forty. Our own text calls it the mountain: steady, self-reliant and quietly determined, slow to change course, someone who accumulates and keeps and holds the family together, with obstinacy, isolation and hoarding as the shadow side. The Kushi line calls the number 8 Soil and gives it late winter, the hour before dawn and the themes of change and renewal.
The two ideas fit the palace. A mountain is the image of stillness, yet the north-east is where the old year ends and the new one starts; the tradition's house reading for the palace keeps both, a pause and a turn.
On the boards
八白 is the star of the solar years 1983, 1992, 2001, 2010 and 2019, each from 立春. In an 八白 year the first solar month has the star 二黒, so an 八白 person born in the 巳 month, from 立夏 in early May to 芒種 in early June, has 八白 as their month star too, and the inclination falls on the centre.
With any other month star in the centre, an 八白 year star lands in 震宮 (month star 1), 坤宮 (2), 坎宮 (3), 離宮 (4), 艮宮 (5), 兌宮 (6), 乾宮 (7) or 巽宮 (9).
The north-east palace is the eighth house of the nine-step rhythm, which the tradition reads as the change phase, a time to pause and turn: what to keep and what to leave. The tradition counts a direction auspicious for an 八白 person where 九紫 stands, the Fire that generates Earth (生気); where 二黒 stands, the one other Earth star that counts (比和; 五黄 never does); or where 六白 or 七赤 stands, the Metal that Earth generates (退気). We show these with their names as the tradition's readings and advise no journey or move.
The trigram's classical correspondences
The Shuogua's lists for 艮:
- Family member: the youngest son (少男).
- Part of the body: the hands (艮為手).
- Image: the mountain (艮為山); Legge's translation adds a by-path, small stones, a gate and the fruit of trees among its images.
- Polarity of the trigram: yang, as one of the three sons.
These are the trigram's symbols in a classical text, given as such. They are not statements about anyone's body, and the star itself has no yin or yang in any source we found.
Names
The Japanese name reads happaku dosei: 八 eight, 白 white, 土 earth, 星 star. The Traditional Chinese form is the same; Chinese feng shui also calls it 八白左輔星, after 左輔, one of the two helper stars that later lists add to the seven of the Northern Dipper to make nine. The trigram is read Gon in Japanese and Gèn in Chinese; Zheng Xuan's commentary sends the spirit Taiyi from 兌 to 艮, the eighth step of its round. Its doubled form is hexagram 52 of the I Ching.
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.
- Place in the Later Heaven circuit
- The north-east, where the Shuogua says all things come to their end and make their beginning: the turn from winter to spring sourced
- The Kushi line's season and hour
- Late winter and the hour before dawn, under the name 8 Soil; a modern Western reading sourced
- Character taught in Japan
- Honest, hard-working, a striver; said to flourish after forty sourced
- Chinese Dipper name
- 左輔, the left-hand helper of the Northern Dipper; a name only here sourced
- Our one-line image
- The mountain our construction
- Our reading of its house
- The change phase, read as a time to pause and turn: what to keep and what to leave our construction
- Yin or yang of the star itself
- No source gives one; the 艮 trigram is the youngest son and yang disputed
How the schools read it
- Japanese 気学
- Honest, hard-working and persevering; builds by accumulation and holds on to what has been built.
- The Kushi line
- "8 Soil": late winter and the hour before dawn, change and renewal.
- Chinese feng shui (Xuan Kong)
- Names the number 八白左輔星 and reads it for the sectors of a building over time; that reading is not about people and is not shown here.
- Eight Mansions feng shui
- A Kua number of 8 is the 艮 life trigram; women whose formula gives 5 are also given 8. A different number from the year star.
- EsoTerrier
- The mountain: steady, self-reliant and quietly determined, slow to change course, someone who keeps and holds the family together, with obstinacy, isolation and hoarding as the shadow side.
Claims about it
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The Chinese flying-star reading of 八白 describes the people born under it.
disputedWhat the record shows: In Xuan Kong feng shui that reading belongs to the number when it flies into a sector of a building for a period. We show only the Chinese name, and never apply a period reading to a person.
-
Eight White Earth rules a part of the body.
unverifiedWhat the record shows: The Shuogua gives the 艮 trigram a part of the body as a symbol. We give it only in the trigram's block.
-
八白 has a fixed yin or yang of its own.
unverifiedWhat the record shows: No Japanese source gives one. The Shuogua makes its trigram, 艮, a yang trigram, as the youngest son.
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Eight White Earth is a star in the sky.
falseWhat the record shows: It is the number 8 of the Lo Shu with its colour and phase; "star" is a counting name.
