Meaning
The 全書's dialogue on the stars opens with this one:
紫微屬土，乃中天之尊星為帝座，主掌造化樞機，人生主宰。
In our translation: Zi Wei belongs to earth. It is the honoured star of the middle sky, the imperial seat, holding the pivot of creation and presiding over a human life.
Almost everything else the text says about it concerns company. The song that follows the dialogue puts it in ten characters, 「有相為有用，無相為孤君」: with ministers it is of use, without them it is a lonely sovereign. Tian Fu, Tian Xiang and the Left and Right Aides are its court; with them, the dialogue says, it brings blessing to every palace and can subdue the Fire and Bell stars and turn Qi Sha into authority. Without them it is a fine jade that is not enough on its own.
The 形性賦, the text's verse on form and nature, gives it 「厚重之容」, a weighty, dignified look. Like every line of that verse it is a sketch of a type in the manner of its time, and never a reading of anyone's body.
Our chart's short name for it is the Emperor, and our gloss reads: leadership, dignity and self-direction; thrives with capable support. That is EsoTerrier's wording, not a translation; it keeps the shape of the text, a figure that leads and needs others.
The name
紫微 is the name of the enclosure of stars round the celestial pole in Chinese astronomy, 紫微垣, and of the deity enthroned there. The system takes its name from it, and the 太微賦 says the star "governs the image of the whole celestial sphere". On the board, though, Zi Wei is a symbol placed by counting; no star of the sky is looked up. The flower 紫薇 is a different word.
On the board
Zi Wei is placed by the borrowed-days rule from the lunar day and the bureau, as the 全書's five thirty-day diagrams lay it out, and every other major star is counted from it: Tian Ji, the Sun, Wu Qu, Tian Tong and Lian Zhen backward, and Tian Fu as its mirror across the 寅–申 axis, from which the second series runs forward.
It shares a palace with Po Jun in 丑 or 未, Tian Fu in 寅 or 申, Tan Lang in 卯 or 酉, Tian Xiang in 辰 or 戌 and Qi Sha in 巳 or 亥, and stands alone in 子 and 午, where Tan Lang faces it. By the seven-level table it is brilliant (廟) in 丑, 午 and 未, strong in six branches, gaining in 辰 and 戌 and neutral in 子: weak or fallen nowhere. In the common table it takes 化科 in a 乙 year and 化權 in a 壬 year.
What this page leaves out
The 全書 also says, in the idiom of its age, what this star means for rank and office, for a person's kin and children, and for how a life turns out. We record that it does and repeat none of it.
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.
- 諸星問答論, the opening line
- 「紫微屬土，乃中天之尊星為帝座，主掌造化樞機，人生主宰。」 Zi Wei belongs to earth: the honoured star of the middle sky, the imperial seat, holding the pivot of creation and presiding over a human life sourced
- 形性賦, form and nature
- 「紫微帝座，生為厚重之容」 Zi Wei, the imperial seat, gives a weighty, dignified look; a sketch of a type, never a reading of anyone's body sourced
- The name in the sky
- 紫微垣, the enclosure of stars round the celestial pole, drawn on the Dunhuang atlas (Figure 2 on the system page); the name of a region, not of one star, and the chart observes none of it sourced
- Dipper by series
- Listed as a Northern Dipper star on some practitioner pages because it heads the Zi Wei series; the 全書 seats it in the middle sky disputed
- English names elsewhere
- Emperor Star (English Wikipedia); emperor (iztro); "Purple Star" on some sites, which we avoid because it is also a name of the system sourced
- Our short name and gloss
- Emperor: Leadership, dignity and self-direction; thrives with capable support. our construction
How the schools read it
- 紫微斗數全書, 諸星問答論
- The honoured star that "brings blessing to every palace" (諸宮降福) and can subdue the Fire and Bell stars; with Tian Fu, Tian Xiang and the two Aides it is a ruler with a court, without them "a lonely sovereign" (孤君).
- 紫微斗數全書, 形性賦
- A weighty, dignified look (厚重之容): the verse's sketch of a type, never a reading of anyone's body.
- 紫微斗數全書, the lines under 玉蟾先生
- Gives it a whole court: the two Aides as ministers, Tian Xiang and the two literary stars as attendants, Tian Kui and Tian Yue as messengers, the Sun and Moon as officers (以左輔右弼為相 ... 以日月為分司).
- Three-harmony practice (三合派)
- Reads it with the stars of its triad and opposite (三方四正) before any judgement, and asks first whether it has its court.
- English teaching
- Calls it the Emperor or the Emperor Star; a few sites call it the "Purple Star".
- EsoTerrier
- Short name Emperor; our gloss keeps the text's shape, a figure that leads and needs support. No reading of rank or outcome.
Claims about it
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Zi Wei is the pole star, and the chart is fixed on it.
falseWhat the record shows: The name is borrowed from the 紫微 enclosure round the pole; the 全書 calls the star the honoured star of the middle sky and places it by arithmetic on the lunar day and the bureau. Nothing in the method looks at the sky.
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Zi Wei means "purple myrtle", a flower that stands for the delicacy of fate.
unverifiedWhat the record shows: 紫微 is the name of the pole enclosure and of its deity; the crape myrtle is 紫薇, a different character.
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The Zi Wei series are the Northern Dipper stars.
falseWhat the record shows: The two series are a placement grouping, by the star each is counted from. The 全書 seats 紫微 in the middle sky, and puts 天機 and 天同 of the same series in the Southern Dipper.
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The text's lines on Zi Wei foretell rank, office and the fate of children.
unverifiedWhat the record shows: The 全書 does speak in that register, in the idiom of its age. We take its images.
