Your Day Master is the heavenly stem of your day pillar (see what the Day Master is). If yours is 癸, you are a Yin Water Day Master. Not sure? The free calculator shows it at the top of your chart.
| Stem | 癸 Gui |
|---|---|
| Element · polarity | Water · Yin |
| Sibling stem | 壬 Ren Water (yang) |
| Strongest season | winter (亥 子 months) |
| Birth · Peak · Tomb | 卯 · 亥 · 未 (twelve life stages) |
| Combines with | 戊 — the pair is said to transform into fire (combinations) |
| Clashed by | 丁 |
The classical verse
The Di Tian Sui (滴天髓), the most quoted text on the ten stems, gives 癸 a verse of eight four-character lines:
癸水至弱，達於天津，龍德而運，功化斯神，不畏火土，不論庚辛，合戊見火，火根乃真。“Gui water is the weakest, yet it reaches the ford of Heaven. Moving with the virtue of the dragon, its work of transformation is wondrous. It does not fear fire or earth and pays no regard to Geng or Xin. When it combines with Wu and sees fire, the fire must truly have roots.”— Di Tian Sui (Drops from Heaven’s Marrow) 《滴天髓》, 天干論. Original text: Wikisource · also on ctext.org (different edition). Translation: bazimethod.
Reading the verse line by line
“The weakest, yet it reaches the ford of Heaven.” Gui is pure yin, the extreme of the yin stems — the Di Tian Sui’s opening chapter says “Gui is the extreme” of the five yin stems. Yet as rain and mist it rises to the sky, and it moves through the whole chart:
凡柱中有甲乙寅卯，皆能運用水氣，生木製火，潤土養金“Wherever the pillars have Jia, Yi, Yin or Mao, it can make use of water’s qi: it grows wood, controls fire, moistens earth and nourishes metal.”— Di Tian Sui (Drops from Heaven’s Marrow) 《滴天髓》, 天干論. Original text: Wikisource · also on ctext.org (different edition). Translation: bazimethod.
“Does not fear fire or earth; pays no regard to Geng or Xin.” Gui can be present among a lot of fire and earth without being destroyed, and it does not depend on metal (its resource) for life, nor suffer from too much of it.
“When it combines with Wu and sees fire.” 戊 and 癸 combine (戊癸合), said to transform into fire. The commentary insists that this only truly happens if the fire has real roots in the chart:
惟合戊化火，必通火根，乃為真也“Only when combining with Wu to transform into fire must it connect to fire roots for the transformation to be true.”— Di Tian Sui (Drops from Heaven’s Marrow) 《滴天髓》, 天干論. Original text: Wikisource · also on ctext.org (different edition). Translation: bazimethod.
Gui in the four seasons
- Spring: wood drains it; metal support is welcome.
- Summer: water is weakest; metal and water roots matter.
- Autumn: metal feeds it; usually comfortable.
- Winter: in season, can become cold and heavy; fire and earth balance it.
The ten gods for a 癸 Day Master
Every other stem in your chart takes a role relative to 癸. This is the ten gods table worked out for Gui Water; hidden stems inside the branches (see hidden stems) use the same table.
| Stem | Element | Ten god | English |
|---|---|---|---|
| 甲 Jia | Yang Wood | 伤官 | Hurting Officer |
| 乙 Yi | Yin Wood | 食神 | Eating God |
| 丙 Bing | Yang Fire | 正财 | Direct Wealth |
| 丁 Ding | Yin Fire | 偏财 | Indirect Wealth |
| 戊 Wu | Yang Earth | 正官 | Direct Officer |
| 己 Ji | Yin Earth | 七杀 | Seven Killings |
| 庚 Geng | Yang Metal | 正印 | Direct Resource |
| 辛 Xin | Yin Metal | 偏印 | Indirect Resource |
| 壬 Ren | Yang Water | 劫财 | Rob Wealth |
| 癸 Gui | Yin Water | 比肩 | Companion |
Strong or weak?
Whether a 癸 Day Master is strong or weak depends on the whole chart, above all the month branch. Gui peaks in 亥 and, in the yin-backward table, is born in 卯. Water roots and metal strengthen it; wood, fire and earth weaken it. Because the verse calls it the weakest stem, practitioners take particular care judging whether a Gui chart might “follow” the dominant element instead. The general method is on the Day Master and useful god pages.
A word on personality descriptions
Many websites give each Day Master a fixed personality. The classical texts do not work that way: the verse above describes how 癸 behaves in different seasons and next to other elements, and the same 癸 reads very differently in a summer chart and a winter chart. We give the traditional images as tradition, for cultural study, not as a description of any real person.
All ten Day Masters
甲 Jia Wood · 乙 Yi Wood · 丙 Bing Fire · 丁 Ding Fire · 戊 Wu Earth · 己 Ji Earth · 庚 Geng Metal · 辛 Xin Metal · 壬 Ren Water · 癸 Gui Water
Calculate your chart to find your Day Master, its strength factors and your luck pillars.
Keep learning
More in Day Masters, plus core guides — or go back to the Bazi calculator home page.
Classical quotations are copied from the public-domain texts on Wikisource; links let you check every line. English translations are our own. Traditional Bazi statements are reported as tradition, not as fact.