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The North/South Debate

FENG SHUI FUNDAMENTALS

"Therefore: Heaven creates divine things; the holy sage takes them as models. Heaven and earth change and transform; the holy sage imitates them. In the heaven hangs images that reveal good fortune and misfortune; the holy sage reproduces these. The Yellow River brought forth a map and the Lo River brought forth a writing; the holy men took these as models."

Ta Chuan¹

Feng Shui has been developed over thousands of years. It is an amalgamation of different techniques developed during many dynasties and in different parts of China². It will be useful to isolate some of the influences.

1. Yin Yang

This is such a core belief that it seems rather obvious to mention it. It is however, important to note that it is a separate concept in its own right.

2. Wu Xia

This is the cycle of five elements that forms such an important part of Chinese philosophy. Everything can be described in terms of these elements.

3. Ba Gua

The sage Fu Hsi found the prototype of the Ba Gua inscribed on the back of a horse that emerged from the river Ho. From this he created the trigrams and what we have come to know as the Earlier Heaven Sequence. History accredits King Wen and his son, the Duke of Chou with the development of the earliest commentaries on the meaning of the hexagrams as well as the development of the Later Heaven Sequence. The Earlier Heaven Sequence arranges the eight trigrams as opposites that are said to reflect the divine structure of the Universe. For instance, the trigram Chien, 'Heaven' is placed in the position of south, opposite the trigram Kun, 'Earth' in the north. This mirrors Chinese cosmology. The Later Heaven sequence is said to represent the energies on Earth. The trigrams are arranged to represent the cycles of life and death, the seasons, and night and day.

4. I Ching

The I Ching is a book that explores the meaning behind each of the sixty-four hexagrams created from the eight fundamental trigrams. It is of central importance to Chinese philosophy.

5. The Lo Shu

The Lo Shu diagram was discovered on the back of tortoise that came out of the river Lo. It is a magic square where all the squares add up to 15. It forms the basis of Chinese magical numerology. It has also been assigned directions with 1 being assigned to north and 9 to south, and so on.

6. The Shih Pan

This was an instrument used to read the heavens. It took as its axis the Celestial North Pole. The constellation of the 'Northern Ladle', Bei Dou, acted as a pointer to indicate the Lunar month. The four heavenly animals, the Black Tortoise, Crimson Phoenix, White Tiger and Azure Dragon are
divisions of the ecliptic³.

7. The compass

The Chinese invented the compass. Legend tells us that the Emperor Huang-Ti was fighting a bandit king with magical powers. The bandit had caused a fog to appear and Huang-Ti's army became lost. The Lady of the Nine Heavens appeared to Huang-Ti and revealed to him the secret of the compass. He was able to use this to lead his army and defeat the bandit king⁴.

8. The Stems and Branches

Based on the Wu Xia, each combination has its own characteristic energy. These combinations are assigned an hour, day, month and year and have a powerful effect on the timing of events in Feng Shui.

9. The Lo P'an

This is the Feng Shui compass. It is an adaptation of the Shih Pan that incorporates the Lo Shu diagram, the Later Heaven Ba Gua as well as many other rings of information, including the 24 Mountain stars, the 64 Hexagrams, the 60 Stems and Branches, the 12 Water Dragons and so on. The earliest type was a Shih Pan with a lodestone spoon placed at the centre. The lodestone would point along the north/south axis. There are now many types of Lo P'an, some specific to certain Schools and Masters.