What is White Tiger in Liu Yao and how is it judged?

What is White Tiger in Liu Yao?

White Tiger is one of the six beasts of Liu Yao, six spirits placed on the six lines of a hexagram to add a layer of qualitative meaning alongside the layers of the five elements and the six relations. The six beasts are Green Dragon, Chu Tuoc, Cau Tran, Dang Xa, White Tiger and Huyen Vu. They are not the six relations (Parents, Siblings, Offspring, Wife/Wealth, Officials) and they are not the earthly branches of the line either, but a third layer of information stacked on top of the other two.

One point to grasp from the start: in Liu Yao, generation, overcoming, clash and combination are the work of the earthly branches on the lines; the six beasts do not take part in those relations, they only add a shade of meaning to the line they occupy. The book Tăng san Bốc Dịch by Elder Dã Hạc (Qing dynasty, expanded by Lý Văn Huy) calls the six beasts auxiliary spirits: a fortunate hexagram meeting Green Dragon becomes more fortunate, an inauspicious hexagram meeting White Tiger becomes more inauspicious. That is the convention this article follows.

How is White Tiger placed?

White Tiger is placed according to the stem of the day of the divination, not the stem of the year, month or hour. The rule for placing the six beasts, recorded in the chapter "Lục thần" of Tăng san Bốc Dịch, is summed up in the verse: Giáp and Ất start with Green Dragon, Bính and Đinh start with Chu Tuoc, a Mậu day starts with Cau Tran, a Kỷ day starts with Dang Xa, Canh and Tân start with White Tiger, Nhâm and Quý start with Huyen Vu. That is, on a Giáp day or an Ất day the first line (line 1) is Green Dragon, and the rest follow a fixed order up the lines; on a Canh day or a Tân day the first line is White Tiger, and the lines above continue around the cycle.

Tăng san Bốc Dịch sets out a full table of six columns for the six groups of day stems, so that students can quickly look up the position of each beast. The table below summarises exactly that order, read from the first line up to the top line:

Looking at the table, one thing is easily missed: White Tiger is not fixed on any line. It runs around the six lines depending on the day stem. So one cannot say "White Tiger is line X" as a general rule, but must look it up according to the exact stem of the day of divination.

The meaning of White Tiger according to Tăng san Bốc Dịch

In the chapter "Lục thần", Tăng san Bốc Dịch quotes old books in order to criticise the mechanical use of the six beasts. The book Thiên Nguyên Phú says that when the self is strong and Green Dragon holds the line there is much good; the book Toái Kim Phú says that when the dragon moves the house has joy, when the tiger moves the house has mourning; the book Bốc Phệ Nguyên Quy says that Dang Xa and White Tiger govern sorrow for elders. The author of Tăng san Bốc Dịch does not accept the reading "whenever you see White Tiger, predict death". The book affirms that the six beasts are auxiliary spirits: a hexagram that is already fortunate becomes more fortunate with Green Dragon, a hexagram that is already inauspicious becomes more inauspicious with White Tiger. White Tiger does not create fortune or misfortune by itself.

The book accepts only one line from Thiên Kim Phú: when the tiger rises but meets a fortunate spirit it does not harm the good, when the dragon moves but meets an inauspicious star it is hard to cover the bad. The book adds that Huyen Vu governs theft and Chu Tuoc governs quarrels, and both prove true, and that when examining houses and graves one cannot do without the six beasts.

Tăng san Bốc Dịch tells an example to illustrate: on a Mậu Tý day a hexagram was cast about childbirth, giving the hexagram Sơn Địa Bác changing to Phong Địa Quan. The self line was Offspring, and was held by Green Dragon. Read mechanically, the six beasts would make this a joyful event. But that Offspring line transformed into an Officials line in the palace of extinction, and the recorded outcome is that the child died the very day it was born. The author uses this case to prove: Green Dragon cannot save the inauspiciousness of the five elements, and White Tiger does not create inauspiciousness by itself either.

Is White Tiger a spirit that announces mourning?

According to Tăng san Bốc Dịch, one should not rigidly assign White Tiger to mourning. The book cites a second case: on a Giáp Thìn day, in the month of Thân, a hexagram was cast asking about the illness of an elder brother, giving the hexagram Thủy Lôi Truân changing to Thuần Chấn. In the hexagram, the Siblings line Tý Thủy is the useful spirit. Both the overcoming spirit line and the source spirit line moved together, Tuất earth moved to generate Thân metal, Thân metal moved to generate Tý water, and the month pillar Thân metal also generated Tý water. White Tiger occupied the Officials line in the fifth place, Dang Xa occupied the Officials line in the third place. If one predicted death on seeing Dang Xa and White Tiger, this case should have been bad news. But the book records: by the Mậu Thân day, the patient had recovered completely. The author concludes: what decides is the generation and overcoming of the five elements, not the names of the six beasts.

So when you see White Tiger in a hexagram asking about illness, the right question is not "will they die", but "which line is White Tiger on, is that line the useful spirit or the overcoming spirit, is it strong or weak, is it clashed or broken". Only when that chain is answered should one speak of the degree of severity.

Judging White Tiger in Liu Yao practice

Once you have a hexagram, to judge White Tiger you need to follow this order.

• Determine the day stem of the divination, and look up the table to know which line White Tiger occupies.
• Determine what that line is among the six relations, and whether it is the useful spirit of the question.
• See whether that line is strong or weak according to the month pillar, the day spirit, and the moving lines that generate or overcome it.
• Only after that should you attach the layer of meaning of White Tiger to the conclusion.

As for its qualities, Tăng san Bốc Dịch mentions White Tiger in many chapters, mostly together with the Officials line. The preface records: when Quỷ is accompanied by White Tiger and moves, it governs mourning and mourning garments. The chapter on Marriage records: when Quỷ is accompanied by White Tiger, one meets a matter of mourning. The chapter on Guarding against slander and lawsuits records: when Quỷ is accompanied by White Tiger, there is injury with blood. The chapter on the origin of illness records: White Tiger means there is injury. When examining the lay of the land, the book takes Green Dragon as the mountain on the left and White Tiger as the mountain on the right of the grave site. Those statements must still be read under the principle of the chapter "Lục thần": fortune and misfortune are decided by the useful spirit and by generation and overcoming.

Why do many people misunderstand White Tiger?

There are three main reasons.

The first is reading the six beasts apart from the five elements. Many popular materials write briefly "White Tiger governs mourning, illness, lawsuits", and readers memorise it and apply it directly to every hexagram. Tăng san Bốc Dịch opposed this way as far back as the Qing dynasty, and used its own example hexagrams to prove that the six beasts are only a supporting layer.

The second is confusing the meanings between different schools. White Tiger in landform feng shui is the mountain range on the right of the grave site, in Liu Ren it is a heavenly general, in Qi Men it is one of the eight spirits. Each system has its own rules of placement and judgement. Mixing the meaning of one system into another leads to wrong conclusions.

The third is skipping the step of determining the day stem. Because White Tiger runs around according to the day stem, the same hexagram cast on different days has White Tiger on a different line. To guess which line White Tiger is on without checking the day stem is guesswork.

Practical conclusion

White Tiger in Liu Yao is a six beast, placed according to the day stem, occupying one specific line among the six lines. It does not decide fortune or misfortune by itself. According to Tăng san Bốc Dịch, it is an auxiliary spirit: an inauspicious hexagram meeting it becomes more inauspicious, and the book often mentions it together with the Officials line in matters of mourning garments and injury. To judge correctly, one must place it in relation to the useful spirit, the month pillar, the day spirit and the moving lines. This is the reading that has a basis in the book, and it is also the reading that helps avoid heavy conclusions that lack foundation.