Qimen Dunjia consists of three concepts: Qi, Men, and Dunjia.
"Qi" refers to the Three Qis: Yi, Bing, and Ding. "Men" refers to the Eight Gates: Xiu (Rest), Sheng (Life), Shang (Injury), Du (Block), Jing (Scenery), Si (Death), Jing (Surprise), and Kai (Open). "Dun" means hiding, and "Jia" refers to the Six Jias: Jiazi, Jiaxu, Jiashen, Jiawu, Jiachen, and Jia yin. Among the Ten Stems, "Jia" is the most noble; it is hidden and not revealed, lurking under the Six Yi (Wu, Ji, Geng, Xin, Ren, Gui).
The divination of Qimen Dunjia is mainly divided into three disks: Tian (Heaven), Men (Gate), and Di (Earth), symbolizing the Three Talents (Heaven, Earth, and Humanity). The Nine Palaces on the Tianpan (Heaven Disk) contain the Nine Stars; the Eight Palaces on the Zhongpan (Middle Disk, with the Middle Palace attached to the Second Palace) are arranged with the Eight Gates; the Eight Palaces on the Dapan (Earth Disk) represent eight directions and remain stationary. Meanwhile, on both the Tianpan and Dapan, each palace is assigned specific Qis (Yi, Bing, Ding) and Yi (the Six Yi: Wu, Ji, Geng, Xin, Ren, Gui).
In this way, based on specific days and hours, by arranging the Six Yi, Three Qis, Eight Gates, and Nine Stars to divine the relationships, properties, and trends of things, and select auspicious times and directions, it constitutes a unique category in Chinese mysterious culture—Qimen Dunjia.
Among various ancient Chinese divination techniques, Qimen Dunjia is a relatively complete mathematical model with a high accuracy rate in practical application. It skillfully combines four aspects: celestial timing, geographical advantages, human harmony, and certain energy fields affecting humans, with time and space. Using the Eighteen Yin-Yang Positions, it simulates a three-dimensional dynamic image-number model of the unified cosmic information field. It can be used to predict various natural and ambiguous things in nature, society, and life, as well as help people choose auspicious directions, auspicious times, and predict the future.
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This article is part of our comprehensive guide covering all core Taoist philosophies, concepts, and practices — curated from the classic Encyclopedia of Taoism.
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