From Round to Square (and back)

For The Emperor's Teacher, scroll down (↓) to "Topics." It's the management book that will rock the world (and break the vase, as you will see). Click or paste the following link for a recent profile of the project: http://magazine.beloit.edu/?story_id=240813&issue_id=240610

A new post appears every day at 12:05* (CDT). There's more, though. Take a look at the right-hand side of the page for over four years of material (2,000 posts and growing) from Seinfeld and country music to every single day of the Chinese lunar calendar...translated. Look here ↓ and explore a little. It will take you all the way down the page...from round to square (and back again).
*Occasionally I will leave a long post up for thirty-six hours, and post a shorter entry at noon the next day.

Friday, April 20, 2018

China's Lunar Calendar 2018 04-20

Click here for the introduction to the Round and Square series "Calendars and Almanacs" 
***Check out the full explanation of today's lunar-solar calendar translation*** 
⇦⇦⇦⇦⇦ From right to left: ⇦⇦⇦⇦
4/20..................................................4/16........Monthly Calendar Information
This is one in a never-ending series—following the movements of the calendar—in Round and Square perpetuity. It is today's date in the Chinese lunar-solar (or "luni-solar" calendar; I call it the "lunar" calendar in order to distinguish it from the kinds of calendars most Westerners use. It has a basic translation and minimal interpretation. Unless you have been studying calendars (and Chinese culture) for many years, you will likely find yourself asking "what does that mean?" I would caution that "it" doesn't "mean" any one thing. There are clusters of meaning, and they require patience, reflection, careful reading, and, well, a little bit of ethnographic fieldwork. The best place to start is the introduction to "Calendars and Almanacs" on this blog. I teach a semester-long course on this topic and, trust me, it takes a little bit of time to get used to the lunar calendar. Some of the material is readily accessible; some of it is impenetrable, even after many years.

As time goes on, I will link all of the sections to lengthy background essays. This will take a while. In the meantime, take a look, read the introduction, and think about all of the questions that emerge from even a quick look at the calendar. You will likely find that several of the translations seem quite "fanciful" in English. I am simply trying to convey that they also sound fairly fanciful in Chinese.
Section One
Solar Calendar Date
二
十
五期星
Fourth Month, Twentieth Day 
Friday, April 20
————

Section Two
Beneficent Stars 
(top to bottom, right to left)
時月天
德德德
Heavenly Virtue
Lunar Virtue
Timely Virtue
————
Section Three
Auspicious Hours
(top to bottom, right to left) 
申辰子
凶凶凶
中吉吉戌午寅
凶中吉
亥未卯
吉吉吉
23:00-01:00 Inauspicious
01:00-03:00 Auspicious
03:00-05:00 Auspicious
05:00-07:00 Auspicious

07:00-09:00 Inauspicious
9:00-11:00 Auspicious
11:00-13:00 In-Between
13:00-15:00 Auspicious

15:00-17:00 Inauspicious
17:00-19:00 In-Between
19:00-21:00 Inauspicious
21:00-23:00 Auspicious

The hours above are for Hong Kong. It is up to you if you want to recalibrate or to assume that the cyclicality of the calendar "covers" the rest of the world. This is a greater interpretive challenge than you might think.
                             —————————————————
***Check out the full explanation of today's lunar-solar calendar translation*** 
Section Four 
Activities to Avoid  
(top-to-bottom; right to left) 
忌
動苫開
土蓋渠
Opening Sluices
Thatched Coverings
Moving Soil

Section Five 
Cosmological Information
初
五
壬
午
木
牛
滿
Fifth Day (Second Lunar Month)
Cyclical day: renwu (19/60)
Phase (element): Wood
"Constellation Personality" Cycle: Ox (9/28)
"Day Personality" Cycle: Fullness (3/12)
————
Section Six
Appropriate Activities
and Miscellaneous Information  
(top-to-bottom; right to left)
雨穀
十十午
三一初
分時    
宜
開嫁會
市娶友
安移出
葬徙行
生始萍
灾地月
煞囊忌
————
Corn Rain
In the wu hour; 11:13 a.m.
 (the sixth of twenty-four fifteen-day solar periods on the agricultural calendar)
 
Appropriate Activities
Meeting Friends
Bubbling and Bathing
Patterning Hair
Sweeping Rooms
Opening Markets
Setting-up Appointments
Trade and Commerce
Positioning Beds

Floating Weeds Appear
(the sixteenth of seventy-two five-day solar micro-periods on the agricultural calendar)

Baleful Astral Influences
Lunar Taboo
Earth Duffel
Calamitous Balefulness
 
Section Seven
Inauspicious Stars
丫 水
Bifurcation, Water
———— 

Section Eight 
Miscellaneous Activities
倉
碓 庫
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