I am Master Libo. Ask away.

Master Libo Kang defines it in a single sentence: “If you are on the path of cultivation, you are in the Middle Tao.” Cultivation is the Middle Tao and the Middle Tao is cultivation, with no further condition in between.

It is also called the Way of the Mean. Everyone has a right road of their own, not higher or lower, not larger or smaller than it should be, suited to their nature, circumstances and heart. To find it and keep walking it steadily is the Middle Tao.

It draws on Confucian, Buddhist and Daoist thought, holds with Wang Yangming that everything turns on the heart, and has no quarrel with Western psychology. No incense or chanting is needed; any small matter of daily life, met with a heart willing to look at itself, is already the path.

Into the Middle Tao

A life is the pattern a person carries from the moment of birth: one chart each, kept for good. Four Pillars and Purple Star Astrology belong here, reading what kind of person you are and where the rises and falls of a life come. That is Life Reading.

A matter is the one thing hanging in front of you. No birth details are needed; the chart is cast for that matter alone, either from the moment you ask or from a hexagram you throw. Qimen Dunjia, Da Liu Ren, Jin Kou Jue, Plum Blossom Numerology, Six Lines and Yarrow Stalk Divination belong here, answering whether to move or hold, here and now. That is Trend Divination. “What am I suited to in this life” is a question for the life; “will this deal come off” is one for the matter.

Life ReadingTrend Divination

One system sees a question from one side; Xuantian Mode puts the same question to several at once. Once it is on, a number of Shenlong agents are summoned, each keeping to a single chart: natal charts from Four Pillars, Purple Star Astrology, Qimen Dunjia and Da Liu Ren; timing charts from Qimen Dunjia, Da Liu Ren, Six Lines, Plum Blossom Numerology and Jin Kou Jue; cast hexagrams from Six Lines and Yarrow Stalk Divination. Eleven charts in all, to tick as you choose.

Each chart is judged on its own, none reading over another’s shoulder; then Master Libo draws them into one in-depth report, kept in your Xuantian records and easy to share. Where the systems agree you can rest easy; where they differ is exactly where to take more care.

Xuantian for a lifeXuantian for a matter

Both begin from the moment of birth but proceed differently. Four Pillars turns the time itself into stems and branches and reads the interaction of the five phases; it is strong on temperament and on the rhythm of the decade luck. Purple Star Astrology places over a hundred stars across twelve palaces and is strong on specifics — career, marriage, wealth, one palace at a time.

They also count time differently. Four Pillars runs on the solar-term calendar, where the year turns at Start of Spring; Purple Star Astrology runs on the lunar calendar, where it turns at the first new moon. The same birth moment can fall in different months on the two systems.

How a Four Pillars chart is castPurple Star Astrology chartingStars and palacesAI Four Pillars

Qimen Dunjia is the art of emperors, used in the old accounts to deploy armies. It is cast from the hour and lays the heaven, earth and human affairs of that moment across nine palaces: which gate stands open, where the road leads, what holds sway. That makes it strong on direction and timing.

Six Lines is usually cast by hand: three coins thrown six times make six lines, which are dressed with stems, branches and the six relations, the matter asked about taken as the subject line. It does not survey the whole situation; it brings one matter down to one pivot and answers “will it come off, will it be got”. To know which way to go and when to set out, cast Qimen Dunjia; to know whether the thing will be yours, cast Six Lines.

Qimen Dunjia chartingSix Lines castingThe 64 hexagrams

The library holds two hundred and eighty classical texts in sixteen branches: Four Pillars, Purple Star Astrology, Qimen Dunjia, Da Liu Ren, Six Lines, Plum Blossom Numerology and Feng shui each have a shelf of their own, and the Confucian, Buddhist and Daoist classics are there too. Every text sets the original beside a modern Chinese rendering, passage by passage, and much-cited works such as the Sanming Tonghui, the Ziwei Doushu Quanshu, the Zengshan Buyi and the Da Liuren Zhinan are there in full.

Two hundred of the metaphysical classics are now in English, translated passage by passage from that modern rendering, with terms drawn from the same glossary as the reference pages; the end of each volume says how its translation was made. In other languages, select any line while reading in the app and ask Master Libo, who will explain it in your own language.

Classical texts in EnglishReference