地支 · Shēn
Shēn (申)
the first Metal of autumn — sharp and restless, the seed of Water already forming
- 對應生肖:
- Monkey
- 五行:
- Metal
- 季節:
- early autumn
- 時辰:
- 15:00–17:00
- 月令:
- the 7th lunar month
- 藏干:
- Yang Metal (庚) · Yang Water (壬) · Yang Earth (戊)
The ninth Earthly Branch — early autumn, rising Metal with hidden Water. Its zodiac animal is the Monkey.
概覽
Shen (申) is the ninth Earthly Branch, and the distinction holds: Shen is the branch; the Monkey is the popular Chinese-zodiac animal that corresponds to it. Shen is not 'the Monkey' — it is Shen, a calendrical unit, with the Monkey as its familiar label.
As a branch, Shen is the first Metal of autumn — the 7th lunar month, the late afternoon, the turn from growth to harvest. Its element is Metal, sharp and restless, and one of the four 'growth-opening' branches that begin a season. What makes Shen distinctive is the Water hidden in it: this Metal branch is where Water is born, the seed of winter already forming inside autumn.
作為時間單位
As time, Shen rules 15:00–17:00 (the 申時 double-hour), the 7th lunar month at autumn's opening, and a west-southwest position. Its pillar placement fixes which layer of the chart this rising Metal colours.
藏干
Shen's hidden stems (藏干) are Yang Metal (庚) as the main qi, with Yang Water (壬) and Yang Earth (戊). The buried Water is the key: this Metal branch is the birthplace of Water (Metal generates Water), so Shen already carries the seed of the next season. The hidden stems hold that forward motion inside the branch.
六沖、三合、六合
Shen's clash (六沖) is with Yin (寅, the Tiger) — the Metal-against-Wood, autumn-against-spring axis. It opens the Water trinity (三合) 申子辰 (Shen–Zi–Chen), and its six-combination (六合) is with Si (巳, the Snake), combining toward Water. These are structural relationships between chart positions, not predictions.
跨系統對照
| 系統 | 最近的原型 | 備註 |
|---|---|---|
| Zi Wei Dou Shu | One of the twelve fixed cells of a Zi Wei chart — the 申 position a palace sits on | In Zi Wei the twelve Earthly Branches are the chart's twelve fixed cells: every palace occupies a branch, and a chart's 命宮 (Life Palace) can land on 申. Its Bazi clash partner 寅 (Tiger) sits in the cell directly opposite — what Zi Wei reads as the 對宮 (opposite palace) on the same axis. Same twelve branches, used as the spatial frame for the palaces, not as a Bazi pillar. |
| Chinese zodiac (生肖) | The Monkey — the popular animal label for the branch Shen | The Monkey is the everyday zodiac's name for Shen; the branch Shen — its Metal element, hidden Water, time and interactions — is the technical unit a Bazi chart reads. |
| Western astrology | A loose structural parallel only — twelve divisions of a cycle | No sign maps to a branch; the branches are calendrical, not personality signs. The only parallel is the shared twelve-fold division. |
生肖動物只是地支的通俗別名、不是地支本身，地支與西方星座之間也沒有對應。跨系統對照只是鬆散參考；地支是帶藏干的曆法單位，這個結構生肖與西方占星都沒有。
以描述而非預言來讀
Shen describes a position in time and its elemental character — early-autumn rising Metal — not a personality, not a destiny, and not 'you are a Monkey'. It is read against the rest of the chart, and the same branch plays out very differently across different lives.
保持聯繫
想讀更多宮位？
我們每幾週新增宮位、星耀、進階概念頁面。訂閱免費 Substack 即可在下批次上線時收到通知。
在 Substack 訂閱 →