About Chinese Astrology
Chinese civilization is perhaps one of the most ancient civilizations ever existed to have devised their own methods of predicting the future. The Chinese have preserved their wisdom and cultures from centuries. And perhaps the most important and fascinating thing is the ancient Chinese astrology which dates back much further than the current western astrology. Although a good amount of ancient western wisdom has been lost, the Chinese wisdom is available in many forms even today.
There is a very basic difference between the western and Chinese astrology. The western astrology tends to analyze on the character of an individual and not on his future. The Chinese astrology on the other hand, emphasizes on an individual's life and predicts what might happen to him in the near future. The Chinese follow the Feng Shui, which is indirectly linked with Chinese astrology. It states that by choosing specific locations of house or furniture, or using wind chimes or placing nine fish in a bowl, you can cure the effect of inauspicious stars that affect you. The art of Feng Shui and Chinese astrology are also used in various fields like:
> Chinese medicine
> Fortune telling
> Acupuncture
> Business analysis
The Chinese astrology revolves around the concept of 'Balance'. This includes both elemental correspondences as well as the concept of 'Yin' and 'Yang' which is explained later.
The ancient Chinese astrology was known as Five House or Five Planet Chinese astrology. The basis of this was the five major planets in our solar system namely Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. The ancient Chinese astrologers named these planets after the five elements. Mercury is Water, Venus is Metal, Mars is Fire, Jupiter is Wood and Saturn is Earth. The Chinese astrologers used the position of these five planets, the Sun, the Moon, comets and the Chinese zodiac sign associated with the time of birth of a person to find out the fate and destiny of that person. After sometime, it was made the seven planet system when the Sun and the Moon were added to it. This laid the foundation for the modern day ‘28 Lunar Mansions’. This system gave a very accurate horoscope which was used to predict the fate and events for the society as a whole and not for an individual. So to overcome this limitation, two more systems were developed by the Chinese. One of these systems was based on the solar calendar called the Four Pillars of Destiny, and the other was based on the lunar calendar and was called the Purple Emperor.
According to the Chinese, the Sun is a symbol for a humane, bright and idealistic person who has got many great ideas to contribute to the world. The Moon on the other hand, is the symbol of being romantic, soft, clean and observant.
The origin of the Chinese astrology seems to have come from the Babylonian and Sumerian cultures some 5000 years ago. This was almost 2000 years before the Pyramids in Giza were built and the Golden Age of Greek philosophy, when most of the present day constellations were named. Chinese astrology is used to map our physical chemistry to predict our behavior in a particular environment. Chinese astrology has been introduced to the western world for a long time now but its knowledge in English language was quite limited. Therefore, its complete knowledge was not known. But recently, more and more topics about Chinese astrology have become available in the west, allowing the world to study this fascinating system more closely.