The day pillar for Thursday, 24 December 2026
| Day pillar | 壬申 (ren shen) |
|---|---|
| Heavenly stem | 壬 (ren) |
| Earthly branch | 申 (shen) |
| Day element | Water 水 (shui) |
| Polarity | Yang |
| Month pillar | 庚子 (geng zi), governed by 大雪 (daxue) |
Today's day pillar is 壬申 (ren shen), a yang Water day in the sixty-day cycle. The month pillar is 庚子 (geng zi), governed by the term 大雪 (daxue).
壬 (ren), the ninth heavenly stem
壬 is yang Water: the sea and the river in flood, water with somewhere to be.
壬 is the ninth stem, Water in its yang form. The images are large bodies of moving water, which is why classical texts associate it with scale, momentum and a certain amount of not being easily stopped. Water is the element the tradition links with intelligence and with flow.
It is a yang stem and takes only yang branches: 壬子 (ren zi), 壬申 (ren shen), 壬戌 (ren xu). It is also the hidden stem inside 亥 (hai), the branch that opens winter, so 壬亥 pairings show up in the calendar's coldest stretch by design.
A 壬 day shows Water and yang on the page. It is the second-to-last stem, which means the sixty-day cycle is close to turning over whenever you see it.