The day pillar for Tuesday, 27 April 2027
| Day pillar | 丙子 (bing zi) |
|---|---|
| Heavenly stem | 丙 (bing) |
| Earthly branch | 子 (zi) |
| Day element | Fire 火 (huo) |
| Polarity | Yang |
| Month pillar | 甲辰 (jia chen), governed by 清明 (qingming) |
Today's day pillar is 丙子 (bing zi), a yang Fire day in the sixty-day cycle. The month pillar is 甲辰 (jia chen), governed by the term 清明 (qingming).
子 (zi), the first earthly branch
子 is the rat branch, deep winter and the hours around midnight, the point where a cycle is quietly starting again.
子 opens the twelve earthly branches. Its element is Water, its position in the twelve makes it yang, and its animal is the rat. As an hour it runs from 23:00 to 01:00, and as a month it is the depth of winter, the stretch that begins at 大雪 (daxue) in early December and holds the solstice inside it.
Its hidden stem is 癸 (gui), which is yin Water. That is worth noticing: the branch counts as yang by position while the stem living inside it is yin. Branches have an outside and an inside, and BaZi reads both.
On the daily page 子 appears as the lower character of the day pillar. A 子 day is a rat day in the same zodiac series people know from birth years, just counted in days instead.