How I Ching Numerology works

The I Ching, or Book of Changes, is one of the oldest Chinese classics: a text of sixty-four hexagrams, each made of six solid or broken lines, studied for millennia for its images, judgments and philosophy of change. The Plum Blossom (Méi Huā) numerological method, attributed to the Song-dynasty scholar Shao Yong, derives a hexagram from numbers. From your birth date, this tool obtains the primary hexagram, one changing line and the resulting hexagram.

All the digits of the date (DDMMYYYY) are added. The remainder of dividing that sum by 8 sets the upper trigram, and the remainder of dividing the day of the month by 8 sets the lower one, in the Earlier Heaven order (1 Heaven, 2 Lake, 3 Fire, 4 Thunder, 5 Wind, 6 Water, 7 Mountain, 8 Earth); a remainder of 0 counts as 8. The remainder of the sum divided by 6 gives the changing line, counted from the bottom (0 counts as 6). Flipping that line, from solid to broken or the reverse, produces the resulting hexagram. Numbering follows the King Wen sequence.

Example: 15 January 1990 gives a sum of 26. Since 26 divided by 8 leaves 2, the upper trigram is Lake; the day 15 divided by 8 leaves 7, so the lower is Mountain: hexagram 31 (Xián). Since 26 divided by 6 leaves 2, line 2 changes, leading to hexagram 28 (Dà Guò). This content is cultural and for entertainment only, and is not a substitute for professional advice or for the study and guidance of an I Ching teacher.