Cast & Chart

Monkey and Pig

These are traditional rules about the twelve signs. No chart decides a relationship.

The traditional relations

  • 六害 Six Harms

    One of six pairs of branches the old tables list as harming each other. The name is a label, not a forecast.

What tradition says

申 and 亥 are listed in 六害, the Six Harms, and 害 means injury or damage. The Sanming Tonghui explains the harm through a third party: 申 is opposed by 寅 and 亥 is the partner of 寅, so 亥 is tied to the branch that strikes 申. It labels this pair as rivals for advancement, each leaning on its own standing. By element, 申 is metal and 亥 is water, and metal carries water, a friendlier flow than the name suggests.

A shrewd Monkey and a trusting Pig appear in popular zodiac books, and popular writers warn that one may run rings around the other. That worry is a modern gloss, and the rivals in the old text are branches in a chart.

If one of you is said to be the quick one, it is worth asking how that feels to the other. Has either of you ever felt outmaneuvered in a small thing, like plans or chores, and said nothing?

The harm named here sits between 申 and 亥 in a table of signs, and it is no finding about a Monkey and Pig who talk to each other.

Where this text comes from

The relation tables follow 五行大義 volume 2 and 三命通會 volumes 2 and 3 on Wikisource. The popular readings are modern and come from neither.

The English here is our own plain wording, not a translation of a single source.