Guan Di lot 41 of 100
A ladder to the edge of the sky
Fairly good (中吉, 戊甲). Grades differ between editions, and many Taiwanese temples print none. Shown as Wikisource gives it. Wikisource prints no stem pair for this lot, so 戊甲 is from manekineko.com.tw.
自南自北自東西
欲到天涯誰作梯
遇鼠逢牛三弄笛
好將名姓榜頭題
North, south, east and west, wherever you go,
if you want to reach the edge of the sky, who will be your ladder?
When the year of the rat meets the year of the ox, play the flute three times,
and put your name at the head of the list.
What this lot says
This is a lot about ambition and timing. The verse asks who will help you climb, and the answer is a time and a persistent effort.
Its last line is about being listed first. If you are preparing for an exam or a selection, it suggests steady work through to the right year.
A lot is a prompt for reflection. It cannot promise a result, and it is no substitute for medical, legal or financial advice.
The story behind it
Liu Wenlong seeks office (劉文龍求官)
According to the account on Wikisource, which draws on informal histories, Liu Wenlong of the Han was learned and left home to seek office. He was separated from his wife for eighteen years and, when he returned, no one at home knew him.
Source: Wikisource, 關聖帝君靈籤/41, the 故事及記載 section
Where this text comes from
This verse is a traditional temple text with no known author. We read it from two named web transcriptions, Chinese Wikisource (the base text) and manekineko.com.tw. Neither is a scan of a printing, the edition behind them is mixed, and we could not establish whether the two are independent of each other.
Wikisource (關聖帝君靈籤) (the text shown above)
自南自北自東西 / 欲到天涯誰作梯 / 遇鼠逢牛三弄笛 / 好將名姓榜頭題
Retrieved 2026-11-09. Transcription licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
manekineko.com.tw (富貴轉運站)
自南自北自東西 / 欲到天涯誰作梯 / 遇鼠逢牛三弄笛 / 好將名姓榜頭題
Retrieved 2026-11-09
English translation, meaning and story summaries are by Cast & Chart.