庚申 geng shen

庚 above, 申 below

The stem and the branch carry the same element (Metal), which is the most single-minded pairing in the cycle. Nothing here pulls in two directions.

Where 庚申 sits in the five elements

Wood and Fire do not appear anywhere in this pillar.

Metal leads at 77.8%, then earth at 11.1%.

What is buried inside 申

申 hides 3 stems. The primary is 庚 (Metal), the same element as the stem; behind it sit 壬 (Water, what the stem produces) and 戊 (Earth, what produces the stem).

庚 meeting 申: the 臨官 stage

The twelve stages (十二長生): yang stems run forward, yin stems backward.

庚 meets 申 at the 臨官 stage — office.

申 against 寅, with 巳

Opposite across the cycle (六沖), and paired with (六合):

Clashes with

寅 (Tiger) — 丙寅

Combines with

巳 (Snake) — 己巳

Nayin: 石榴木

Nayin (納音) groups the cycle in pairs, each with an image. This one shares its image with 辛酉: 石榴木, “wood of the pomegranate.”

How 庚申 is conventionally read

庚 is unworked metal: the blade before it is polished. 申 is the turn from heat to metal, the first contraction.

A metal-element day master on a metal footing — one of eight characters, which colours a chart and does not fix the person.

When the next 庚申 days fall

The sixty-cycle repeats every sixty days, so this pillar returns roughly every two months. The next one is 12 December 2026 (Saturday). Each is calculated at midday Beijing time; a birth in the hour before midnight can still belong to the previous 庚申 day, because the day rolls at 23:00 true solar time.

Showing up to eight of the 6 occurrences in the next twelve months, from 2026-10-31.

庚 on six different footings

Six pillars carry this stem. It is the same day master every time, so everything that differs below is caused by the branch underneath it:

Here the footing is Metal — the same element as the stem. The other five branches this stem sits on are 午 (Fire), 辰 (Earth), 寅 (Wood), 子 (Water), 戌 (Earth).