Void (Kong Wang, Gongmang) in Saju: Find Your Empty Branches
Sooner or later a reading mentions that a character in your chart "is in the void." The Korean term is gongmang (공망, 空亡), Kong Wang in Chinese BaZi, literally "empty and lost," and it describes two earthly branches that a given birth day leaves unfilled. Once you see the arithmetic behind it, anyone can find their own void in a minute, and the reading is calmer than the name suggests. This guide explains where the two empty branches come from, gives the table for all six decades of the sixty pillars, and shows how Korean readers use it, including the idea of a void that gets filled.
Ten stems, twelve branches, two left over
The sixty pillars are made by pairing the ten heavenly stems with the twelve earthly branches one step at a time: 甲子, 乙丑, 丙寅 and so on. In the ten steps it takes the stems to make one full round, only ten of the twelve branches get a partner. Count from 甲子 to 癸酉 and the branches left without a stem are 戌 and 亥.
Each block of ten pillars is a decade, sun (순, 旬) in Korean and xun in Chinese, and the two branches each decade leaves out are its void. The full name is sunjung gongmang (순중공망, 旬中空亡), "the void within the decade," shortened to sungong (순공, 旬空). Old readers pictured a heavenly stem as something that descends onto a branch, so a branch with no stem to receive was empty ground. Because there are six decades, there are six possible voids, and the two void branches are always neighbors. The Japanese system of sanmeigaku calls the same thing tenchusatsu (天中殺), the "heaven-center void," and derives it in exactly the same way.
The table: six decades and their void branches
The base is the decade your day pillar belongs to. Find your day pillar in the middle column and the void is on the right. Tradition also runs the lookup from the year pillar as a second base; which of the two a reader weighs more heavily varies by school.
| Decade | Its ten pillars | Void branches |
|---|---|---|
| 甲子旬 Jia Zi decade | 甲子 乙丑 丙寅 丁卯 戊辰 己巳 庚午 辛未 壬申 癸酉 | 戌 Xu · 亥 Hai (Dog, Pig) |
| 甲戌旬 Jia Xu decade | 甲戌 乙亥 丙子 丁丑 戊寅 己卯 庚辰 辛巳 壬午 癸未 | 申 Shen · 酉 You (Monkey, Rooster) |
| 甲申旬 Jia Shen decade | 甲申 乙酉 丙戌 丁亥 戊子 己丑 庚寅 辛卯 壬辰 癸巳 | 午 Wu · 未 Wei (Horse, Goat) |
| 甲午旬 Jia Wu decade | 甲午 乙未 丙申 丁酉 戊戌 己亥 庚子 辛丑 壬寅 癸卯 | 辰 Chen · 巳 Si (Dragon, Snake) |
| 甲辰旬 Jia Chen decade | 甲辰 乙巳 丙午 丁未 戊申 己酉 庚戌 辛亥 壬子 癸丑 | 寅 Yin · 卯 Mao (Tiger, Rabbit) |
| 甲寅旬 Jia Yin decade | 甲寅 乙卯 丙辰 丁巳 戊午 己未 庚申 辛酉 壬戌 癸亥 | 子 Zi · 丑 Chou (Rat, Ox) |
There is a way to do it without the table. Count your day stem backward to 甲, then count your day branch backward by the same number of steps. That gives the first pillar of your decade, and the two branches just before its branch are your void. Take the Bing Wu (丙午) day pillar: 丙 is two steps after 甲, and two steps back from 午 is 辰, so the decade is 甲辰旬 and the void is the pair before 辰, namely 寅 and 卯.
- Cast your chart on the calculator and read your day pillar.
- Find its decade in the table and read the two void branches.
- Check your year, month and hour branches for those two characters. Then, as a second check, repeat the lookup with your year pillar.
One useful fact falls out of the arithmetic: by the day-pillar method, your day branch can never be void, because it already has its stem within the decade. So a day-pillar void can only sit in the year, month or hour branch.
How the void is read
The traditional reading is short. A branch in the void has less force behind it, so the Ten God it carries, and the family member it stands for, acts weakly or shows up late. To that the classics add one principle: if a character that helps you is void, that is a pity; if a character that burdens you is void, the burden is lighter. What helps and what burdens is decided by the balance of the whole chart, the analysis that identifies the useful god. The same logic applies to the special stars: a Nobleman branch in the void is read as a weakened Nobleman.
Modern readers describe the void as a gap between effort and the sense of possession. The area a void branch points to never quite feels held, however hard one works at it, and people are more at ease there once they loosen their grip on the outcome and find the meaning in the process. A void Wealth star suggests money that flows through rather than piles up; a void Authority star suggests someone who would rather be recognized for ability than for a title. Charts with several void branches have long been read as drawn to philosophy, religion and art, the domains that do not run on ordinary accounting.
What it means in each pillar
- Year branch void: a thin fence around ancestry and hometown. Early independence, and a life built on ground of one's own making rather than inherited ground.
- Month branch void: standing on one's own feet rather than on the help of parents and siblings. Because the month branch is the season itself and carries so much weight, some schools do not count a void here at all.
- Hour branch void: children, juniors and the later years. Results that ripen late, or satisfaction found in the work more than in its rewards.
- Day branch: never void by the day-pillar method. By the year-pillar method it can be, and even then readers treat it as a footnote rather than a verdict on the marriage.
A void can be filled. When a void branch forms a combination (합, 合) or a clash (충, 沖) with another branch, whether in the natal chart or in a luck pillar or a year, readers say the empty seat has been set in motion and occupied, and the branch is no longer treated as void. This is haegong (해공, 解空), the "resolved void." A void 卯, for example, is filled by a 戌 (its six-harmony partner) or by a 酉 (its clash partner) anywhere in the chart or in the current year.
When it arrives: 2026, 2027 and 2028
When the branch of a luck pillar or a year is one of your void branches, readers call the period a void year. The classics warned that what is started in such a year tends to spin without catching. A more reasonable modern reading is a period for preparation and tidying up rather than for harvesting: not a ban, a change of gear.
- 2026 (丙午) and 2027 (丁未) have 午 and 未 as their branches, the void pair of the 甲申旬 decade. Anyone with a day pillar of 甲申, 乙酉, 丙戌, 丁亥, 戊子, 己丑, 庚寅, 辛卯, 壬辰 or 癸巳 passes through two void years in a row. Contracts and big decisions deserve one more review, and the two years are well spent strengthening foundations rather than opening new fronts.
- 2028 (戊申) brings 申, one of the void branches of the 甲戌旬 decade, and 2029 (己酉) brings the other. Day pillars from 甲戌 to 癸未 get their own pair of void years next.
- 丙午, 丁未 and 戊申 all belong to the 甲辰旬 decade, so everyone born from the Jia Chen year of 2024 to the Gui Chou year of 2033, counted from Ipchun, has a year-pillar void of 寅 and 卯. See why the saju year starts at Ipchun.
- A ten-year luck pillar on a void branch is read as a decade whose theme matures slowly, accumulating inside more than it shows outside.
The modern reading
Strengths first. People with a void in the chart are often unusually free in the very area the void marks. They hold money, titles or family expectations more lightly than others, which makes them good at work whose rewards are delayed or intangible: research, the arts, teaching, care, anything done for its own sake. A void year, read well, is a productive one: the studying gets done, the files get sorted, the long-postponed conversation happens.
Then the cautions. Lightness can slide into not trying, and a void that is used as an excuse becomes self-fulfilling. The void does not say that a domain is closed to you; it says the usual sense of grip will be weaker there, so build structure deliberately: written plans, deadlines, a second person to check the numbers. And keep the proportions in mind. Every one of the sixty day pillars has a void pair; it is a calculation that applies to everyone, and plenty of charts contain no void branch at all.
Questions people ask
Does having a void mean my life will feel empty?
No. All sixty day pillars have two void branches; the question is only whether those branches happen to appear in your chart. Many people have none, and those who do have a note about one area of life, not a description of the whole.
Should I avoid doing anything important in a void year?
A void year is a signal to adjust speed, not a stop sign. Work whose results can arrive late, such as study, preparation, organizing and repair, suits it well. If a big decision cannot wait, take it; just review it once more than usual.
Is the void always a bad thing?
No. The traditional rule says that a burdensome character in the void becomes less of a burden. Whether a void helps or hinders depends entirely on which character is empty, which is why the void is read after the main analysis of the chart, never before it.
To find yours, cast your chart, read the day pillar and locate its decade in the table. Then check the year, month and hour branches for the two void characters, and look at whether anything in the chart combines with or clashes them.
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