Saju palja (사주팔자, 四柱八字 sìzhù bāzì) is the Korean phrase for a birth chart: 사주 saju, the four pillars, and 팔자 palja, the eight characters. Each pillar is one Heavenly Stem written over one Earthly Branch, so four pillars carry eight characters. The second half, palja, is the same word as Ba Zi (八字 bāzì), read in Korean.
The phrase has a life outside the consulting room too. In everyday Korean, saju palja, or simply palja, stands for one’s fate, the way an English speaker might say “it was meant to be”. This page is the reading key: the 22 characters with their Korean sounds, and how to move between Korean, Chinese and pinyin without losing track. For what saju is and how it compares with Ba Zi, see the saju overview.
The ten Heavenly Stems in Korean
The stems are 천간 cheongan (天干 tiāngān). Each Korean reading is the Sino-Korean sound of the same character, so the element and polarity carry over unchanged. Stems run in yang–yin pairs: 갑 and 을 are Wood, 병 and 정 are Fire, and so on down to 임 and 계 for Water.
| Stem | Pinyin | Korean | Element |
|---|---|---|---|
| 甲 | Jiǎ | 갑 gap | Wood |
| 乙 | Yǐ | 을 eul | Wood |
| 丙 | Bǐng | 병 byeong | Fire |
| 丁 | Dīng | 정 jeong | Fire |
| 戊 | Wù | 무 mu | Earth |
| 己 | Jǐ | 기 gi | Earth |
| 庚 | Gēng | 경 gyeong | Metal |
| 辛 | Xīn | 신 sin | Metal |
| 壬 | Rén | 임 im | Water |
| 癸 | Guǐ | 계 gye | Water |
The twelve Earthly Branches in Korean
The branches are 지지 jiji (地支 dìzhī). They name the months and the two-hour blocks of the day as well as the years, and each carries its familiar animal.
| Branch | Pinyin | Korean | Animal |
|---|---|---|---|
| 子 | Zǐ | 자 ja | Rat |
| 丑 | Chǒu | 축 chuk | Ox |
| 寅 | Yín | 인 in | Tiger |
| 卯 | Mǎo | 묘 myo | Rabbit |
| 辰 | Chén | 진 jin | Dragon |
| 巳 | Sì | 사 sa | Snake |
| 午 | Wǔ | 오 o | Horse |
| 未 | Wèi | 미 mi | Goat |
| 申 | Shēn | 신 sin | Monkey |
| 酉 | Yǒu | 유 yu | Rooster |
| 戌 | Xū | 술 sul | Dog |
| 亥 | Hài | 해 hae | Pig |
One trap is worth flagging. The stem 辛 (Yin Metal) and the branch 申 (Monkey) are both read 신 sin in Korean. Pinyin keeps them apart (Xīn and Shēn), and so does position: in a pillar the stem always sits on top. When a chart is written only in hangul, check which row a 신 belongs to before you read anything into it.
Writing one pillar three ways
Every pillar is a stem plus a branch, and the Korean name is simply the two readings joined. Take the first pillar of the cycle:
- Chinese: 甲子
- Pinyin: Jiǎ Zǐ, Yang Wood over Water Rat
- Korean: 갑자 gapja (갑 gap + 자 ja)
The same method works for any pillar. A few more, read straight off the two tables:
| Pillar | Pinyin | Korean |
|---|---|---|
| 乙丑 | Yǐ Chǒu | 을축 eulchuk |
| 丙午 | Bǐng Wǔ | 병오 byeong-o |
| 庚辰 | Gēng Chén | 경진 gyeongjin |
| 癸亥 | Guǐ Hài | 계해 gyehae |
丙午 is the year pillar for 2026, the Bing Wu Fire Horse year, so in Korean it is a 병오 year. Write your own four pillars this way and the full saju palja is eight syllables, read year, month, day, hour.
The sixty-pair cycle: 갑자 to 계해
Stems and branches advance together, one step each, so a yang stem only ever meets a yang branch and a yin stem a yin branch. That is why ten stems and twelve branches give sixty pillars, not 120. In Korean the cycle runs from 갑자 gapja (甲子) to 계해 gyehae (癸亥), then starts again.
The same cycle counts years, months, days and hours. Its most familiar Korean marker is 환갑 hwangap (還甲), the 60th birthday, which marks the return of the year pillar you were born under.
Palja in everyday Korean
Outside the reading room, palja (팔자) has become an ordinary Korean word for one’s lot in life, much as “fate” or “luck” is in English. You will hear it in phrases that have nothing to do with drawing up a chart:
- 팔자가 좋다 (palja-ga jota): “to have a good palja”, said of someone whose life seems easy or comfortable.
- 팔자가 세다 (palja-ga seda): “to have a strong palja”, said of someone who has met more than their share of hardship.
- 팔자를 고치다 (palja-reul gochida): “to fix one’s palja”, to change one’s fortunes, often through marriage or a sudden windfall.
The everyday usage is looser than the technical one. In a reading, the eight characters describe tendencies and timing, and nothing is fixed in the way the idioms suggest. If you want to see your own eight characters, the same chart that Korean saju and Chinese Ba Zi both read can be plotted with our free Ba Zi calculator.
What saju palja leaves out
Saju palja names eight visible characters, but a chart holds more than eight. Each branch carries hidden stems inside it, and those hidden stems often decide how strong the Day Master really is. They are listed in full on the Ba Zi hidden stems table. For how all 22 characters work together, see heavenly stems and earthly branches, and for the order in which a reader works through them, the saju reading guide.
Find your own saju palja in Chinese characters, then read it in Korean with the tables above. Plot it free with the Ba Zi calculator; for a Korean birth, choose “Tokyo / Seoul (UTC+9)”, and see the saju calculator guide for the time questions to settle before you enter it.