Saju (사주, 四柱 sìzhù) is the Korean name for the Four Pillars of Destiny, the same system this site calls Ba Zi (八字 bāzì). The word means “four pillars”: the year, month, day and hour of birth, each written as one Heavenly Stem over one Earthly Branch. A practitioner in Seoul casting your saju and a practitioner in Singapore casting your Ba Zi write down the same eight characters from the same birth data.
What changes is the language spoken around the chart, a few habits of practice, and one genuine question about the clock. This page covers what saju is and how it lines up against Ba Zi. The other saju pages on this site each take one practical job from there.
Saju and Ba Zi: one chart, two vocabularies
Korean reads Chinese characters with Sino-Korean pronunciations, so nearly every saju term is a Ba Zi term said in Korean. The written characters are the same; only the sound and the romanisation change. If you have read a Ba Zi chart before, you already know the concepts below.
| Term | Korean | Chinese | What it means |
|---|---|---|---|
| Saju | 사주 saju | 四柱 sìzhù | Four pillars |
| Palja | 팔자 palja | 八字 bāzì | Eight characters (= Ba Zi) |
| Cheongan | 천간 cheongan | 天干 tiāngān | Heavenly stems |
| Jiji | 지지 jiji | 地支 dìzhī | Earthly branches |
| Ilgan | 일간 ilgan | 日干 rìgān | Day stem = Day Master |
| Ohaeng | 오행 ohaeng | 五行 wǔxíng | Five elements |
| Yongsin | 용신 yongsin | 用神 yòngshén | Useful god (favourable element) |
| Daeun | 대운 daeun | 大運 dàyùn | Luck pillars (Da Yun) |
Two more terms come up often. 만세력 manseryeok (萬歲曆) is the perpetual calendar used to cast the chart, the Korean counterpart of the almanac tables behind any Ba Zi calculator. 신살 sinsal (神煞 shénshà) are the symbolic stars, layered on top of the pillars in both traditions. The full stem and branch readings in Korean sit on the saju palja page.
What is the same in saju and Ba Zi
The arithmetic. Saju uses the same sixty pillars, the same stems and branches, and the same order of counting. Nothing about the calculation is Korean-only.
- The year boundary. The year pillar changes at 입춘 ipchun (立春 lìchūn), Li Chun, the start of the solar year, not on 1 January and not at the lunar new year. This holds in saju exactly as in Ba Zi.
- The months. Month pillars follow the solar terms, 절기 jeolgi (節氣 jiéqì), changing at the twelve jie (节 jié). A birth a few hours either side of a jie can sit in a different month pillar in either system.
- The Day Master. The reading still starts from the day stem, 일간 ilgan. Its element and strength, judged against the season, set the frame for everything else. The concept is laid out on Day Masters explained.
- The relations. Clashes, combinations and harms between branches are the same fixed lists, read the same way.
The classic mistake is to assume a “Korean chart” needs a different calculator. It does not. It needs the right clock time, which is the subject of the next section.
What differs: vocabulary, the clock, and where it is consulted
Vocabulary and emphasis
Beyond the pronunciations in the table, the ten gods go by two names in Korean, 십신 sipsin (十神 shíshén) or 십성 sipseong (十星 shíxīng). Emphasis varies from one practitioner to the next, as it does between schools anywhere. That is a difference of style, not of system.
The 32-minute question
This is the one genuine technical difference, and schools differ on it. Korean Standard Time (UTC+9) is set on the 135°E meridian, but Seoul sits near 127°E, so local solar time in Seoul runs about 32 minutes behind the clock.
Many saju practitioners correct for this: they subtract roughly 32 minutes so the hour pillar reflects where the sun actually stood. Others cast from the clock time as recorded and leave it there. Both positions are held by serious practitioners. In practice it only changes the chart when a birth falls close to the boundary between two-hour blocks, where the hour pillar can tip one way or the other.
Older Korean birth times carry a second check: the clock itself changed over the decades. The saju calculator guide walks through those years and what to enter.
Where saju is consulted
In Korea, saju is often read at a 철학관 cheolhakgwan (哲學館), a storefront saju consultancy. And 궁합 gunghap (宮合), the compatibility of two charts, is traditionally consulted before marriage. The method behind it is the same two-chart comparison used in Ba Zi, covered on the saju compatibility page.
Where to go next in the saju pages
Each page below does one job, so you can go straight to the part you need.
- Saju palja: the eight characters in Korean, with every stem and branch reading.
- Saju reading: the order a chart is read in, from 일간 to 대운, and what a good session looks like.
- Saju calculator: how to cast a Korean birth correctly, time zone included.
- Saju compatibility: how gunghap reads two charts together.
For the wider system, start with what Ba Zi is, then the heavenly stems and earthly branches, the 22-character alphabet that saju and Ba Zi share.
Find your own saju in a few seconds: plot it free with the Ba Zi calculator. For a Korean birth, choose “Tokyo / Seoul (UTC+9)” as the place of birth. The calculator does not apply the Seoul 32-minute correction or daylight saving automatically, so if your practitioner corrects for local solar time, adjust the clock time yourself before you enter it.