1st. May 2009
Today on top of this castle tower showed below* we came to study the “Xing Shi” (Form and Configuration) of this defence stronghold as part of the Unit 2 Feng Shui Professional Practitioners Course. Lidia Sarek, our Polish host, told us a funny story about modern understanding of Feng Shui.
She said she went to see a client earlier this year, the husband said to her, “So you do Feng Shui for a living, you know, I don’t believe in this superstitious rubbish!” Lidia tried her best to be polite and replied, “Oh, is that so? What do you do for a living?” The man replied, “I do something very different, I look for potential sites for MacDonald.”
Being a good-natured person Lidia just smiled. Little did the man know he is in the same profession as Lidia and if he bothers to study a little bit of Feng Shui, it might even improve his professional skill!
* Lipowiec Castle – built at the end of 13th. century, by Cracow bishop Jan Muskata. The fortress was intended to be the church’s administration centre and at the same time a frontier watchtower. It sits on a solid Black Turtle to the north and has a closer and higher Azure Dragon to the left and a lower and broader White Tiger to the right, overlooking a wide Mingtang to the south with the distant mountains holding the qi back towards the Xue, the Feng Shui Spot – a classic Siling model in the landscape.
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May 18, 2009 at 8:46 am
Sanjay Dua
Hi Howard.
I am assuming you are referring to the classic armchair formation – with the embrace (You King) from four mythical animals – as the Siling model. What is the origin of the word Siling?
Best,
Sanjay
May 19, 2009 at 7:58 am
howardchoy
Hi Sanjay,
According to my dictionary of Chinese metaphysics (Fangshu), the origin of the term Siling came from Guopu’s Zangshu (The Book of Burial) in which he wrote (my translation), “The earth has four configurations and the Qi comes from the eight directions, so to bury is to consider the left as the Azure Dragon, the right as the White Tiger, the front as the Red Bird and the back as the Black Turtle”. The ancient Chinese also divided the night sky into the four “Sixiang” out of the 28 Lunar Mansions – Azure Dragon to the east, White Tiger to the west, Red Bird to the south and the Black Turtle to the north, so it is a case of Heaven coming down to Earth.
Howard