The Host-Guest Relationship is the Essence of the Three Styles

The host-guest relationship is the essence of Qimen application and the core of the Three Styles (三式 – Qimen Dunjia, Taiyi Shenshu, Liuren). The reason for stating this is that the development and changes of all things are driven by this pair: the host and the guest.

The host-guest relationship can also be described as the relationship between stillness and motion. The ancients used the terms “host” and “guest” to emphasize its application in human affairs. Here, to make the concept of host-guest easier to grasp, we will use “stillness and motion” to aid understanding.

Qimen is a study of movement/dynamics. It requires us to discover the outcomes of developments from a dynamic perspective and to exert control over the potential results within that dynamic process. This ensures we fulfill the two fundamental purposes of studying it: understanding phenomena (“knowing things”) and managing/influencing outcomes (“applying things”).

Host and Guest are relative

The host represents a relatively static state, while the guest represents a relatively dynamic state. Motion and stillness are relative, not absolute. Within the social fabric, a person is either in an active position of motion or in a passive position of stillness. Moreover, one can simultaneously have an active role from one point of view and a passive one from another. The host-guest dynamic exists with phenomena as its medium, conditioned by time and space.

Host and Guest are Opposite

Here are some examples illustrating the relationship between host and guest:

• Time is motion (guest), Space is stillness (host).
• Striving/Initiating is motion (guest), Waiting is stillness (host).
• Above is motion (guest), Below is stillness (host).
• Front is motion (guest), Back is stillness (host).
• Coming is motion (guest), Going/Departing is stillness (host).
• External is motion (guest), Internal is stillness (host).
• Formless is motion (guest), Tangible/Formed is stillness (host).
• … [etc.]

The Application of Host and Guest in Qimen

The Qimen chart we commonly use for divination is formed by overlaying two charts. These two charts consist of one static chart and one dynamic chart. Typically, we call the moving chart the Heaven Plate (天盘, Tian Pan) and the static chart the Earth Plate (地盘, Di Pan). Spatially, the Heaven Plate is above (motion/guest), and the Earth Plate is below (stillness/host). Temporally, the Heaven Plate represents what is arriving (motion/guest), and the Earth Plate represents what is departing (stillness/host). The interplay of motion and stillness, above and below, coming and going between these two plates—which also corresponds to Yin and Yang—interprets the unfolding patterns and changes of events.

If one studies the discipline of Qimen without truly understanding the host-guest relationship, it can be said that one hasn’t truly studied Qimen at all. This is because the profound essence of Qimen lies precisely here. Although the drawn Qimen chart appears static, when the meaning of host and guest is incorporated, the chart becomes alive and dynamic.

From predicting the future based on the past, to grasping when to advance or retreat in handling affairs, to turning defeat into victory through strategy, and even to the cultivation of one’s nature and life-destiny through the harmonization of Yin and Yang – all are inseparable from this principle (the Way) of host and guest.