Saju compatibility, or gunghap: two charts, one story

Traditionally, gunghap was the reading a family asked for before a wedding. Today people read it for partners, crushes, co-founders, and close friends. The Fox Scholar treats it less as a pass-or-fail score and more as a portrait of two energies meeting.

Good compatibility is not “identical charts.” Two people who are too alike often lack what the other needs. Gunghap looks for fit, not sameness.

How two charts are compared

First the Fox Scholar looks at each person's Day Master — the core self — and asks whether the two elements generate, control, or simply pass each other by. Then it weighs the overall element balance: does one person supply the wood that the other's fire is hungry for?

• Day Master interaction — do your core elements support or restrain each other?
• Element supply and demand — does one chart provide what the other lacks?
• Branch harmonies (hap) — combinations that draw two people together.
• Branch clashes (chung) — tensions that create friction or growth.

Harmonies and clashes between branches

Korean Saju reads specific relationships between the Earthly Branches: six harmonies and three-branch combinations that bind, and clashes, breaks, and harms that pull apart. A single clash is not a verdict — plenty of lasting relationships carry one. What matters is the whole pattern, and whether the harmonies give the pair somewhere soft to land.

Reading your own gunghap

To start, you only need both birth dates — and birth times if you have them. From there, the comparison is the same art used for a single chart, simply doubled. If you are new to the mechanics, the Four Pillars guide explains stems, branches, and Day Masters first.