Lug (Sheep)

Tibetan sources present these portraits as warnings, not as a fixed fate. In Gyurme Dorje's words, the predictions "are not considered to be deterministic, but cautionary and prescriptive", and a negative portent is met with rites that "have the power to nullify" it.

The White Beryl, the seventeenth-century treatise of the regent Sangs-rgyas rGya-mtsho, gives the Sheep a gentle portrait. In Dorje's translation: "Natives of the sheep year are characteristically taciturn, slow-witted and stubborn, with a great appetite for food. They desist from harming others, but are incapable of helping very much. Nonetheless they display a genuine sense of gratitude for services rendered. Patient, pure-hearted and relaxed, with a tendency to procrastinate, they do not overtly disclose their likes and dislikes, but are extremely loyal and generous."

Philippe Cornu's Tibetan Astrology sees the Sheep as good-natured, gentle and warm-hearted, with a sense of justice and a love of nature and art; but also conventional and easily used, a worrier who seeks the protection of the powerful, gets what it wants by roundabout ways and "does not hesitate to become a parasite", though it has a great filial spirit.

Both portraits see a gentle, harmless Sheep, but the White Beryl praises its loyalty and gratitude where Cornu stresses its dependence. ZodiAtlas gives the White Beryl first because it is the Tibetan text itself, written down in the seventeenth century; Cornu does not say which Tibetan text his portraits come from.

Every Sheep year shares the same vitality (srog): earth, the element of the intermediate directions, where the Sheep stands on the divination turtle. Its life-spirit (bla) is fire, the element that is "mother" to earth. Its wind-horse (rlung-rta), the force of luck and good reputation, is fire: the Sheep belongs to the luck group of the Hare, Sheep and Pig, whose luck is the Snake's element, fire.

Body (lus) and power (dbang-thang) change with each of the five Sheep years. In the Wood Sheep year the body is iron and the power wood; in the Fire Sheep, water and fire; in the Earth Sheep, fire and earth; in the Iron Sheep, earth and iron; in the Water Sheep, wood and water. The power element is the one that names the year.

Sheep natives fall under the numeric squares Red Nine, White Six and Blue Three, which also govern the Ox, the Dog and the Dragon.

Wood Sheep (shing-mo lug-lo). "Corpulent with clear sense-faculties", yet "foolish" and fond of over-eating. Sixty years, two children, three obstacles.

Fire Sheep (me-mo lug-lo). "Corpulent, upright and capable of long-standing friendships", they "will achieve whatever purpose they have in their minds"; "their voices are pleasant, as are their minds", and they will have "many children and grandchildren", though they crave wealth and suffer chronic kidney ailments. Seventy-seven years, seven obstacles.

Earth Sheep (sa-mo lug-lo). They are "prone to many diseases", afraid of enemies, threatened by leprosy and injuries; "outsiders will be well-disposed, but family members will become resentful", and the text calls them "extremely selfish and proud". Sixty years, four obstacles.

Iron Sheep (lcags-mo lug-lo). "Corpulent, with sluggish sense faculties and meagre recollection", prone to eye diseases and to "many foes, afflictions and disputations"; they will have few children. Eighty-one years, four obstacles.

Water Sheep (chu-mo lug-lo). "Of feeble intelligence", they "delight in travelling" and enjoy abundance at first, but their prosperity declines, and "if the subject is male he will die abroad". Seventy-three years, five obstacles, few children.

The years of one's own sign, at ages 13, 25, 37, 49, 61 and 73, bring what the White Beryl calls "natural obstacles" (rang-keg). In them it advises performing virtuous actions, drawing in prosperity and long life by ritual means, and avoiding contact "with those in grief, or invalids". The years of the seventh sign, the Ox, fall at ages 7, 19, 31, 43 and 55. At seven, adversarial forces must be ritually averted; the nineteenth year is "the time for making money"; the thirty-first brings the risk of divorce, the forty-third hostile forces against wealth, and the fifty-fifth difficult breathing. The Sheep is also one of the four "adversarial" signs (gshed-bzhi) with the Ox, the Dragon and the Dog.

According to sMon-'gro Paṇḍita, as Dorje reports, the seventh day of the last autumn month of a Sheep year is a "black day".

Philippe Cornu adds a table of good and bad days for each sign, shown below; he does not name its Tibetan source. For Cornu, a Year of the Sheep is "a year of rest after effort", favourable to feelings and to the arts.

• Excellent day: Friday
• Good day: Monday
• Bad day: Thursday
• Day of basis: day 8 of the lunar month
• Day of power: day 1 of the lunar month
• Day of success: day 2 of the lunar month
• Day of obstacles: day 20 of the lunar month
• Day of disturbance: day 5 of the lunar month
• Day of enemies: day 27 of the lunar month

From Philippe Cornu, Tibetan Astrology, tables 26 and 27. Cornu does not name the Tibetan source of these days.

The White Beryl also divines illness from the animal of the day. A Sheep day is "light" for men and "heavy" for women; its illnesses are complex disorders that are hard to cure, and pains of the brain, the waist and the neck. For the most severe diseases, those with signs of impending death, the text adds that the rites vary with the year-sign of the sick person.

On the divination turtle the Sheep belongs to the intermediate directions, the sector of earth, the spleen, the four trigrams Khon, Khen, Gin and Zon and the planet Saturn. Diviners use this sector to divine matters concerning "land and houses". Among the twelve hidden spirit lords, the Sheep's is Be-sna.

Among the five constitutional types, Ox, Dragon, Sheep and Dog years are "friend" years for the wood type, son years for the fire type, destiny years for the earth type, "mother" years for the iron type and enemy years for the water type. The Sheep year itself is the year of "greater penalty" for the wood type and of "lesser penalty" for the iron type.

The White Beryl judges a birth by the father's sign. A father born in an Ox, Sheep, Dog or Dragon year and a child born in a Bird or Monkey year give the auspicious prediction called "spear at the top and sister at the bottom"; with a child of the Tiger or Hare, the prediction is "short lifespan, inauspicious in both the short and long term".

Seen from the child's side, a Sheep child of a Horse or Snake father has the auspicious "high fortress construction"; with a Mouse or Pig father, the prediction is short life.

For a Sheep child, the autumn months are the delicate ones. Birth in the Monkey month falls in the sector of ill-health, in the Bird month in that of death, and in the Dog month in that of the tomb, "inauspicious to oneself and one's father".

The White Beryl makes earth the presiding element at death when a deceased of the Ox, Dragon, Sheep or Dog sign also bears the other marks of earth: the earth constitutional type, one of the trigrams Khen, Khon, Gin or Zon, the numeric square Yellow Five, the planet Saturn, and three generations of the family, father and son included, of the same sign. "In all such cases, and during the four last seasonal months", the body should not be given sky burial in the mountains.

Cremation is auspicious for someone who dies in a Sheep year if most living relatives are Mouse or Pig; interment is auspicious if they are Tiger or Hare. In each case the trigrams or numeric squares must also agree. The corpse itself should not be carried towards the east, "otherwise, it will be inauspicious for friends".

When the deceased is a Sheep, the White Beryl warns that the demonic influence may fall on relatives of the Ox or Sheep sign, and prescribes rites "for the slaying of the avengers".

For every negative reading the White Beryl gives a remedy. In the years of one's own sign it prescribes recitations, such as the sNang-brgyad and the Pañcarakṣā at thirteen and the Vajravidāraṇa and the Amitāyus Sūtra at twenty-five, together with long-life rituals. Weak forces are restored with a ransom for vitality (srog-bslu) and with prayer flags for the wind-horse. As the book itself says, "if the appropriate rituals are correctly undertaken, the negative conjunctions will turn out to be auspicious."

The White Beryl manuscript gives several lists of couples, each with its own prognosis, and for the Sheep they contradict one another; we show them as they are. The Horse and the Snake form a loving triad with the Sheep, yet the Snake and the Sheep are also the "greater" ill-omen, "utterly incapable", and have difficulty raising children. The Ox brings many children but "losses in business", and "if a groom of the sheep sign takes a bride of the ox sign they will have a short life and their children will become orphans".

With the Hare the couple becomes rich and powerful. With the Bird it has no descendants; with the Monkey its family line ends; with the Dog it divorces and meets the "six inauspicious fears"; with the Dragon it has difficulty raising children. No compatible relationship is possible between the Monkey and the Sheep: "the sheep's head will butt the monkey's heart". Two Sheep partners will be "happy in early life but face great hardships in old age"; a second list foresees hunger for the same couple.

Philippe Cornu's table rates the Sheep's partners differently. For him the Pig is excellent, the Horse very good, the Monkey and the Bird neutral and the Dog a source of intolerance; he prints nothing for the other six signs. Cornu himself admits that "Chinese, Tibetan, and Western writers are not in complete agreement as to compatibility".