Korean Yihak - Genius Young Master Cheongjae
Explore the principles of all things through 64 hexagrams
Temple stick for your answer
Kau Cim is the traditional practice of shaking a bamboo cylinder of oracle sticks at Hong Kong and Guangdong temples until one falls out as the deity's answer. This game uses the actual lot texts of four temples: Sik Sik Yuen Wong Tai Sin (100 lots, five grades), the Guanyin oracle (100 lots, Hong Kong recension with palace signs and allusions), the Guan Di Thunder-Rain-Master 100 lots (stem codes, eight grades, allusions), and Sha Tin Che Kung Temple (96 lots, three grades). The drawn lot's verse, grade and allusion reveal the flow of fortune.
Kau cim (Cantonese for 'drawing a slip,' 求籤) is the signature numinous-slip (靈籤) divination of temples in Hong Kong, Macau, and Guangdong. A bamboo tube (籤筒) holding a hundred slips is held in both hands and shaken until one slips out — that slip is the deity's answer.
The most famous site is Sik Sik Yuen Wong Tai Sin Temple in Kowloon, Hong Kong. Founded in 1921 at Chuk Yuen on the divination revelation (乩示) of Wong Tai Sin (Wong Cho Ping) and fully opened to the public in 1956, the temple draws over ten thousand worshippers a day with its reputation for 'granting every request' (有求必應). It is a temple of the 'widely saving and exhorting to goodness' (普濟勸善) ideal, honoring Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism together.
Beyond Wong Tai Sin, the numinous-slip traditions continue with each temple's own character — the Guanyin slips of the Goddess of Mercy (觀音靈籤), the Guandi slips of Guan Yu (關帝靈籤), and the Che Kung slips of Sha Tin's Che Kung Temple (車公廟).
The Wong Tai Sin slips are those of the Taoist immortal Wong Cho Ping, giving answers of an all-granting character — 'ask and it shall be answered.' The Guanyin slips answer from the standpoint of compassion and affinity.
The Guandi slips answer from loyalty, righteousness, and the upright path — is the matter the right road? — while the Che Kung slips answer from protection and forward drive. Like the custom of turning the windmill at Sha Tin's Che Kung Temple to turn one's luck, they are slips that set stalled fortune spinning again.
Each slip carries a number (第N籤), a grade, a four-line seven-syllable verse (籤詩), the old precedent the verse alludes to (典故), and a resolution text (解曰). The slip verse does not state fortune plainly — it shows it through metaphor.
Grades follow six ranks — sheung-sheung (上上), sheung-gat (上吉), chung-gat (中吉), chung-ping (中平), chung-ha (中下), ha-ha (下下). This service follows the distribution handed down in the Sik Sik Yuen line: 3 sheung-sheung, 10 sheung-gat, 32 chung-gat, 36 chung-ping, 1 chung-ha, 18 ha-ha — 100 slips in all.
In the traditional rite you first offer incense, silently state your name, birthday, address, and the matter asked, then tilt the slip tube about 45 degrees and shake. If several slips jump out at once it is void — return them and shake again until exactly one emerges.
Once a slip emerges, you collect the slip-paper (籤文紙) by its number; some temples also have you confirm with jiaobei whether the slip is truly the deity's answer. If the reading is hard to make out, asking the interpreters at the slip stalls (籤檔) outside the temple has long been part of the scene.
Choose one of the four temples — Wong Tai Sin, Guanyin, Guandi, Che Kung — then shake the tube to draw a slip. Each temple holds 100 slips, 400 in total, and grade, verse, precedent, and resolution are shown together.
Slip numbers, the grade distribution, and the themes of the precedents follow the public-domain tradition; the verse and resolution texts are original compositions made by this project to fit each temple's character — we state this plainly.
Even with a high grade, do not read past the warnings inside the verse; even with a low grade, read it as practical advice to 'step back and prepare' — that is the correct way to read a slip. Read the verse and the precedent together and the slip's true message appears.
A slip is one answer, not a sentence of fate. Rather than drawing the same question many times a day, taking one answer deeply to heart is the attitude of this tradition.
Sik Sik Yuen Wong Tai Sin Temple (1921) grade distribution — 3 sheung-sheung, 10 sheung-gat, 32 chung-gat, 36 chung-ping, 1 chung-ha, 18 ha-ha, 100 slips; Guanyin, Guandi & Che Kung slip traditions; slip numbers/grades/precedent themes are public domain — verses & resolutions are this project's original work
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Kau cim (Cantonese for 'drawing a slip,' 求籤) is the signature numinous-slip (靈籤) divination of temples in Hong Kong, Macau, and Guangdong. A bamboo tube (籤筒) holding a hundred slips is held in both hands and shaken until one slips out — that slip is the deity's answer.
The **Wong Tai Sin** slips are those of the Taoist immortal Wong Cho Ping, giving answers of an all-granting character — 'ask and it shall be answered.' The **Guanyin** slips answer from the standpoint of compassion and affinity.
Each slip carries a number (第N籤), a grade, a four-line seven-syllable verse (籤詩), the old precedent the verse alludes to (典故), and a resolution text (解曰). The slip verse does not state fortune plainly — it shows it through metaphor.
Kau Cim(求籤), Korean Yihak - Genius Young Master Cheongjae, Jiaobei(擲筊), Liushijiazi(六十甲子籤), Xiao Liu Ren(小六壬), Cezi(測字), Fan Tai Sui(犯太歲)