Five Elements 五行, Fire 火
Lucky colors of the Fire element
South and red belong to Fire, and the original texts use two characters for that red: 赤 and 朱
Fire in the Five Elements texts
- Direction
- South
- Season
- Summer
Color in the texts
- Element colorred 赤
Two characters for one red
Two books, two characters: 《素問》 has 南方赤色, while 《禮記·月令》 lists 衣朱衣 and 載赤旂 for the Son of Heaven, so the robe uses 朱 and the banner uses 赤.
From 孟夏 to 季夏 the 月令 keeps both characters. This is palace ritual, not a lucky color for ordinary people. The name 朱鳥, tied to Fire by Liu An, carries 朱 as well.
Wood creates Fire, and Fire creates Earth
The section 第四論相生 reads 木生火 and 火生土. The section 第十論相剋 reads 水剋火, where Water overcomes Fire, and 火剋金, where Fire overcomes Metal.
丙 is red, 丁 is purple
The table 論配五色 gives 丙 the true color 赤 and gives 丁 the mixed color 紫 (zǐ), purple. So this text uses red for 丙 alone, while 丁 takes purple.
- 丙red 赤Yang stem, true color
- 丁purple 紫Yin stem, mixed color
Stem colors are the colors in the text, not lucky colors of the year.
These colors are traditional belief, not a prediction.