Definition and subject
Shichen chongsha is a broad term in traditional time selection, usually requiring the stems and branches of an hour to be considered alongside a day, year, or personal condition. It is not a permanently valid list of forbidden clock times independent of the date. State the rule, both sides of the comparison, and the intended activity first. An unexplained claim that an hour clashes cannot be checked and readily confuses different layers.
How to identify it
Retain the Gregorian date, location, time zone, time precision, and day-boundary convention, then explain the conversion into branch hours. The Hong Kong Observatory provides basic stem-and-branch time correspondences, but calendar information does not prove auspiciousness. If a source uses apparent solar time or another Zi-hour boundary, disclose that conversion rather than presenting a result with hidden inputs.
Versions, folk interpretations, and source limits
The hierarchy matters: Suipo belongs to the year layer and Yuepo to the month layer; neither is synonymous with an hour clash. The Xieji Bianfang Shu discussion of month establishment and breaking also distinguishes readings concerning days and directions, showing why context matters even for a shared name. The supplied Suipo and Yuepo examples therefore belong in a comparison of time layers, not in two fixed periods of a day.
What to check in the actual setting
Practical scheduling should first meet participants', site, weather, rest, and procedural needs. Traditional time selection may be a negotiated cultural preference, but a clash label cannot determine the illness, personality, or marriage of someone born then, or justify delaying something urgent. When versions disagree, show their differing rules rather than accumulating labels into a claim of inevitable harm.
Practical improvements and the limits of remedies
For study or recordkeeping, use separate rows for year, month, day, and hour. Record the selected stems and branches, source rule, and comparison object, then identify the layer where the conflict is claimed. Negotiate a different date if the plan is flexible. Without a dependable rule basis, stop short of certainty. Mirrors, ornaments, and turning a room cannot alter the original time inputs and should not be presented as the same kind of remedy.
Similar names and common confusions
Zodiac clashes commonly use the six opposing year-branch pairs, and a calendar's animal-clash notation is not automatically an hour clash. Directional clashes concern directional and annual-deity rules rather than doors physically facing one another. This page separates the entry points instead of supplying an unspecified time-selection calculator, so readers can return to a particular date, version, and purpose.
Sources and further reading
These sources help clarify the concepts and their origins. Explaining a traditional term does not establish that it can predict outcomes.