The Chinese have made use of constellations for over 3000 years for the purposes of astrology. In Chinese astrology Ox comes after Rat and this year, 2009 is the year of the Earth Ox. When Chinese astrology first began they names 10 Heavenly Stems and 12 Earthly Branches, chiefly for chronological purposes to tell apart time and the season.
Later on in time, as so many Chinese people were illiterate animals became used by people to represent the 12 Earthly Branches, these are used today, and in order are: mouse, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, sheep, monkey, rooster, dog and pig, in Chinese astrology, Ox is representative of 2009.
Legend tells that Buddha was celebrating Chinese New Year and he invited all animals to partake of the festivities. Unfortunately only these 12 animals arrive. In honor of them he named the years after them. There are other variations of this story, but for the purposes of this information we shall use this one. People who are born in the year of the animal it is represented by are supposed to have some traits of these animals inherent in them.
As well as the animal cycles we find element cycles. The five elements are wood, fire, earth, metal (gold) and water, each element is represented by color with fire being red, earth, brown, wood, green, water black and metal, white (although the metal element is supposedly gold). These are placed at the top of each animal and the sign would read, "wood rooster", or "metal dragon".
The animal zodiac consists of 12 and this is divisible by two, so each sign falls under the binary Yin and Yang years, with no two animal represented by both. They are either Yin or Yang and this is determined by if the year is an odd or even year. The combination of the animals, colors and elements leads Chinese astrology to have a 60 year cycle, and our present cycle began in 1984. The cycle always begins with a wood rat and ends with a water pig.
The Ox is a very similar zodiac sign to the Rat in Chinese Astrology. It is significant in that it symbolizes a sure and steady building action so good decisions have to be made in 2009, as there are long term implications attached to your decisions. 2009 is an earth Ox year and this has destructive potential as the ruling element of Ox is water. However the past 6 years have been fraught with conflicting Chinese zodiac years and elements, out of these 6, there have been four. Apparently this is why Chinese astrologers believe the world has experienced such conflict during these years.
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