Four Pillars and Four Diviners: Fate, Fluidity, and Invention in Horoscopic Saju Divination in Contemporary South Korea

Horoscopic eight-character divination, saju p’alcha, or saju for short, flourishes in South Korea. This article profiles four diviners and their reflections on saju. Their conceptualizations of fate shape their ethics and personal livelihoods while highlighting the qualitative diversity and fluid inventiveness of divination practices, which is emphasized here over its analytical dimensions. The first diviner began by working in a divination café but has since transitioned to teaching his own students and gives readings from his office. The second diviner worked off the streets in a park, but now divines from his home, while the third used to work primarily from a street-tent but has since disappeared from the scene. The fourth works exclusively from her office in a lucrative area of Seoul with an unmarked storefront. Each diviner has their own unique style and interpretation of the craft, which provides insights into saju’s structural dynamics, in addition to the formations of fate, character, and subjectivity, which are potentially more fluid than fixed.