濁氣简体浊气

zhuó qì

Turbid qi

Also rendered: turbid qi (Literal, and standard) · impure qi (Moralises a mechanical term) · turbidity (Makes it a substance rather than a qi)

Physiology

Reviewed · 2026-09

At a glance

Pinyin: zhuó qì
Simplified: 浊气
Literal: 濁 muddy, turbid, the opposite of 清 clear; 氣 qi. What is turbid here is not evil but left over — the remainder of what the storing organs have already used.
Shuowen: 《說文解字》：濁，水名（引申為不清）；气，雲气也。王冰：「言水穀入已，糟粕變化而泄出，不能久久留住於中。」

In brief

The organs keep the pure part of what comes in; what they are finished with is handed to the palaces of transmission as turbid qi, and the palaces exist precisely in order not to keep it. Wang Bing is emphatic on the timing: once transformed, it is to be transmitted and discharged, not held. The turbidity is not an enemy to be driven out but a remainder to be moved on.

Senses in the classical corpus

What the organs hand on 五藏濁氣

The remainder of what has been used

此受五藏濁氣，名曰傳化之府 — Suwen 11

It must not be kept 不能久留

王冰：不能久久留住於中，但當化已，輸寫令去而已

此不能久留輸冩者也 — Suwen 11

Not the same as an evil 與虛邪賊風別

Turbid qi arises within and is to be moved on; a thieving wind comes from without and is to be avoided

— — Suwen 1 / 11

The pairing with the clear 清濁

The clear rises and is stored, the turbid descends and is discharged

— — later formulations

Occurrences in the classics

Passages where the term does real work, with the original, pinyin and English on the same line.

Display

2 passages

素問·五藏别論 Suwen 11 · 五藏别論 Read in context →

夫胃、大腸、小腸、三焦、膀胱，此五者，天氣之所生也，其氣象天，故冩而不藏。此受五藏濁氣，名曰傳化之府。此不能久留輸冩者也。夫胃、大肠、小肠、三焦、膀胱，此五者，天气之所生也，其气象天，故写而不藏。此受五藏浊气，名曰传化之府。此不能久留输写者也。

fú wèi, dà cháng, xiǎo cháng, sān jiāo, páng guāng, cǐ wǔ zhě, tiān qì zhī suǒ shēng yě, qí qì xiàng tiān, gù xiě ér bù cáng. cǐ shòu wǔ zàng zhuó qì, míng yuē chuán huà zhī fǔ. cǐ bù néng jiǔ liú shū xiě zhě yě.

Now stomach, large intestine, small intestine, triple burner and bladder — these five are born of the qi of heaven; their qi images heaven, and therefore they discharge and do not store. They receive the turbid qi of the five storing organs. They are named the palaces of transmission and transformation. These are the places in which nothing may be held long — only passed along and discharged.

本篇「此受五藏濁氣，名曰傳化之府。此不能久留輸冩者也。」王冰：「言水穀入已，糟粕變化而泄出，不能久久留住於中，但當化已，輸寫令去而已，傳寫諸化，故曰傳化之府也。」

素問·經脉别論 Suwen 21 · 經脉别論 Read in context →

食氣入胃，濁氣歸心，淫精於脉。脉氣流經，經氣歸於肺，肺朝百脉，輸精於皮毛。食气入胃，浊气归心，淫精于脉。脉气流经，经气归于肺，肺朝百脉，输精于皮毛。

Shí qì rù wèi, zhuó qì guī xīn, yín jīng yú mài. Mài qì liú jīng, jīng qì guī yú fèi, fèi cháo bǎi mài, shū jīng yú pí máo.

Food qi enters the stomach; the turbid qi returns to the heart, which steeps essence into the vessels. Vessel qi flows through the channels, channel qi returns to the lung; the lung is courted by the hundred vessels and conveys essence to skin and hair.

「食氣入胃，濁氣歸心，淫精於脉。脉氣流經，經氣歸於肺」：本篇濁氣之義，在與「精」相對為文——食氣入胃，其厚濁者歸於心，心復以其精淫於脈。與本書他篇之以濁為邪者有別：本篇之濁，乃食氣之厚者，非病理之濁邪，故其歸心不為害而為用；上文「食氣入胃，散精於肝，淫氣於筋」言其輕清之一路，此句言其厚濁之一路，兩路並出同源。與第十七篇「夫精明五色者，氣之華也」所論者同屬飲食所化之類，而彼論其見於外之華，此論其行於內之濁。下文「脉氣流經，經氣歸於肺，肺朝百脉」，即此路之接。

Compounds built on this term

濁

zhuó

turbid

說文：水名，引申為不清

清

qīng

clear

與濁對舉

糟粕

zāo pò

the dregs

王冰's word for what the turbid becomes

輸冩

shū xiě

to transmit and discharge

What must be done with it

How it has been translated

Every rendering below is a decision about which reader is being addressed. There is no neutral option.

Common English	turbid qi	Standard, and the pairing with clear qi is well established in English writing on Chinese medicine.
This site	turbid qi	Kept unchanged. The word is doing ordinary work here — what is left over after the organs have taken what they need — and impure would invite a moral reading that the chapter's plumbing does not support.

Entry status

Review pending — who reviews this?

2026-09

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Reading path

Guided routes through the corpus, each built on a handful of chapters and their key terms.

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