Each entry gives the term in traditional and simplified form, its pinyin, the senses it carries in the classical corpus, the passages where it does real work, and how published translations have rendered it.
fā méng
A named needling method, listed under the prohibitions: on a 甲乙 day one may not needle the head, nor 發矇 in the ear. The name says what it does — it opens a film, and what it opens here is the ear, later comment identifying the points inside the auditory meatus. Two things follow. First, early needling had methods named for their effect rather than their site. Second, even a good method has days on which it must not be used.
chuán dǎo zhī guān
The large intestine's office. What issues from it is 變化 — transformation, not merely transport: the residue is altered on the way through, which is why the office is named for conducting rather than for carrying. The reading to guard is 道 as dǎo rather than dào: the large intestine conducts, it does not teach.
shòu chéng zhī guān
The small intestine's office: what the stomach has broken down is handed on to it, and it holds it and finishes the work. What issues is 化物 — the separating out of what is usable from what is not. The reading to guard is 盛 as chéng, to fill, not shèng, to flourish: this office is a vessel, not a peak.
jiāng jūn zhī guān
The liver's office, and the pairing that makes it intelligible: what issues from the liver is 謀慮, planning and deliberation — the general's business is counsel before it is force. The gallbladder that follows is where the counsel becomes a verdict. Read together, the two offices are one movement: the liver weighs, the gallbladder decides.
cāng lǐn zhī guān
The office of the spleen and stomach together, and the reason the list is twelve rather than eleven: 脾胃 are named as one office while counted as two organs. What issues from them is 五味, the five flavours — the whole business of taking food in and turning it into what the body can use. 倉 stores and 廩 issues; both halves are needed, which is why one office carries two organs.
zhōng zhèng zhī guān
The gallbladder's office. What issues from it is 決斷 — the decision itself. 王冰：「剛正果決，故官為中正。」The impartiality here is not a moral virtue but the character of a verdict: the gallbladder is where weighing ends and something is settled. It is the smallest of the twelve in bulk and the one that decides.
xiàng fù zhī guān
The lung's office. What issues from it is 治節 — governance and regulation: the lung is what keeps the body's motions measured and in season. 王冰：「位高非君，故官為相傅。」The word to watch is 傅, not 傳: the lung is the tutor who stands beside the ruler, not the chancellor who governs in his place.
zhōu dū zhī guān
The bladder's office, and the only one in the list whose action is made conditional. Fluids are stored there — 津液藏焉 — and they leave only when qi transforms them: 氣化則能出矣. 州都 is the seat to which water is brought and where it gathers, which is why reservoir is the common rendering and why it is not quite enough: 都 is a capital, not a tank.
jūn zhǔ zhī guān
The heart's office, and the one the whole chapter rests on. What issues from it is 神明 — spirit brightness, the clarity by which a person knows and judges. Everything the chapter finally says turns on this office alone: if the ruler is clear those below are at peace, and if the ruler is not clear all twelve are in danger. The list is an anatomy only in appearance; in argument it is a chain of command.
zuò qiáng zhī guān
The kidney's office. 王冰：「強於作用，故曰作強。」What issues from it is 伎巧 — skill and craft, the dexterity of a body whose foundation is sound. Read 作強 as causative rather than descriptive: the kidney is not itself the strong labourer but what makes strength and dexterity possible. A minority reading takes 強 as qiǎng, to strain, which fits a kidney that is failing; the note keeps it.
jué dú zhī guān
The triple burner's office, and the one member of the twelve with no nameable thing behind it: it is a function, not an organ. What issues from it is 水道, the waterways. 決 is the breach that releases, 瀆 the channel that carries — the office does both, which is why a single English noun has trouble with it.
gù xié
The chapter's answer to its own question, and a word that changes the shape of the argument. Something was hurt before — dampness that lodged in the blood and between the muscles, a fall that left blood inside, an anger or a meal or a change of weather that was never resolved — and it stayed, silent. When the pores open and wind and cold come, the new evil does not act alone; it joins the old, and the two together produce the illness. 相襲 is the verb: to come upon in succession, like garments put on one over another. The concept is the chapter's real contribution, because it explains illness without an obvious cause: nothing new was needed, only the arrival of a small thing upon an old one. It is also why the chapter can speak of ghosts and mean it medically — what comes from so far back leaves no trace at the door.