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.
qí ǒu
The odd formula and the even one, told apart by the number of drugs in them: 君一臣二，奇之制也；君二臣四，偶之制也；君二臣三，奇之制也；君二臣六，偶之制也. The count is of the whole formula, not of any one rank — 君二臣三 is five and odd though it has an even lord — so 奇 and 偶 are properties of the number a formula lands on. Which of the two to use is then given as a rule of distance: 近者奇之，遠者偶之, 汗者不以奇，下者不以偶, and the size of the dose answers to it — 近而奇偶，制小其服也；遠而奇偶，制大其服也；大則數少，小則數多. The pair is thus the chapter's arithmetic of prescriptions, and it is the thing that fails first: 奇之不去則偶之，是謂重方.
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.
guān zhēn
The nine needles considered as a set of offices. 凡刺之要，官鍼最妙 — the essence of needling lies in the official needles — and the chapter then assigns each one its post: the chan for skin, the yuan for partition flesh, the feng for channels, the di for supplementing a scant pulse, the pi for pus, the yuan-li for sudden bi, the hao for lingering bi, the chang for deep disease, the da for dropsy. To use a needle outside its office is the chapter's definition of failure.