Classica Sinica Medica

傳乘 简体 传乘

chuán chéng

Transmission and encroachment · chuan cheng

Also rendered: transmission and encroachment (Keeps both words as actions) · conveyance and overriding (Wiseman-leaning: overriding is their term for 乘) · transfer and invasion (Invasion is too violent for riding into a gap) · chuan cheng (Bare transliteration)

Core vocabulary

Reviewed · 2026-09

At a glance

Pinyin
chuán chéng
Simplified
传乘
Literal
傳 to relay, to hand on, a post-stage relay (《說文》: 遽也 — a courier's relay); 乘 to mount, to ride upon (《說文》: 覆也; 段注: 加其上曰乘). Two ways a disease moves: it is handed on in order, or it rides in on another's weakness.
Shuowen
《說文解字》：傳，遽也（段玉裁注：傳者，以車馬給使者，引申爲傳遞）；乘，覆也（段注：加其上曰乘）。

In brief

The chapter’s two mechanisms of movement, named together at the end of its long discussion of transmission. 傳 is ordered movement: the viscera hand the disease along the conquest cycle, liver to spleen to kidney to heart to lung, and each handover can be counted, so the time of death can be calculated in months, or days, or in fifths of a day and night. 乘 is movement that ignores order: one emotion empties a viscus and another’s qi rides into the gap — joy empties the heart and the kidney encroaches, anger lets the liver encroach, sorrow the lung, fear the spleen, anxiety the heart. Five diseases and five encroachments give twenty-five variations, and the chapter closes the section by saying these are the names of the two things it has been describing.

Senses in the classical corpus

1
Two ways a disease moves 及其傳化。傳乘之名也
傳者以次，乘者乘虛
故病有五，五五二十五變，及其傳化。傳乘之名也 — Suwen 19
2
Ordered transmission 傳之於其所勝
各傳其所勝，如肝傳脾
五藏有病，則各傳其所勝 — Suwen 19
3
Counted, and therefore timed 法三月若六月，若三日若六日
傳五藏而當死
不治，法三月若六月，若三日若六日，傳五藏而當死 — Suwen 19
4
Encroachment on emptiness 喜大虚則腎氣乘矣
喜則心氣大虛而腎氣乘之
因而喜大虚則腎氣乘矣 — Suwen 19
5
The five and the twenty-five 病有五，五五二十五變
五病各有所乘，故二十五變
故病有五，五五二十五變 — Suwen 19

Occurrences in the classics

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

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1 passages
素問·玉機真藏論 Suwen 19 · 玉機真藏論 Read in context →
因而喜大虚則腎氣乘矣，怒則肝氣乘矣，悲則肺氣乘矣，恐則脾氣乘矣，憂則心氣乘矣，此其道也。故病有五，五五二十五變，及其傳化。傳乘之名也。 因而喜大虚则肾气乘矣，怒则肝气乘矣，悲则肺气乘矣，恐则脾气乘矣，忧则心气乘矣，此其道也。故病有五，五五二十五变，及其传化。传乘之名也。
Yīn ér xǐ dà xū zé shèn qì chéng yǐ, nù zé gān qì chéng yǐ, bēi zé fèi qì chéng yǐ, kǒng zé pí qì chéng yǐ, yōu zé xīn qì chéng yǐ, cǐ qí dào yě. Gù bìng yǒu wǔ, wǔ wǔ èr shí wǔ biàn, jí qí chuán huà. Chuán chéng zhī míng yě.
Thus great joy leaves a great emptiness and the kidney qi encroaches; anger lets the liver qi encroach; sorrow lets the lung qi encroach; fear lets the spleen qi encroach; anxiety lets the heart qi encroach. Such is its way. So there are five diseases, and five times five — twenty-five variations, through their transmission and transformation. These are the names of transmission and encroachment.
本篇傳變之論，析為二端：一曰傳，五藏以所勝相傳，肝傳脾、脾傳腎、腎傳心、心傳肺，各有其期（三月、六月、三日、六日），故可「一日一夜五分之」以占死生之早暮；二曰乘，情志過極則一藏虛而所不勝之氣乘之——喜大虛則腎氣乘，怒則肝氣乘，悲則肺氣乘，恐則脾氣乘，憂則心氣乘。病有五，五五二十五變，及其傳化，故曰「傳乘之名也」。與第十五篇「所勝所不勝」（行所不勝曰逆，逆則死；行所勝曰從，從則活）同條而義進：第十五篇以之論脈，本篇則以之論傳變與情志。

Compounds built on this term

傳
chuán
to transmit, to relay
說文：遽也
乘
chéng
to encroach, to ride upon
說文：覆也；加其上曰乘
所勝
suǒ shèng
what it conquers
傳變所循之次
傳化
chuán huà
transmission and transformation
傳與化並稱
二十五變
èr shí wǔ biàn
the twenty-five variations
五五相乘之數

How it has been translated

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

Wiseman & Fengconveyance and overridingTheir 傳 is conveyance; 乘 in the five-phase sense is overriding.
Common Englishtransmission and invasion, or transmission and encroachmentBoth circulate; neither is fixed.
This sitetransmission and encroachment傳 in 說文 is 遽, a courier's relay — staged, handed on, countable — and that is exactly why the chapter can time death by it. 乘 is 覆, to be added on top of: it needs an emptiness to arrive in, and the chapter supplies one from the emotions. Overriding is the correct technical term in the five-phase vocabulary and is not wrong, but it pictures force, while this passage is about a gap left open — joy empties, and something else rides in. Encroachment keeps that asymmetry, which is the whole reason the two words are set side by side.

Entry status

Review pending — who reviews this?

2026-09

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Reading path

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