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Meridians

Bladder

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Origin 1945 to 1963

The Bladder meridian (Foot Greater Yang) is the longest channel, descending from the inner eye over the head and down the back in two lines to the little toe. It stores and excretes urine and carries the Shu (transporting) points that access every organ. Its emotion is fear. Paired with the Kidney in the Water phase. Peak activity 3pm to 5pm.

Facts
Origins
Origin Period
1945 to 1963 1Tradition: Traditional Chinese Medicine as standardised in the People's Republic
Origin Period
200 BCE to 168 BCE 2Tradition: Mawangdui medical manuscripts
Origin Period
c. 100 BCE - 100 CE 3Tradition: Huangdi neijing
Origin Period
The twelve-conduit system, paired yin and yang, circulating in a daily round and tied to the viscera, is set out in the Huangdi neijing corpus 3Tradition: Huangdi neijing
Origin Period
This is the layer the classical theory belongs to 3Tradition: Huangdi neijing
Origin of the Name
The English "meridian" is a translator's term, not a rendering of the Chinese. Jingmai and jingluo mean conduits, channels and the vessels branching from them; scholarly translation gives conduits or vessels, and "meridian" imports a cartographic image the Chinese does not carry. 2
Language
Classical Chinese 2
Attestation
Meaning in the Attesting Source
The bladder channel is the longest continuous pathway among the twelve, running the full length of the back in two parallel lines, and it is along this channel that the back transport points associated with every other zang and fu organ are located, one channel carrying points named for organs it is not itself. 4Tradition: Huangdi neijing
Chinese Correspondences
Yin or Yang
Yang 3
Learn More
The Bladder Meridian

The Bladder meridian (Zu Tai Yang Pang Guang Jing) is one of the twelve principal channels of Chinese medicine, the network along which qi is held to circulate through the body. It is a Yang channel, paired with the Bladder, and belongs to the phase of Water in the five-phase (wu xing) scheme.

Function in the tradition

In the theory of the channels this meridian is concerned with the storing and discharge of fluid; its channel is the longest, running the length of the back. The twelve principal channels are arranged in yin-yang pairs and in a daily cycle through which qi is said to pass from one to the next, and the points along them are those used in acupuncture and related therapies.

The meridian is described here as a concept of traditional Chinese medicine, a system of ideas and practice with a long documented history, rather than as an anatomical structure of Western physiology.

The Longest Channel and the Row of Transport Points

The Bladder channel is the longest in the system and carries the most points, sixty seven of them, running from the inner corner of the eye over the crown, down the back in two parallel lines, and along the back of the leg to the little toe. Its length is out of all proportion to the organ it is named for, and the tradition's use of it is correspondingly wide.

The reason is the row of back shu points, the transport points, which lie along the inner branch of the channel on either side of the spine. Each of the twelve organs of the system has one, arranged from the top down in roughly the order the organs sit in the trunk: Lung high between the shoulder blades, Kidney low in the lumbar region. This makes the Bladder channel a kind of index of the whole scheme, and it is the reason a practitioner working in this tradition may attend to the back when the named concern is elsewhere.

The outer branch of the channel carries a second row, named for the spirits the tradition associates with each organ, and those names are among the most poetic in the classical literature.

The Bladder pairs with the Kidney as the yang and yin of Water and holds the horary period from three to five in the afternoon.

The atlas records the tradition's arrangement and makes no anatomical or clinical claim about it.

Cross-Tradition Connections

Associated With

Acupuncture, Disciplines

Acupuncture points lie along the twelve primary meridians and two extraordinary vessels, including the Bladder meridian; needling a point is meant to affect qi flow along its meridian.

Source Huangdi Neijing (The Yellow Emperor's Inner Classic)Traditionally attributed to Huangdi; actual authorship unknown
Traditional Chinese Medicine, Disciplines

TCM organizes diagnosis and treatment, including acupuncture point selection, around the twelve primary meridians and two extraordinary vessels along which qi is held to flow, including the Bladder meridian.

Source Huangdi Neijing (The Yellow Emperor's Inner Classic)Traditionally attributed to Huangdi; actual authorship unknown

Disciplines That Use This

Tai Chi, Disciplines

The meridians the practice claims to move qi along.

Source Lost T'ai-chi Classics from the Late Ch'ing DynastyDouglas Wile

Originates in Language

Classical Chinese, Languages
Source Medicine in China: A History of IdeasPaul U. Unschuld

Related To

Qi (Ki, Gi), Subtle Energies

One of the twelve principal meridians (jingluo) through which qi is said to circulate.

Source The Foundations of Chinese Medicine: A Comprehensive TextGiovanni Maciocia
Sources
1. Chinese Medicine in Early Communist China, 1945-1963: A Medicine of Revolution
Kim Taylor, RoutledgeCurzon, 2005On the standardisation of Chinese medicine as a national system
2. Medicine in China: A History of Ideas
Paul U. Unschuld, University of California Press, 1985On the doctrine of the conduits, the circulation of qi, and the system of the five phasesView the Source
3. Huang Di Nei Jing Su Wen: An Annotated Translation of Huang Di's Inner Classic - Basic Questions
Paul U. Unschuld and Hermann Tessenow, University of California Press, 2011The Su wen on the conduits and the organ functions assigned to them
4. Huangdi Neijing (The Yellow Emperor's Inner Classic)
Traditionally attributed to Huangdi; actual authorship unknownon the bladder channel's length and its back transport points for the other organsView the Source
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