The Foundations of Traditional Chinese Medicine

Yin and yang are used to represent two opposing concepts on the one hand, and they are also used to stand for a harmony between two opposing elements on the other. All phenomena and objects in the universe can be classified into yin and yang. Five elements refer to wood (mu), fire (huo), earth (tu), metal (jin), and water (shui) which had been used by the ancient Chinese to explain away natural phenomena and their connections with each other. Energy, blood, body fluids are the material bases of the human body, they are the foundations underlying the activities of internal organs, meridians, tissues, and senses. The energy is moving pure and refined materials whose primary functions are those of pushing and warming, it belongs to yang; the blood and the body fluids are two names for water in the body under normal circumstances. The birth, growth, aging, and death as well as the attack and development of diseases are, all of them, the results of the movements and changes of the energy, the blood, and the body fluids.