Thank you Lorraine. This was very clear and friendly. I am currently teaching some on the stems and branches as actual semi-physical structures, 纲纪. I am going to direct my students to your video to learn this time/space motion aspect of this.
Very nice Lorraine. I think most acupuncturists would be curious why the elements of the branches differ from the elements of the channels. For instance the yang wood branch (Gallbladder) is at the clock time of the yin metal element (Lung). The way I learned it was that the court day began at 3 AM, so it's a wood branch (begining of day), but the Prime Minister (Lung) was in charge of court procedure (Metal). Do you know of a better reconciliation? Also, I'd emphasize that both Stems and Branches follow the creative cycle of the 5 elements even if that arrangement was developed much later historically. You mentioned that but I think it deserves more emphasis as a cardnal principle of Chinese Medicine.
I mostly wanted this to be practical and not go off into all kinds of theoretical stuff like why there are these element associations. I think things kind of grew organically as different systems and then later people tried to reconcile them. I don't picture these things as one gameboard developed at one time for internal consistency. Someone developed the 12 branches. Someone later attached the five elements to them. Someone later thought the twelve channels should sync up with the twelve branches and the time of day but the channels already had different element associations. It is like a quilt that was patched together out of different scraps of fabric. You appear to want to impose an overall scheme to it. I am content with a certain level of mismatch. Each application of elements, stems, and branches has its own rules, and the rules differ between different applications. As far as cardinal principals... don't you think different styles emphasize different things? A cardinal principle in one style might be lower ranked in another style. Anyway, just my thoughts...
Thanks so much for this, Lorraine. I offer a lecture on the branches and stems in Cosmology and Philosophy but there is never enough time to cover it all. I so appreciate that I can direct students to your video for further information.
