---
title: "Influential and confluent points"
url: "https://acuiq.com/wiki/nomenclature/influential-and-confluent-points"
updated: 2026-10-09
last_verified: 2026-10-09
license: CC-BY-4.0
license_url: "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"
section: "nomenclature"
basis: "Classical"
audience: "Practitioner"
published: "2026-10-09"
reading_minutes: 7
sources: 8
---

# Influential and confluent points

_The eight influential points of the Nanjing, the eight confluent points that open the extraordinary vessels, and the lower he-sea points of the six fu from the Lingshu._

Three sets of points each gather several things at one place on the body. The eight influential points, or hui-meeting points (hui 會), are where the qi of eight kinds of tissue or function meets. The eight confluent points (bamai jiaohui xue 八脈交會穴) are where the twelve organ channels communicate with the eight extraordinary vessels. The lower he-sea points (xia he xue 下合穴) are the points on the three yang channels of the leg that correspond to the six fu organs. The [WHO International Standard Terminologies on Traditional Medicine](https://iris.who.int/handle/10665/206952) of 2007 defines all three sets in those terms, and each comes from a different text: the influential points from the Nanjing, the confluent points from a 13th-century guide to the needling classics, and the lower he-sea points from the Lingshu.

## The eight influential points

[Difficulty 45 of the Nanjing](https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/%E9%9B%A3%E7%B6%93), the Classic of Difficult Issues, which the WHO terminology dates to the Han dynasty, names the eight meetings and says what they are for: for a hot disease inside the body, take the point of the meeting concerned. The Nanjing places some meetings by a named point and others by a region of the body. The point the region stands for comes from later texts, chiefly the [Leijing tuyi](https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/%E9%A1%9E%E7%B6%93_%28%E5%9B%9B%E5%BA%AB%E5%85%A8%E6%9B%B8%E6%9C%AC%29/%E5%9C%96%E7%BF%BC%E5%8D%B709) of Zhang Jiebin, the illustrated companion to his Classified Classic (Leijing), which the WHO terminology dates to 1624. Zhang gives a reason for each.

| Meeting of | Where the Nanjing places it | Point | Source of the identification |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| The zang organs | At the free ribs (jixie) | [`LV13`](/points/LV13) Zhangmen | The Leijing tuyi gives Zhangmen, the spleen’s front-mu point, because the five zang draw on the spleen |
| The fu organs | At Taicang | [`CV12`](/points/CV12) Zhongwan | The [Zhenjiu jiayi jing](https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/%E9%8D%BC%E7%81%B8%E7%94%B2%E4%B9%99%E7%B6%93/%E5%8D%B7%E4%B8%89) records Taicang as another name for Zhongwan |
| Qi | Outside the triple burner, one sinew in, straight between the breasts | [`CV17`](/points/CV17) Danzhong | The Leijing tuyi gives Danzhong, where the gathering qi of the triple burner resides |
| Blood | At Geshu | [`BL17`](/points/BL17) Geshu | Named in the Nanjing |
| Sinews | At Yanglingquan | [`GB34`](/points/GB34) Yanglingquan | Named in the Nanjing |
| Vessels | At Taiyuan | [`LU09`](/points/LU09) Taiyuan | Named in the Nanjing; the Leijing tuyi calls the wrist pulse there the great meeting of the vessels |
| Bone | At Dazhu | [`BL11`](/points/BL11) Dazhu | The Leijing tuyi gives Dazhui, [`GV14`](/points/GV14), instead |
| Marrow | At Juegu | [`GB39`](/points/GB39) Xuanzhong | The Leijing tuyi gives Xuanzhong, as the marrow belongs to the bone |

The bone meeting is the one on which the two texts name different points: the Nanjing writes Dazhu, on the bladder channel, and the Leijing tuyi Dazhui, on the governing vessel. Several of the eight belong to other sets as well: LV13 and CV12 are the front-mu points of the spleen and stomach and CV17 the front-mu point of the pericardium in later lists, all set out with the back-shu row that holds BL17 in [Back-shu and front-mu points](/wiki/nomenclature/back-shu-and-front-mu-points).

## The eight confluent points

The set enters the literature in the [Zhenjing zhinan](https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/%E9%87%9D%E7%B6%93%E6%8C%87%E5%8D%97), the Guide to the Acupuncture Classics of Dou Hanqing, which the WHO terminology dates to 1295. Dou calls them the eight points of the crossing channels and says he did not know who first described them: the preface he had read credited a recluse of Mount Shaoshi, and he had the text from a man named Song Zihua and used the method for 41 years between the Huai and Yellow rivers. His chapter on their locations places each of the eight and names its partner, so they work in four pairs, each joining a point on the arm or hand with one on the leg or foot. The same book’s rhymed guide, the Biao you fu, assigns the yang qiao, yang wei, du and dai vessels to disorders of the shoulders, back, lower back and legs on the exterior, and the yin qiao, yin wei, ren and chong vessels to the heart, abdomen, flanks and ribs inside.

The [Zhenjiu dacheng](https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/%E9%87%9D%E7%81%B8%E5%A4%A7%E6%88%90/%E5%8D%B7%E4%B8%83) of Yang Jizhou, dated to 1601, gives in its seventh volume the vessel each point opens and the regions each pair was held to reach. The vessels are described in [The extraordinary vessels](/wiki/theory/the-extraordinary-vessels).

| Point | Vessel | Paired point | Vessel | Regions the pair reaches |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| [`SP04`](/points/SP04) Gongsun | Chong | [`PC06`](/points/PC06) Neiguan | Yin wei | The heart, chest and stomach |
| [`GB41`](/points/GB41) Zulinqi | Dai | [`TB05`](/points/TB05) Waiguan | Yang wei | The outer corner of the eye, the ear, the cheek, neck and shoulder |
| [`SI03`](/points/SI03) Houxi | Du | [`BL62`](/points/BL62) Shenmai | Yang qiao | The inner corner of the eye, the neck and nape, the ear, the shoulder, the small intestine and bladder |
| [`LU07`](/points/LU07) Lieque | Ren | [`KD06`](/points/KD06) Zhaohai | Yin qiao | The lung, throat, chest and diaphragm |

The dacheng also prints the method that times them. The WHO terminology calls it the eightfold method of the sacred tortoise (linggui bafa 靈龜八法), which selects a confluent point by the eight trigrams, the nine squares and the heavenly stems and earthly branches of the day and hour. The dacheng gives each of the eight points a trigram and a number for that calculation.

## The lower he-sea points of the six fu

[Chapter 4 of the Lingshu](https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/%E9%BB%83%E5%B8%9D%E5%85%A7%E7%B6%93/%E9%9D%88%E6%A8%9E%E7%AC%AC%E4%B8%80%E5%8D%B7) separates the jobs of the transport points: the ying-spring and shu-stream points treat the outer course of a channel, and the he-sea points treat the fu organs inside. Asked whether those he-sea points have names, it lists one for each of the six fu, all on the stomach, bladder and gallbladder channels of the leg. Chapter 2 had already placed two of them: three cun below Sanli is the upper Juxu and three cun below that the lower Juxu, the large intestine belonging to the upper and the small intestine to the lower, and both to the stomach.

| Fu organ | He-sea point of its own channel | Lower he-sea point |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Stomach | [`ST36`](/points/ST36) Zusanli | `ST36` |
| Large intestine | [`LI11`](/points/LI11) Quchi | [`ST37`](/points/ST37) Shangjuxu |
| Small intestine | [`SI08`](/points/SI08) Xiaohai | [`ST39`](/points/ST39) Xiajuxu |
| Triple burner | [`TB10`](/points/TB10) Tianjing | [`BL39`](/points/BL39) Weiyang |
| Bladder | [`BL40`](/points/BL40) Weizhong | `BL40` |
| Gallbladder | `GB34` | `GB34` |

For the three fu whose channels run on the leg, the lower he-sea point is the channel’s own he-sea point; the three fu of the hand channels take a point on a leg channel. Chapter 2 says the triple burner’s lower point, Weiyang, binds the lower burner: when it is full the urine is held back, and when it is empty the urine leaks, so it is supplemented for leaking and drained for retention. For each of the six fu, chapter 4 lists the signs of its disorders and the point to take. A [2023 review](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37429664/) by Wu and Wang at the Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine names this rule, that the he-sea points of the three yang channels of the foot treat the six fu, as one reason the yang-channel source points drew little attention for the same disorders.

## What these sources cannot tell you

All three sets are classical attributions, and none of the texts reports how patients fared. The Nanjing names some of its meetings by region, so the point printed for them depends on which commentator is followed, and the texts disagree on the bone meeting. Dou Hanqing did not know where the confluent points came from, and the vessel each opens is recorded in the later Zhenjiu dacheng. Several points belong to more than one set: GB34 is an influential point, a lower he-sea point and the gallbladder channel’s he-sea point, and LU09 is an influential point and the lung’s shu-stream and source point, so a prescription that includes either does not say which role a study had in mind.

AcuiQ’s protocols record the points a study used, not the rule it chose them by; [What AcuiQ does not do](/wiki/method/what-acuiq-does-not-do) sets out that limit. The other sets of named points are in [Five transport points](/wiki/nomenclature/five-transport-points) and [Source, connecting and cleft points](/wiki/nomenclature/source-connecting-and-cleft-points).

### Sources

1. World Health Organization Regional Office for the Western Pacific, WHO international standard terminologies on traditional medicine in the Western Pacific Region, 2007 (sections 5.1 and 7) — https://iris.who.int/handle/10665/206952
2. Nanjing (Classic of Difficult Issues), difficulty 45, Chinese text, Wikisource — https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/%E9%9B%A3%E7%B6%93
3. Zhang Jiebin, Leijing tuyi, volume 9 (Siku quanshu edition), Chinese text, Wikisource — https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/%E9%A1%9E%E7%B6%93_%28%E5%9B%9B%E5%BA%AB%E5%85%A8%E6%9B%B8%E6%9C%AC%29/%E5%9C%96%E7%BF%BC%E5%8D%B709
4. Huangfu Mi, Zhenjiu jiayi jing (A-B Classic of Acupuncture and Moxibustion), volume 3, Chinese text, Wikisource — https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/%E9%8D%BC%E7%81%B8%E7%94%B2%E4%B9%99%E7%B6%93/%E5%8D%B7%E4%B8%89
5. Dou Hanqing, Zhenjing zhinan (Guide to the Acupuncture Classics), 1295, Chinese text, Wikisource — https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/%E9%87%9D%E7%B6%93%E6%8C%87%E5%8D%97
6. Yang Jizhou, Zhenjiu dacheng (Complete Compendium of Acupuncture and Moxibustion), 1601, volume 7, Chinese text, Wikisource — https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/%E9%87%9D%E7%81%B8%E5%A4%A7%E6%88%90/%E5%8D%B7%E4%B8%83
7. Huangdi neijing Lingshu, volume 1, chapters 2 (Ben shu) and 4 (Xie qi zangfu bing xing), Chinese text, Wikisource — https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/%E9%BB%83%E5%B8%9D%E5%85%A7%E7%B6%93/%E9%9D%88%E6%A8%9E%E7%AC%AC%E4%B8%80%E5%8D%B7
8. Wu T, Wang XY, Discussion on the relationship between yuan-source points of yang meridians and diseases of fu-organs, Zhongguo Zhen Jiu 2023 — https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37429664/