Tag: Pīnyin Was Plan A

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Culture Experiences Language Learning Theocratic

jiàoyù

jiàoyù (jiào·yù teaching · educating [→ [education]] 教育) ← Tap/click to show/hide the “flashcard”

[Notes: Tap/click on a Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) expression to reveal its “flashcard”; tap/click on a “flashcard” or its Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) expression to hide the “flashcard”. 📖 📄 📘 icons mean 📖 Reveal All, 📄 Reveal Advanced, and 📘 Reveal None re all the “flashcards” in the heading, paragraph, etc. that they are placed at the beginning of.]

At the time of this writing, jw.org was featuring the article “Can Education and Money Guarantee a Secure Future?”. Of interest to those of us in the Mandarin field, this article mentions the comments and experiences of several Asians. Where the English version of this article uses the word “education”, the Mandarin version uses this week’s MEotW, “jiàoyù (jiào·yù teaching · educating [→ [education]] 教育)”. (Since this article is from a relatively recent issue of The Watchtower, it provides the option to show Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音).)

Related Expressions

The “jiào (teach | {teaching [→ [religion]]} | cause/ask 教)” in “jiàoyù (jiào·yù teaching · educating [→ [education]] 教育)” is a verb meaning “teach”. It also appears in past MEotW “jiàodǎo (jiào·dǎo teaching · {guiding [→ [instructing]]} 教导 教導)”, which means “teach” or “instruct”, and in “jiàoxun (teaching → [reprimanding | knowledge gained from an error; lesson; moral] 教训 教訓)”, which means “reprimanding” or “lesson”. (“Jiàoxun (teaching → [reprimanding | knowledge gained from an error; lesson; moral] 教训 教訓)” is also discussed in the MEotW post on “jiàodǎo (jiào·dǎo teaching · {guiding [→ [instructing]]} 教导 教導)”.) This “jiào (teach | {teaching [→ [religion]]} | cause/ask 教)” can also effectively mean “religion”, as it does in “Jīdū Jiào ((Jīdū Christ 基督) (Jiào Teaching → [Religion] 教) → [Christianity | Christian])” and in “Tiānzhǔ Jiào ((Tiān·zhǔ Heavenly · Lord → [Catholic] 天主) (Jiào Teaching → [Religion] 教) → [Catholicism])”.

The “yù ({give birth to} | rear; raise; {bring up}; cultivate | educating [→ [education]] 育)” in “jiàoyù (jiào·yù teaching · educating [→ [education]] 教育)” is a verb meaning “educate”. In other contexts, such as in the expressions “shēngyù ({giving [of] birth} [→ [fertility]] 生育)” and “yùzhǒng (yù·zhǒng {giving birth to} · breeds → [breeding] 育种 育種)”, it can mean “give birth to”.

Verbs or Nouns

While “jiàoyù (jiào·yù teaching · educating [→ [education]] 教育)” and its constituent morphemes are verbs, they can also be nouns. As the MEotW post for “jiàodǎo (jiào·dǎo teaching · {guiding [→ [instructing]]} 教导 教導)” explains:

One interesting thing to note about “jiàodǎo (jiào·dǎo teaching · {guiding [→ [instructing]]} 教导 教導)” (and about “jiàoxun (teaching → [reprimanding | knowledge gained from an error] 教训 教訓)”, for that matter) is that their component morphemes seem to basically be verbs. In certain contexts, however, they are used as nouns. An example of this being done in English is that “teach” and “teaching” are verbs (e.g. “Jesus was teaching the crowd.”), but in certain contexts, “teaching” is used as a noun (e.g. “The crowd was amazed at the teaching Jesus shared with them.”). When a word is used this way, it’s called a verbal noun, or a gerundial noun. Verbal nouns are quite common in Mandarin.

Usage Examples

Here are a couple of examples of “jiàoyù (jiào·yù teaching · educating [→ [education]] 教育)” in use, taken from the above-mentioned article:

English:

Can Education and Money Guarantee a Secure Future?

Mandarin:

📖 📄 📘 Jiàoyù (Jiào·yù Teaching · Educating → [Education] 教育) hé ({(together) with} → [and] 和 和/龢) Cáifù (Cái·fù Wealth · {Being Wealthy} 财富 財富) Néng (Can 能) Dàigěi (Dài·gěi Bring · {to Give to} 带给 帶給) Rén (People 人) Měihǎo (Měi·hǎo Beautiful · Good 美好) de (’s 的) Wèilái (Wèi·lái (What) {Is Not Yet} · Come → [Future] 未来 未來) Ma ([? ptcl for “yes/no” questions] 吗 嗎)?

English:

Like Franklin, many have concluded that there is more to life than pursuing higher education and riches.

Mandarin:

📖 📄 📘 Hěn (very 很) duō (many 多) rén (people 人) gēn (with 跟) Āfù (Franklin 阿富) yíyàng (yí·yàng {(of) one} · pattern → [the same] 一样 一樣), kànchū (kàn·chū see · out 看出) shēnghuó (shēng·huó life · living 生活) zhōng (within 中) yǒuxiē (yǒu·xiē {(there) are having → [(there) are]} · some 有些) shì (things 事) bǐ ({compared to} 比) zhuīqiú (zhuī·qiú pursuing · seeking 追求) gāoděng (gāo·děng high(er) · rank 高等) jiàoyù (jiào·yù teaching · educating → [education] 教育) hé ({(together) with} → [and] 和 和/龢) cáifù (cái·fù wealth · {being wealthy} 财富 財富) gèng (more 更) zhòngyào (zhòng·yào {being weighty} · {being important} 重要).

Education in the “Deep Things” of the World

In addition to the issues discussed in the above-mentioned article, the world’s higher education also tends to indoctrinate people in the “deep things” of this world that we know is ruled by Satan. Regarding these, chapter 10, paragraph 17 of the Revelation Climax book says:

Satan has other “deep things” today, such as complicated speculations and philosophies that flatter the intellect. In addition to permissive, immoral reasonings, these include spiritism and the theory of evolution. How does the all-wise Creator regard these “deep things”? The apostle Paul quotes him as saying: “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise ones.” In contrast thereto, “the deep things of God” are simple, lucid, and heartwarming. Wise Christians shun the “deep things” of Satan’s sophisticated world. Remember, “the world is passing away and so is its desire, but he that does the will of God remains forever.”—1 Corinthians 1:19, Kingdom Interlinear; 2:10; 1 John 2:17.

Should Chinese characters be counted as being among the “deep things” of Satan’s world? Well, they do come from Satan’s world, and, as per the above quote’s description, they certainly are complicated, and many do seem to enjoy how they flatter the intellect. Also, if they are allowed to, they can serve Satan’s interests by greatly adding to the weighty difficulties faced by Mandarin field language learners. In this respect, Chinese characters are like all the human traditions surrounding the Sabbath that added unnecessary weighty burdens to those trying to serve God in Jesus’ time, except that instead of just affecting God’s people one day a week, characters make things much harder than necessary for Mandarin field language learners every single day.

The article “Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Was Plan A” says the following about the attitude of many of those highly educated in Chinese characters towards the prospect of Chinese writing reform that would make things much easier for future language learners:

…as noted above, “opposition [to Chinese writing reform] ‘comes primarily from intellectuals, especially from high level intellectuals.’ ” Lǔ Xùn (鲁迅/魯迅, Lu Xun), considered by many to be the greatest Chinese writer of the twentieth century (he wrote “The True Story of Ah-Q”, “Diary of a Madman”, and “My Old Hometown”), had this to say about the matter:

In addition to the limitations of social status and economic means, our Chinese characters present another high threshold to the masses: their difficulty. If you don’t spend ten or so years on them, it’s not easy to cross this threshold alone. Those who cross over it are the scholar-officials, and these same scholar-officials do their utmost to make writing as difficult as possible because it makes them especially dignified, surpassing all other ordinary scholar-officials.

…

Chinese characters and the Chinese literary language are already difficult enough by their own nature. On top of that, the scholar-officials have purposely devised all of these additional difficulties that get added on. Such being the case, how could anyone hope that the masses would have any affinity for the Chinese writing system? But the scholar-officials precisely want it to be this way. If the characters were easy to recognize and everybody could master them, then they would not be dignified, and the scholar-officials would lose their dignity along with them.

Being more concerned about one’s own “dignity” than about what would greatly relieve the suffering of others certainly sounds to me like an attitude that’s characteristic of people of Satan’s world. Don’t let Satan’s world—including its well-meaning Mandarin language teachers—“educate” you (in other words, brainwash you) into having such an ungodly and unchristian attitude!

Categories
Culture Language Learning Science

jítǐ zhǔyì

jítǐ zhǔyì ((jí·tǐ gathered; collected · {body [→ [style; form]]} → [collective] 集体 集體) (zhǔ·yì master · meaning → [-ism] 主义 主義) → [collectivism; community spirit]) ← Tap/click to show/hide the “flashcard”

Generally speaking, Western societies are considered to be relatively individualistic, while Eastern societies, like Chinese ones, are considered to be relatively collectivistic, emphasizing the collective, or group, over the individual. This week’s MEotW, “jítǐ zhǔyì ((jí·tǐ gathered; collected · {body [→ [style; form]]} → [collective] 集体 集體) (zhǔ·yì master · meaning → [-ism] 主义 主義) → [collectivism; community spirit])”, seems to be the main Mandarin expression referring to such collectivism. (The MEotW post on “kǒngbù huódòng ((kǒng·bù fearing · terror → [terrorist] 恐怖) (huó·dòng living · moving → [activities] 活动 活動) → [terrorism; terrorist activities])” contains a brief discussion about some other Mandarin -isms.)

Differences and Possible Causal Factors

While researching this post, I came across a scientific paper that has some interesting information about individualism and collectivism, including some information about measurable regional variations in collectivism that have been found across the Chinese mainland. Here is a quotation from it, regarding individualism and collectivism in general:

The distinction between individualism and collectivism captures important differences in how the relationship between self and others is constructed, as well as whether the individual or the group is understood as the basic unit of analysis (Cross et al., 2011; Hofstede, 2001; Markus & Kitayama, 1991, 2010; Oyserman et al., 2002; Triandis, 1995). People living in individualistic cultural contexts (e.g., the United States and the United Kingdom) tend to pay more attention to the achievement of their own goals and their own uniqueness. They have clear boundaries with others and pursue well-being or life satisfaction by sharing feelings and achieving personal success. In contrast, people living in collectivistic cultural contexts (e.g., China, Japan, and Korea) tend to be more concerned about maintaining harmonious relations with in-group members, and the boundaries between themselves and these others are much less firm. This distinction is reflected in cognition, perception, memory, cultural products, and even brain function (Morling, 2016; Nisbett & Masuda, 2003; Oyserman et al., 2002; Zhu et al., 2007). Many explanations for these differences have been proposed, including cultural heritage (Ma et al., 2016), modernity (Inglehart & Baker, 2000), climato-economic theory (Van de Vliert et al., 2013), the subsistence system (Uskul et al., 2008), the historical risk of infectious disease (Fincher et al., 2008), and geographic and relational mobility (Oishi, 2010).

Later in the paper, the authors divide China into four regions, and present a table listing some factors that may have contributed to the varying degrees of collectivism in those regions.

Triple-Line Framework of variations within China.

…

Table 1. Ecological Factor Differences Among the Four Regions.

Region I Region II Region III Region IV
Collectivism Lowest Lower Higher Highest
Climate Harsh Harsh Comfortable Comfortable
Water Less Enough Less Enough
Rainfall <400 mm 400–800 mm 400–800 mm >800 mm
Subsistence
system		 Herder Wheat or herder/wheat-blended Wheat Rice
Voluntary
settlement		 No Yes No No
Population
density		 Low Low High High

Pluses and Minuses

Collectivistic societies can have certain good aspects, as expressed by this example sentence from the entry for “xūntáo (xūn·táo {cure (meat/etc.) with smoke} · {mould (as with clay)} → [influence positively; nurture; edify; train] 熏陶 熏/薰陶)” in Pleco’s built-in dictionary:

Zài jítǐ zhǔyì jīngshén de xūntáo xià, háizimen hùxiāng guānxīn, hùxiāng bāngzhù. [Word division was edited.]

Nurtured in the spirit of collectivism, the children care for each other and help each other.

However, recently, some research has come out that shows that some negative ways of thinking, feeling, and acting are more likely to be displayed by those in collectivistic societies.

To clarify, here is a definition of “zero-sum” :

Of any system where all gains are offset by exactly equal losses.

So, a zero-sum game or system is one in which another must lose for one to win—no win-win situations. That means that if you hold zero-sum beliefs, as, according to the studies referred to in the above post, collectivists are more likely to do, then you will think that any goodness that’s enjoyed by someone else is goodness that’s no longer available to you.

Zero-sum thinking makes it difficult to have true empathy for others who are suffering, and it makes it difficult to follow the Bible counsel at Romans 12:15:

Rejoice with those who rejoice; weep with those who weep.

Collectivism and the Obsession with Chinese Characters

It seems, then, that there is a connection between collectivism and China’s obsessive refusal so far to move on from Chinese characters to more reasonable and modern writing systems like Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音). Consider this excerpt from my article “Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Was Plan A”:

In addition to those who feel that phasing out the Hànzì [Chinese characters] would be a regrettable cultural loss, I have also noticed that there are some for whom knowledge of Hànzì is a matter of pride and self-identity. They are proud of knowing the Hànzì as they do, and they view their knowledge of the Hànzì as part of what makes them who they are, as something that distinguishes them from those who don’t know the Hànzì. Such ones may defend the Hànzì to the point of irrationality in the face of a more accessible alternative that would make them and their hard-earned knowledge of Hànzì less “special”, that would threaten to render worthless all of the blood, sweat, and tears they have invested into grappling with these “Chinese puzzles”. It’s as if they are saying, “That’s not fair! If I had to go through all this bitter hard work to learn characters before I could read and write Chinese, then everyone else has to too!”

Self-Identity and Balanced Self-Love

Self-identity is one thing that can particularly be a struggle for those raised in collectivistic societies, since the self is relatatively often neglected in such societies. It’s perhaps not surprising then, that, as mentioned above, in the relatively collectivistic Chinese societies, with their relative paucity, or scarcity, of more healthy ways to build and maintain self-identity, so many have such an unhealthy, obsessive attachment to Chinese characters, as something to desperately hang their neglected self-identities on.

As Jehovah’s organization has commented, for us to follow well the command at Matthew 19:19 to “love your neighbor as yourself”, we must first love ourselves in a healthy way. Also, while Romans 12:3 telling each of us “not to think more of himself than it is necessary to think, but to think so as to have a sound mind” is mainly an admonition against the overly self-important thinking that individualistic societies can tend to promote, it also shows that it is necessary to think a certain amount of ourselves to have a balanced, sound mind.

In turn, it seems that our developing a balanced, healthy view of ourselves can contribute to our avoiding things like zero-sum thinking, and to our developing a balanced, healthy view of Chinese characters. From that balanced, healthy place, we can be free to develop a balanced, healthy view of the possible alternative of Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音), which could empower us to serve Jehovah and help others in the Mandarin field as well as we ought to be able to.

Categories
Culture Experiences History Language Learning Science Technology Theocratic

gāo’ào

gāo’ào (gāo’·ào {[is] (considering self to be of) high (status)} · {[is] proud; haughty; arrogant} 高傲) ← Tap/click to show/hide the “flashcard”

[Notes: Tap/click on a Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) expression to reveal its “flashcard”; tap/click on a “flashcard” or its Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) expression to hide the “flashcard”. 📖 📄 📘 icons mean 📖 Reveal All, 📄 Reveal Advanced, and 📘 Reveal None re all the “flashcards” in the heading, paragraph, etc. that they are placed at the beginning of.]

A few years back, I wrote up a brief web page listing reasons for producing Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音), etc. material for the Imitate (ia) book. Some, especially some who grew up in the West, may have felt that this book is made up of “just stories”, and ones that they were already quite familiar with, at that. However, we must remember that Chinese Bible students may often have a different perspective regarding the Bible accounts that are made to come to life in the Imitate book. As that web page said:

  • Many Chinese people in the world have not been exposed to Bible accounts the way many Westerners have.
  • Also, I have heard that some, perhaps many, Chinese Bible students tend to approach their Bible studies like intellectual exercises for accumulating chōuxiàng (abstract) head knowledge as if for a school exam, rather than as training for their hearts for their own real lives.

Later, the web page touches on how some of the real-world benefits of good storytelling like that found in the Imitate book involve empathy:

  • …
    • The actress Natalie Portman once said, “I love acting. I think it’s the most amazing thing to be able to do. Your job is practicing empathy. You walk down the street imagining every person’s life.”
  • The Imitate book helps build Bible students’ empathy towards Bible characters, which in turn helps Bible students realize that others would feel empathy towards them as well if they imitated these Bible characters—not everyone will just think they’re crazy, like many worldly friends or family members might think.

While even fictional stories can have the benefits described in the links and the quote above, true stories from the Bible can have even greater benefits, including spiritual ones.

Besides the Imitate book, another book from Jehovah’s organization that relates Bible accounts is the Learn From the Bible (lfb) book. The letter from the Governing Body in this book says that, similarly to the Imitate book, the Learn From the Bible book also “brings the Bible accounts to life and captures the feelings of those depicted”, while, unlike the Imitate book, it “tells the story of the human family from creation onward”. While the Learn From the Bible book is especially suitable for children, the letter from the Governing Body in this book says that “it can also be used to help adults who desire to learn more about the Bible”. So, it would be good to consider on this blog some of the expressions used in the Mandarin Learn From the Bible book.

Proud Pharaoh

This week’s MEotW, “gāo’ào (gāo’·ào {[is] (considering self to be of) high (status)} · {[is] proud; haughty; arrogant} 高傲)”, appears near the beginning of Lesson 19 of the Mandarin Learn From the Bible book (WOL), which is entitled “Tóu (Head → [First] 头 頭) Sān (Three 三) Chǎng ([mw for recreational, sports, or other activities] 场 場/塲) Zāiyāng (Calamities → [Plagues] 灾殃 災殃)” (“The First Three Plagues”):

English:

Jehovah sent Moses and Aaron to Pharaoh with this message: ‘Let my people go so that they can worship me in the wilderness.’ Pharaoh proudly replied: ‘I do not care what Jehovah says, and I will not let the Israelites go.’

Mandarin (Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus):

📖 📄 📘 Yēhéhuá (Jehovah 耶和华 耶和華) pài ({river branched} → [sent] 派) Móxī (Moses 摩西) hé (and 和) Yàlún (Aaron 亚伦 亞倫) qù ({to go} 去) jiàn (see 见 見) Fǎlǎo (Pharaoh 法老), duì (towards → [to] 对 對) tā (him 他) shuō ({to say} 说 說/説): “Nǐ (you 你) yào (must 要) fàng ({let go} 放) wǒ de ((wǒ me 我) (de ’s 的) → [my]) zǐmín (zǐ·mín persons · people 子民) zǒu ({to be walking} → [to be leaving] 走), ràng ({to allow} 让 讓) tāmen (tā·men him/her · [pl] → [them] 他们 他們) zài (in 在) kuàngyě (kuàng·yě spacious · {open country} → [wilderness] 旷野 曠野) chóngbài ({to worship} 崇拜) wǒ (me 我).” Fǎlǎo (Pharaoh 法老) què (however 却 卻) gāo’ào (gāo’·ào {(considering self to be of) high (status)} · proud 高傲) de (-ly 地) shuō (said 说 說/説): “Yēhéhuá (Jehovah 耶和华 耶和華) shuō (says 说 說/説) shénme (shén·me what · [suf] 什么 什/甚麼) wǒ (I 我) bùguǎn (bù·guǎn not · {am managing → [am bothering about]} 不管), wǒ (I 我) jiùshì (jiù·shì exactly · am 就是) bú (not 不) fàng ({letting go} 放) rén (people 人).”

The Mandarin Learn From the Bible book here uses “gāo’ào (gāo’·ào {[is] (considering self to be of) high (status)} · {[is] proud; haughty; arrogant} 高傲)” to correspond with the English word “proud”. A related expression, which also uses the morphemes in “gāo’ào (gāo’·ào {[is] (considering self to be of) high (status)} · {[is] proud; haughty; arrogant} 高傲)”, is “xīngāo (xīn·gāo heart · {[is] high} [→ [[is] proud | [is] having high aspirations/ambitions]] 心高)‐qì’ào (qì’·ào {air → [spirit | manner; attitude]} · {[is] proud; haughty [→ [[is] unyielding]]} 气傲 氣/气傲)”. This expression occurs in Proverbs 16:18 (WOL, Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus), which is quoted in Lesson 62 of the Learn From the Bible book (WOL, Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus).

Pharaoh Was a Bozo

The below quote was recently added to the article “Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Was Plan A”:

This tendency of many to prioritize their own pride and position over what’s really better for everyone is also described in this quote from Guy Kawasaki about something he learned from Steve Jobs:

A players hire A+ players. Actually, Steve believed that A players hire A players—that is people who are as good as they are. I refined this slightly—my theory is that A players hire people even better than themselves. It’s clear, though, that B players hire C players so they can feel superior to them, and C players hire D players. If you start hiring B players, expect what Steve called “the bozo explosion” to happen in your organization.

Yes, Pīnyīn was Plan A, but China unfortunately let the proud, self-serving B players have their way.

Note that what makes someone a B player or worse is not necessarily that person’s level of intelligence, skill, talent, etc. What characterizes B players or worse is their proud, self-serving rejection of others who are better in some way, their need to feel superior to others.

Pharaoh encountered Jehovah God, an A+ player if ever there was one, and rather than humbly recognizing that, working along with Jehovah, and putting himself in a position to learn from him, Pharaoh in his pride stubbornly rejected Jehovah and his request. He didn’t have to be that way—when the king of Nineveh heard the judgement message from Jehovah that Jonah declared (as discussed in Lesson 54 of the Learn From the Bible book), he and his people repented. Unfortunately, the Pharaoh whom Moses and Aaron faced instead proved himself a bozo.

Psalm 2 prophesies that “the kings of the earth” in general would also “take their stand” against Jehovah and his King Jesus, instead of welcoming and honouring them as they deserve. What a bunch of bozos!

Instead of Following Plan A, China Went with the B Players

Again, as quoted above:

Yes, Pīnyīn was Plan A, but China unfortunately let the proud, self-serving B players have their way.

This is a major reason why China continues to mainly use Chinese characters, when Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) was introduced decades ago as a simple, elegant full writing system for Mandarin that was meant to eventually replace characters as the main writing system of China, to provide relief for the masses of people who were struggling with the unnecessarily inhumanly complex characters. As the above-quoted article explains:

In addition to those who feel that phasing out the Hànzì would be a regrettable cultural loss, I have also noticed that there are some for whom knowledge of Hànzì is a matter of pride and self-identity. They are proud of knowing the Hànzì as they do, and they view their knowledge of the Hànzì as part of what makes them who they are, as something that distinguishes them from those who don’t know the Hànzì. Such ones may defend the Hànzì to the point of irrationality in the face of a more accessible alternative that would make them and their hard-earned knowledge of Hànzì less “special”, that would threaten to render worthless all of the blood, sweat, and tears they have invested into grappling with these “Chinese puzzles”. It’s as if they are saying, “That’s not fair! If I had to go through all this bitter hard work to learn characters before I could read and write Chinese, then everyone else has to too!”

This is probably a big reason why, as noted above, “opposition [to Chinese writing reform] ‘comes primarily from intellectuals, especially from high level intellectuals.’ ” Lǔ Xùn (鲁迅/魯迅, Lu Xun), considered by many to be the greatest Chinese writer of the twentieth century (he wrote “The True Story of Ah-Q”, “Diary of a Madman”, and “My Old Hometown”), had this to say about the matter:

In addition to the limitations of social status and economic means, our Chinese characters present another high threshold to the masses: their difficulty. If you don’t spend ten or so years on them, it’s not easy to cross this threshold alone. Those who cross over it are the scholar-officials, and these same scholar-officials do their utmost to make writing as difficult as possible because it makes them especially dignified, surpassing all other ordinary scholar-officials.

…

Chinese characters and the Chinese literary language are already difficult enough by their own nature. On top of that, the scholar-officials have purposely devised all of these additional difficulties that get added on. Such being the case, how could anyone hope that the masses would have any affinity for the Chinese writing system? But the scholar-officials precisely want it to be this way. If the characters were easy to recognize and everybody could master them, then they would not be dignified, and the scholar-officials would lose their dignity along with them.

Let Us Allow Ourselves to Be Taught by Jehovah

Let us not be proud B players/bozos like those “dignified” scholar-officials, or like Pharaoh. Instead, let us humbly be open to learning from others, especially from Jehovah God himself. Isaiah 54:13 tells us of the good that can result:

And all your sons will be taught by Jehovah,
And the peace of your sons will be abundant.

For convenience:

The direct link for the Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus resource for the Learn From the Bible book is:

The short link for Chinese field language-learning links for the Learn From the Bible book is:

More Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) and Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus web material based on the Mandarin Learn From the Bible book will be made available in the Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus web resource as time allows.