An excursion into the Chinese characters

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You have already seen these three characters many times. It might be interesting to take a little trip into the world of Chinese characters so that you can better understand what they mean.

The highest principles of Falun Dafa (the universe) are: Truthfulness, Goodness and Forbearance. The whole world already knows these characters through Falun Dafa.
 
The Chinese script consists mainly of logograms, which means that the meaning of individual language expressions is rendered by graphic characters.
 
Generally, a character is associated with a word or particle of the Chinese language.
 
It is possible that the Chinese characters are not displayed correctly on your computer. If you arrive at a page that contains Chinese characters, you must have the appropriate code installed on your computer. If you access a page with Chinese characters for the first time, you will normally receive a message that the website contains a code that still needs to be installed. The installation then takes place automatically after confirmation. Otherwise, you can also download the code through the e.g. normal Windows update.

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In the Chinese language, the character for "Truthfulness" looks like this. It is pronounced similarly to "dschen". In Pinyin it is written "zhen". It means "true, real, genuine".

This Chinese character 眞 (zhen) is in turn made up of the two characters 十 (shi) and 目 (mu).

十 is the character for the number ten and symbolises the ten cardinal points of our universe, 目 means eye. 十目 is thus the divine eye or the all-seeing eye.

This character is based on the Chinese belief that only superhuman beings, i.e. deities, are able to recognise the truth, what is true. Deities are free and not subject to any restrictions, it is said. Humans, on the other hand, are limited in their subjective vision and depend on the sensory perception of their bodies.

眞 plays a central role in the Daoist doctrine. In Daoism, man strives to return to his origin in the universe through cultivation, through the pursuit of truthfulness. The goal of every Daoist is to become a 眞人 (Zhen Ren), a "true perfected human being". The 眞人 is said to have attained the truth and exist in unity with the universe. This state is equivalent to enlightenment in Buddhism. The true human being is free of concepts, ideas and limitations because he has realised absolute freedom and emptiness, according to Daoism.

In contrast to 眞, the two characters 假 (jiǎ) and 伪 (wěi) mean false or fake. Both signs have 亻 in the left ideogram, which symbolises the human, the human. In contrast to the true, the false is thus something human. For lies and falsehood, according to Chinese tradition, have their origin in man. 

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This character 善 (Shan) is made up of the characters 羊 (yang) and 言 (Yan), where 羊 means sheep and 言 means the spoken or the word.

In ancient China, the sheep were part of every good household. It was particularly popular as a pet because of its obedience. Moreover, the sheep always bleats in the same way, regardless of whether it is treated well or badly. This quality of reacting kind-heartedly, regardless of whether one is treated well or badly, was described by the Chinese as 善.

In many religions, goodness is one of the main commandments, including Buddhism. There, goodness is to be understood as compassion for one's neighbour. A Buddhist sees the suffering of his fellow human beings that they have experienced through life and tries to help them. In doing so, he should think of others first, because in Buddhism the sufferings of others are more important than his own. Whereby the very existence in the human world means suffering: first a person is trapped in the body and also has to suffer old age, illness and death. By constantly improving oneself and conforming to mercy, Buddhism aims to put an end to human suffering by reaching enlightenment and returning to the source of life.

The opposite of 善 is the character 恶 (E), malice. 恶 consists of the two signs, 心 (Xin), heart, and 亚 (Ya), weakness. 心亚 thus means the weak heart. Accordingly, the Chinese used to regard wickedness as a kind of weakness that comes from the heart. In contrast, the person who, despite insults or humiliations, still feels compassion towards his counterpart, demonstrates true inner strength. 

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This sign means "tolerance, forbearance, endure, bear". It is pronounced "jen", where the j is pronounced like in the French word "bonjour", and in pinyin it is written "ren".

The Chinese character 忍 (Ren) is originally derived from the character 能 (néng), which in turn contains the character 月, which stands for meat. In the oracle bone script, 能 denoted deer, roe deer or red deer. These animals had been valued for their strength and powerful stature. Gradually, the meaning changed and instead of "strength", 能 is equivalent to "ability" or "skill" in today's usage.

From the origin of the character 忍, it can thus be deduced that in ancient China "tolerate, endure, tolerance, forbearance" was seen as a strength, not a weakness. The lower part of today's character 忍 consists of the character 心 (xin), which symbolises the "heart". Thus, forbearance, tolerance and indulgence are internal human affairs that come from the heart. They require open-heartedness and much self-control and self-control. The upper ideogram 刃 means the cutting edge, the blade and also the sharpness of a knife. The character 忍 consequently means that a person's heart is on the edge of a knife. If one does not control oneself in a difficult situation, it can lead to a quarrel. In this case, the knife is rammed into the heart. The structure of 忍 illustrates how much self-control is needed for tolerance.

The contrast to 忍 is the character 鬥 (dòu), which stands for fighting, arguing or wrestling and is a mirror image. In the middle is the same ideogram twice, which embodies the king or the lord. From the visual appearance alone, it can be seen that two warlords are facing each other here who do not want to endure - a quarrel is thus imminent.

So - these are the meanings of the characters. These characters are, as I said, the highest principles of Falun Dafa, and they have been proclaimed in every country on earth.

Watch the video below and playfully learn the Chinese characters, and at the same time learn what it means to be forbearing (our third character). 

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