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Chop Wood in Chinese / Japanese...

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Chop Wood, Carry Water

Before enlightenment or after, chores remain.

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 dùn wù zhī qián kǎn chái tiāo shuǐ dùn wù zhī hòu kǎn chái tiāo shuǐ
Chop Wood, Carry Water Scroll

頓悟之前砍柴挑水; 頓悟之後砍柴挑水 means “Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water; After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.

This is a Chinese proverb that is attributed to 吴力 (Wú Lì) who lived between 1632 and 1718 - living part of his life as a devout Buddhist, and many years as a Catholic Jesuit Priest in China - what an interesting life!

This has been explained many times in many ways. I am a Buddhist, and here is my brief take on this proverb...

Before enlightenment, one may find daily chores mundane, tedious, and boring. However, upon reaching enlightenment one is not relieved of the details of daily life. An enlightened person will, however, see such chores as a joy, and do them mindfully.

There is another version floating around, which is 在你領悟之前砍柴、運水。在你領悟之後，砍柴、運水。
If you want this other version, just contact me. The meaning is the same, just different phrasing.




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Not the results for chop wood that you were looking for?

Below are some entries from our dictionary that may match your chop wood search...

Characters

If shown, 2nd row is Simp. Chinese

 Pronunciation
Romanization		 Simple Dictionary Definition

斫

see styles		 zhuó
    zhuo2
cho
 shaku

斫
Custom Scroll

to chop; to hack; to carve wood
To chop; translit. ca, cha.

斲

斫

see styles		 zhuó
    zhuo2
cho

斲
Custom Scroll

to chop; to carve wood
See: 斫

砍樹

砍树

see styles		 kǎn shù
    kan3 shu4
k`an shu
    kan shu

砍樹
Custom Scroll

to chop wood; to chop down trees

The following table may be helpful for those studying Chinese or Japanese...

Title CharactersRomaji (Romanized Japanese)Various forms of Romanized Chinese
Chop Wood, Carry Water頓悟之前砍柴挑水頓悟之后砍柴挑水
顿悟之前砍柴挑水顿悟之后砍柴挑水		dùn wù zhī qián kǎn chái tiāo shuǐ dùn wù zhī hòu kǎn chái tiāo shuǐ
dun4 wu4 zhi1 qian2 kan3 chai2 tiao1 shui3 dun4 wu4 zhi1 hou4 kan3 chai2 tiao1 shui3
dun wu zhi qian kan chai tiao shui dun wu zhi hou kan chai tiao shui		tun wu chih ch`ien k`an ch`ai t`iao shui tun wu chih hou k`an ch`ai t`iao shui
tun wu chih chien kan chai tiao shui tun wu chih hou kan chai tiao shui
In some entries above you will see that characters have different versions above and below a line.
In these cases, the characters above the line are Traditional Chinese, while the ones below are Simplified Chinese.


Dictionary

Lookup Chop Wood in my Japanese & Chinese Dictionary


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All of our calligraphy wall scrolls are handmade.

When the calligrapher finishes creating your artwork, it is taken to my art mounting workshop in Beijing where a wall scroll is made by hand from a combination of silk, rice paper, and wood.
After we create your wall scroll, it takes at least two weeks for air mail delivery from Beijing to you.

Allow a few weeks for delivery. Rush service speeds it up by a week or two for $10!

When you select your calligraphy, you'll be taken to another page where you can choose various custom options.


A nice Chinese calligraphy wall scroll

The wall scroll that Sandy is holding in this picture is a "large size"
single-character wall scroll.
We also offer custom wall scrolls in small, medium, and an even-larger jumbo size.

A professional Chinese Calligrapher

Professional calligraphers are getting to be hard to find these days.
Instead of drawing characters by hand, the new generation in China merely type roman letters into their computer keyboards and pick the character that they want from a list that pops up.

There is some fear that true Chinese calligraphy may become a lost art in the coming years. Many art institutes in China are now promoting calligraphy programs in hopes of keeping this unique form of art alive.

Trying to learn Chinese calligrapher - a futile effort

Even with the teachings of a top-ranked calligrapher in China, my calligraphy will never be good enough to sell. I will leave that to the experts.

A high-ranked Chinese master calligrapher that I met in Zhongwei

The same calligrapher who gave me those lessons also attracted a crowd of thousands and a TV crew as he created characters over 6-feet high. He happens to be ranked as one of the top 100 calligraphers in all of China. He is also one of very few that would actually attempt such a feat.


Check out my lists of Japanese Kanji Calligraphy Wall Scrolls and Old Korean Hanja Calligraphy Wall Scrolls.

Some people may refer to this entry as Chop Wood Kanji, Chop Wood Characters, Chop Wood in Mandarin Chinese, Chop Wood Characters, Chop Wood in Chinese Writing, Chop Wood in Japanese Writing, Chop Wood in Asian Writing, Chop Wood Ideograms, Chinese Chop Wood symbols, Chop Wood Hieroglyphics, Chop Wood Glyphs, Chop Wood in Chinese Letters, Chop Wood Hanzi, Chop Wood in Japanese Kanji, Chop Wood Pictograms, Chop Wood in the Chinese Written-Language, or Chop Wood in the Japanese Written-Language.

52 people have searched for Chop Wood in Chinese or Japanese in the past year.
Chop Wood was last searched for by someone else on Dec 8th, 2024