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差事

Mandarin · pinyin chà shì#

poor
not up to standard

Mandarin · pinyin chāi shi#

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Characters in this entry

差: chà · chā · to differ; different, wrong; nearly, almost; an officer
事: shì · affair, matter, business; to serve; accident, incident

Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

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Mandarin tones

4–4 · cha4 shi4

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Read this spelling in Classical texts

Follow a written form into the eight pinned witnesses: Analects, Mencius, Laozi, Zhuangzi, Xunzi, Han Feizi, Sunzi and the Mao Shijing. A match is a place to investigate; it does not prove that a modern dictionary sense fits the passage.

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Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 7 senses · 1 Cantonese reading

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

caai1 si6

Cantonese word readings for 差事. This lexicon supplies readings, not definitions.

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Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

Independent source senses for this spelling, with usage labels retained. Not matched to the pronunciation above.

noun

errand; assignment; commission (Classifier: 件)
job; post; position (Classifier: 件)
(literary, historical) official post; temporarily appointed position
(literary, historical) messenger; emissary
(literary, historical) criminal

adj

(colloquial) poor; not up to standard

noun

(literary) strange thing

Source page · dump 2026-09-02 · Contributors & history

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