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夙夜匪懈

Mandarin · pinyin sù yè fěi xiè

to work from morning to night (idiom)

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Characters in this entry

夙: sù · early in morning, dawn; previous
夜: yè · night, dark; in night; by night
匪: fěi · bandits, robbers, gangsters
懈: xiè · idle, relaxed, remiss

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

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Mandarin tones

4–4–3–4 · su4 ye4 fei3 xie4

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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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Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

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

phrase

(idiomatic) to work from morning to night

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

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