引狼入室

Mandarin · pinyin yǐn láng rù shì

Meanings

  1. (lit.) to show the wolf into the house (idiom)
  2. (fig.) to introduce a potential source of trouble
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Characters in this entry

引
yǐn · to pull, draw out, attract; to stretch
狼
láng · wolf
入
rù · enter, come in(to), join
室
shì · room, home, house, chamber; 13th lunar mansion, determinative star α Pegasi (Markab)
Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

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Mandarin tones

3–2–4–4 · yin3 lang2 ru4 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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Rime Cantonese 粵拼

jan5 long4 jap6 sat1

Cantonese word readings for 引狼入室. 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.

phrase

  1. (idiomatic) to bring trouble to oneself by inviting an enemy

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

Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0 · source & license · Data pack

引狼入室 · yin3 lang2 ru4 shi4
CC-CEDICT contributors and MDBG · edition 2026-10-13 · source line 39,143
Original dictionary · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source & transformation details
Exact source record引狼入室 引狼入室 [yin3 lang2 ru4 shi4] /(lit.) to show the wolf into the house (idiom)/(fig.) to introduce a potential source of trouble/