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急中生智

Mandarin · pinyin jí zhōng shēng zhì

quick witted in an emergency
able to react resourcefully

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Characters in this entry

急: jí · quick, quickly; urgent, pressing
中: zhōng · central; center, middle; in the midst of; hit (target); attain
生: shēng · life, living, lifetime; birth
智: zhì · wisdom, knowledge, intelligence

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

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Mandarin tones

2–1–1–4 · ji2 zhong1 sheng1 zhi4

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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

gap1 zung1 sang1 zi3

Cantonese word readings for 急中生智. 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

(idiomatic) to suddenly come up with a solution in an emergency

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

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