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毀家紓難

简毁家纾难 · 繁毀家紓難

Mandarin · pinyin huǐ jiā shū nàn

to sacrifice one's wealth to save the state (idiom)

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Characters in this entry

毀: Look up this written character
家: jiā · house, home, residence; family
紓: Look up this written character
難: Look up this written character
毁: huǐ · destroy
纾: shū · loosen, relax, relieve; extricate
难: nán · difficult, arduous, hard; unable

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

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Mandarin tones

3–1–1–4 · hui3 jia1 shu1 nan4

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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.

毀家紓難 · find source passages ↗ · 毁家纾难 · find source passages ↗

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Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 1 sense · 1 Cantonese reading

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

wai2 gaa1 syu1 naan4

Cantonese word readings for 毀家紓難. 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 sacrifice one's family fortune to save the state; to offer all that a family owns to help the country get through a crisis

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

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