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Kanji Detail for 遜 - "to be humble"

  • Meaning

    遜 means "to be humble." Also associated with to yield, to escape.

    1. To escape - To flee; to run away.

    2. To yield - To defer to others; to put oneself after others.

    3. To be humble - To be modest; to lower oneself.

    4. To be inferior - To fall short; to be less than.

  • Words using

    • 謙遜 けんそん Listen modesty; humility; being humble
  • Four-character idioms with

    • 傲岸不遜 ごうがんふそん Listen haughty arrogance
    • 傲慢不遜 ごうまんふそん Listen haughty; arrogant; overbearing
  • Tattoo check:

    • Verified meaning: to be humble
    • Official Jōyō kanji — a standard character every Japanese reader recognises
    • Used in real Japanese given names (read そん, ゆずる)
    • Also carries these associations: to yield, to escape

    A single kanji rarely maps one-to-one onto an English word. Read the meanings and associations above as a set — a character that fits the dictionary definition can still carry a connotation you did not intend.

  • Name readings of

    Given names (そん)Listen (ゆずる)Listen

  • Dictionary Citations

    The meaning above is based on the following sources:

    KANJIDIC2 A comprehensive Japanese-English kanji dictionary

    humble; modest

    Unihan Unicode Han Database for CJK characters

    humble, modest; yield

    CC-CEDICT A Chinese-English dictionary

    to abdicate; modest; yielding; unpretentious; inferior to; (slang) to suck

    Make Me a Hanzi Open-source Chinese character data

    humble, modest; to yield

    XSZD Xuéshēng Zìdiǎn (學生字典) - Student's Dictionary

    To relinquish; to step down. As in 遜位 (abdicate). | Respectful and compliant. Being disrespectful is called 不遜. | When one thing is inferior to another, it is also called 遜.
  • Onyomi

    tip
  • Kunyomi

    tip
  • Strokes

    tip
  • Radical

    tip
  • Related Keywords

Sentences including

  • His modesty is worth respecting.

  • This is no time for modesty.

  • It tastes every bit as good as Japanese rice.

  • I feel it unfortunate that there is little of this kind of humble attitude amongst Japanese debaters.

  • "Tom, I heard you built your own house." "Er, yeah. It's only small though." "You're underselling yourself again."

  • I was charmed with it, adopted it, dropped my abrupt contradiction and positive argumentation, and put on the humble inquirer and doubter.

Sentences from Japanese classical masterpieces

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