Chan's Chinese Column
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EAR (ĕr)
The Chinese character for ear, "耳" (ĕr) Is a pictograph character resembling the shape of an ear.
The traditional Chinese character 聽 (tīng) means “to listen”. It is beautifully made up of five characters, for ear, king, ten eyes, one and heart.
The left part of the character comprise of an ear above the character for “king” or “dominant one,” indicating that hearing the words through our ear is the most important part of the listening process. On the right, we have ten eyes above the horizontal line for the number “one” and the character for heart/mind. So if we listen whole-heartedly with our ears and heart, giving our undivided attention with ten eyes, we are listening attentively, with our ears, mind, eyes, and heart. |
LISTEN (tīng) 
