MEotW: chénggōng

The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:

• chénggōng

Is “just” learning Chinese characters “the hard way” the key to success in the Mandarin field?

“To Jehovah, for whom ‘a thousand years is as one day’, Chinese civilization has only been around for a few days.… “…we should boast in Jehovah, not in needlessly and self-indulgently complex knowledge relating to a mere worldly human culture” troubadourworks.com/tiandi/meotw... #MEotW #PīnyīnPlus

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— tiandi, Links News (@tiandilinksnews.bsky.social) Dec 2, 2024 at 3:40 PM

Does Jehovah see Chinese characters as a successful writing system? Or does he see characters as a Great Wall obstructing his vital preaching and teaching work in the worldwide Mandarin field?

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MEotW: bìyào

The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:

• bìyào

Are Chinese characters really indispensable? Is it really true that the Chinese languages cannot be written alphabetically?

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MEotW: pútao

The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:

• pútao

Does each Chinese character really represent a one-syllable word?

 Michael Pardo [source]

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MEotW: fǎngxiào

The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:

• fǎngxiào

Would it be good for other writing systems to emulate Chinese characters when it comes to (supposedly) representing meaning directly, without depending on speech sounds?

Should children be taught to read English, etc. words as if they were ideograms, like Chinese characters are supposed to be?

The Library tab in the JW Library app

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Learn From the Bible Book Pīnyīn Plus Material JW Library App Scripture Links

In the _Learn From the Bible_ book _Pīnyīn_ Plus material, beginning in Lesson 48 for now, *JW _nwtsty_* scripture links are now available that go to the scriptures in the JW Library app, when tapped on an iPhone or iPad. (Android has not been tested yet.) troubadourworks.com/tiandi/lf...

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— tiandi, Links News (@tiandilinksnews.bsky.social) Dec 26, 2025 at 11:11 PM

On an Apple Silicon Mac, when the *JW _nwtsty_* links are clicked in a WebKit-based browser like Safari or Orion, they go to the scriptures in the JW Library app. On other browsers, they go to the scriptures on jw.org. troubadourworks.com/tiandi/lfb/P...

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— tiandi, Links News (@tiandilinksnews.bsky.social) Dec 26, 2025 at 11:24 PM

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MEotW: gòngtōng

The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:

• gòngtōng

Are Chinese characters really more universal than alphabetic writing systems are?

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MEotW: Hāmǐjíduōdùn

The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:

• Hāmǐjíduōdùn

Do Chinese characters really directly represent meaning visually, without dependence on language sound?

Table from p. 129 of the book The Chinese Language: Fact and Fantasy

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