MEotW: bùzú

The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:

• bùzú

Are characters the best solution to Mandarin’s “homophone problem”? How else could it be addressed?

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MEotW: tíbǐ‐wàng‐zì

The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:

• tíbǐ‐wàng‐zì

Do you ever just clean forget how to read or write a Chinese character that you’re sure you once knew? What’s up with that?

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MEotW: guānxīn

The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:

• guānxīn

How is it that the Mandarin word for “to care about/for” literally means “to close heart”?

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Go Along to Get Along?

When faced with a strongly entrenched traditional way of doing things that made it way harder than necessary to serve God, e.g. re the Sabbath, Jesus did NOT just accept it and go along to get along.

As Jesus followers, how do we respond to the Great Wall of Chinese characters? pic.twitter.com/I0qf8OUhFC

— tiandi, Links News (@TiandiLinksNews) January 15, 2023

(Wordnik defines “go along to get along” as “conform in order to have acceptance and security”.)

Scripture Links for Jehovah’s Will Br. Pīnyīn Plus Web Material Available Up to the End of Lesson 5

[NOTE: For spiritual food (which is for you yourself to learn spiritual things from, and which ideally should be in your own mother tongue), please go to jw.org.

The supplementary language-learning material mentioned in this post is for helping you to learn about how the Mandarin language is used in an official publication, so that you will be better able to help others in the Mandarin language field.]

The Jehovah’s Will (jl) brochure has been used on Bible studies for a long time, and some may continue to find it useful on Bible studies even as they learn how to make good use of the Mandarin Enjoy Life Forever! (lff) book.

Unofficial previous-generation Pīnyīn and Pīnyīn-English material for the Jehovah’s Will brochure has been available for years, which material was based on an older version of that brochure. Now, the following current-generation Pīnyīn Plus web material resource, based on the most recent 2016-11 Printing of the Mandarin Jehovah’s Will brochure, is available:

• 
• Jehovah’s Will Br.
  (Pīnyīn Plus, Web)
  (rich information about Mandarin speech
  for discussing the people, the activities,
  and the organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses,
  as represented by the text of the
  Mandarin Jehovah’s Will brochure,
  2016-11 Printing, proofread, mobile-friendly,
  can be used offline in supporting browsers,
  icon can be added to the home screen
  with supporting browsers,
  “flashcards” integrated with the text,
  (tap/click on a Pīnyīn word to reveal its “flashcard”,
  tap/click on a “flashcard” or its Pīnyīn expression
  to hide it the “flashcard”),
  Pīnyīn (Pinyin) used as the default writing system,
  carefully done human-translated
  context-appropriate English translations
  with literal & effective meanings,
  Simplified & Traditional characters,
  📖 Reveal All, 📄 Reveal Advanced,
  and 📘 Reveal None controls for
  all the “flashcards” in a lesson, paragraph, etc.,
  links for getting around,
  picture thumbnails & links, audio links,
  Night Theme that can be turned on or off
  using the ☀️/🌙 button at the top right,
  adjustable text size)
  (Info re offline viewing and printing)
• Short Links:
  Links > Publications > Brochures >
  Jehovah’s Will Brochure Links (tiandi.info/jl)

In the above resource, material matching both the current 2016-11 Printing of the Mandarin Jehovah’s Will brochure and the current 2022 Study Edition (nwtsty) of the Mandarin NWT Bible is now available that covers the following:

Fully Proofread Pīnyīn Plus Material:

• Front Cover to Lesson 1;
• Lesson 14;
• Lesson 17;
• Lesson 21

Partially Proofread Pīnyīn and Pīnyīn Plus Material:

• All parts of the brochure besides the fully proofread Pīnyīn Plus material listed above

Scripture Links:

• Front Cover to the end of Lesson 5;
• Lesson 14;
• Lesson 17;
• Lesson 21

Note that in the above resource, the following material matching the current 2016-11 Printing of the Mandarin Jehovah’s Will brochure is available, in which the text of the 2016-11 Printing is different from the text of the previous printing:

Fully Proofread Pīnyīn Plus Material:

• Lesson 14;
• Lesson 17;
• Lesson 21

Material with a grey background has been partially proofread. Pīnyīn material with a golden-hued background has been proofread, but not all of its “flashcards” have been added and proofread.

More current-generation Pīnyīn Plus “flashcard” material matching the current 2016-11 Printing of the Mandarin Jehovah’s Will brochure will be made available in the above resource as time allows.

(NOTE: While the organization expresses valid general concerns here about posting copies of official publications to the Internet, there are good legal and spiritual reasons for concluding that those concerns do not apply to this particular material, since such material should NOT be considered to be infringing on copyright, and since such material is specifically designed to be, NOT SPIRITUAL FOOD, but rather, material FOR LANGUAGE LEARNING. See this disclaimer for more information.)

MEotW: bǎilàn

The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:

• bǎilàn

How can we Mandarin field language learners avoid letting our Mandarin “rot”?

What happens to our Mandarin when we are faced with the Great Wall of Characters?

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MEotW: dòngdàng‐bù’ān

The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:

• dòngdàng‐bù’ān

While we do not participate in New Year’s celebrations, how might we productively use this time of year?

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