In honor of Reformation Day, here is the list of Martin Luther’s 95 Theses in Chinese (simplified). It is taken from the Baidu Baike, the Chinese version of Google/Wikipedia all rolled into one. 路德关于赎罪票效能的辩论（九十五条） 为爱护与阐扬真理起见，下列命题将在文学和神学硕士及常任讲师路德马丁神甫主持之下，在威登堡举行讨论。凡不能到会和我们口头辩论的，请以通讯方式参加。奉主耶稣基督的圣名。阿门。 ( 1 )当我们的主耶稣基督说『你们应当悔改』的时候，他是说信徒一生应当悔改。 ( 2 )这句话不是指着告解礼，即神甫所执行的认罪和补罪说的。 ( 3 )这句话不是仅仅指内心的悔改而言，因为内心的悔改若不产生肉体外表各种的刻苦，便是虚空的。 ( 4 )所以罪恶的惩罚是与自恨同长久，因为这才是真正内心的悔改，而一直继续到我们进入天国。 ( 5 )教皇除凭自己的权柄或凭教条所科的惩罚以外，既无意也无权免除任何惩罚。 ( 6 )教皇不能赦免任何罪债，而只能宣布并肯定罪债已经得了上帝的赦免。那留下归他审判的，他当然可以赦免。他若越过此雷池，罪债便仍然存在。 ( 7 […]
Happy Birthday “Beijing”
No, today is not the birthday of the founding of Beijing. That happened too far back in history to be able to pinpoint a date. Recorded history goes back around 4000 years and Peking Man dates back more than 200,000 years. So why wish “Beijing” a “Happy Birthday?” Well, because it was 36 years ago […]
English Words Borrowed from Chinese
This is a pop quiz — what common English words are borrowed from Chinese? The answer may surprise you. How about kowtow, gung ho, and ketchup? Or typhoon. Or “long time no see.” Even though English is a language that compulsively borrows from other languages, we don’t have too many borrowed from English. A post […]
On the Horse
I’ve been meaning to write about this for awhile, and there’s no better time than today, the first day of the Year of the Horse! One of my favorite Chinese expressions is mashang (马上), which can be translated as “immediately,” or “right away.” It is used to convey that something is about to happen. Q：Ni […]
Talking in Numbers
Chinese is a homonym-rich language. Because it only has 400+ phonemes (spoken syllables), pretty much every word sounds like another word. It can be extremely confusing; but at the same time it allows for some linguistic creativity, like talking in numbers, as illustrated by this fantastic video clip titled “How to Speak with Numbers in […]
Fun with Chinese Adverbs
You have probably never used the word ‘fun’ and ‘adverb’ in the same sentence, but that is most likely because you have not read hundreds and hundreds of pages of translated academic and political articles. I have recently been doing just that, doing the English editing of translated academic and political resources. What it really […]
