生 杀 予 夺

shēng shā yǔ duódictionary entry

(lit.) to spare or to kill, to give or take away (idiom) / (fig.) control over the fate of others

Sources & editorial notes

Reference definitions: CC-CEDICT contributors and MDBG, CC BY-SA 4.0. Source release 2026-10-27T01:55:52Z. Imported 2026-10-27. Definition wording and meaning order are retained. Recognized pronunciation references are displayed with tone marks; the original source record is available below.

Source record: cd-b1389db784691137. Source SHA-256: bbc4b27f26bee1a262f4d7939667a040c7857c7fc0200a2fa7a86d3352a09eae.

Original source entry:

生殺予奪 生杀予夺 [sheng1 sha1 yu3 duo2] /(lit.) to spare or to kill, to give or take away (idiom)/(fig.) control over the fate of others/

Reference definitions and teaching material have separate provenance.

Reference information

The definitions above are from CC-CEDICT. Examples and usage notes are available on selected entries.

Character information

View the individual characters. Their meanings do not necessarily explain the meaning of the whole word.

Other forms in these source records: 生殺予奪

生
shēng
to grow; to give birth; to produce; to be born / to arise; to occur / to light (a fire) / to live; to be alive / life / raw; uncooked; unprocessed / unfamiliar; strange / (bound form) student; person engaged in a field / (bound form) male role in traditional opera / (bound form) life; lifetime / (bound form) means of livelihood / (bound form) very; intensely (as in 生疼[shēng téng]) / (bound form) in a forced manner (as in 生拉硬拽[shēng lā yìng zhuài])
杀
shā
to kill; to slay; to murder; to attack / to weaken; to reduce / (dialect) to smart / (used after a verb) extremely
予
yú
(archaic) I / me
yǔ
(literary) to give
夺
duó
to seize / to take away forcibly / to wrest control of / to compete or strive for / to force one's way through / to leave out / to lose

Reference definitions from CC-CEDICT.