劫 (jié): to rob

Meanings

1 to rob
2 to plunder
3 calamity
4 disaster

Characters

劫

jié

to rob; calamity

Examples

银行被劫了。

Yínháng bèi jié le.

The bank was robbed.

经历了这场浩劫之后，城市慢慢恢复了。

Jīnglì le zhè chǎng hàojié zhīhòu, chéngshì mànmàn huīfù le.

After going through this catastrophe, the city slowly recovered.

Tips

usage

As a verb, 劫 means to rob (劫持, 打劫). As a noun, it means catastrophe/calamity (浩劫, 劫难). In Buddhism, 劫 (kalpa) refers to an immensely long period of time.

Components

radical

力 lì

strength; force

Right 力 — indexing radical for 劫. Pictures a plough or muscular arm. Marks 劫 as an act of force: robbery is forced taking, calamity is forced misfortune. Same strength-radical family as 努 (strive), 助 (help), 加 (add), 动 (move). The combined image is 'forcing-away' — taking by raw power, a fitting picture of plunder.

phonetic

去 qù

go; depart

Left 去 — supplies the sound (qù → jié, with significant Old Chinese drift; the relationship is opaque in modern Mandarin but consistent with the historical phonetic series). Itself meaning 'to go, depart,' which fits 劫 semantically too: robbery is the forced taking-away of something, making the victim part with what was theirs.