📖 Meaning
It describes a situation where defenses cannot possibly cope with the sheer number or variety of threats, attacks, or tricks coming from every direction. Used to convey that there are simply too many hazards to guard against, making prevention futile. Often applied to scams, scheming people, or fast-changing dangers.
📜 Origin Story
This idiom originates from 'Strange Events Witnessed in the Past Twenty Years' (《二十年目睹之怪现状》), a novel by Wu Jianren, a prominent late Qing Dynasty novelist known for his condemnation fiction. In Chapter 47, the narrator laments that petty, treacherous people are so numerous and so devious that no one can possibly guard against them all. The phrase has since become a widely used expression for any situation where the volume or cunning of threats outstrips one's ability to defend.
💡 Example Usage
网络诈骗手段不断翻新，让人防不胜防。
Online scam tactics keep evolving, making them impossible to guard against.
🏷️ Category
➕ Similar Idioms
➖ Opposite Idioms
🔤 Quick Facts
- Chinese: 防不胜防
- Pinyin: fáng bù shèng fáng
- Literal Translation: guard, not, exhaust, guard
- Category: Condition
- Characters: 4