📖 Meaning
To detest evil and wrongdoing as one would detest a personal enemy. It describes a person of strong moral principle who shows zero tolerance for bad conduct and treats wrongdoers as adversaries. The idiom is an older, literary variant of the more common 疾恶如仇.
📜 Origin Story
The phrase originates from a memorial written during the late Eastern Han dynasty by the scholar-official Kong Rong, titled 'Recommendation of Mi Heng' (《荐祢衡表》). In it, Kong Rong praised the brilliant but eccentric scholar Mi Heng before the imperial court, describing him as one who reacts to virtue with joyful astonishment and abhors wickedness as though it were a sworn enemy. The text helped establish Mi Heng's reputation as a man of fierce moral clarity, though his blunt righteousness ultimately brought him into fatal conflict with powerful figures.
💡 Example Usage
他为人刚正，疾恶若雠，从不向权贵低头。
Upright by nature, he detested evil as he would an enemy and never bowed to the powerful.
🏷️ Category
➕ Similar Idioms
➖ Opposite Idioms
🔤 Quick Facts
- Chinese: 疾恶若雠
- Pinyin: jí è ruò chóu
- Literal Translation: hate, evil, like, foe
- Category: Morality
- Characters: 4