📖 Meaning
Though the paulownia tree is a soft wood, it can snap a hard animal horn. The idiom metaphorically expresses that softness can overcome hardness and flexibility can triumph over rigidity. It embodies the classical Chinese philosophical principle that the yielding can defeat the unyielding.
📜 Origin Story
This idiom draws on an ancient Chinese natural observation recorded in classical texts concerning the paulownia tree (梧桐), valued for making fine musical instruments despite being classified as a softwood. The image of softwood breaking a hard horn was used to illustrate a philosophical truth later echoed in Daoist writings such as Laozi's Dao De Jing, where the soft and yielding are shown to overcome the hard and rigid. Over time the phrase became a concise metaphor for the doctrine that softness conquers hardness.
💡 Example Usage
他深悟梧桐断角之理，以柔克刚化解了这场纷争。
He deeply grasped the principle that the soft can break the hard, and used gentle means to resolve this dispute.
🏷️ Category
➕ Similar Idioms
➖ Opposite Idioms
🔤 Quick Facts
- Chinese: 梧桐断角
- Pinyin: wú tóng duàn jiǎo
- Literal Translation: paulownia tree, break, horn
- Category: Philosophy
- Characters: 4