sensitive character: 卍

[Guest Yau]

This buddhism character (as well as a chinese character) was appeared on the forehead of Pocket-mon, the popular japanese anime character that irritated some americans a few years ago. How did you actually feel when seeing it at your first sight?

[Yuchi]

It's considered a good luck sign in south eastern countries, I've heard.

I think of nazis, but it means nothing significant to me.

What's it mean in chinese?

[xuechengfeng]

From what I think I remember in religion class, it was a symbol from some religion, either Hinduism or Buddhism, which is supposed to represent something like 10,000 years of good luck. Then Hitler jacked it and decided to make it a sign symbolizing hatred of Jews. Go figure.

[smithsgj]

http://www.chinese-forums.com/viewtopic.php?t=192&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=25

[Ole]

The Svastika-Symbol is a northern hemisphere Star-Constellation chiffre.

Just watch out at the night sky (enough north of the equator: and watch

what you see around Polaris.... (North Star) )....

have fun,

Ole

[shibo77]

I think this character 卐 wan4 is one of the old characters that did not change shape with time as did the rest of the Chinese characters. It appeared in many different cultures and not only India and China. I also know that it appeared in the Indo-European culture in Serbia. Probably it also appeared in Egypt, but I am not sure. It is one of those universal symbols, like the sun, the moon, wood, reed and water, they are mostly the same shape even though they were developped in different regions of the world, this 卐 usually to mean star. I don't think Hitler took it directly from India or China, but that he took it from a flag he saw somewhere in Europe. For China, I think it used to mean infinite diversity, infinite combinations, and later it was attached the meaning, "万 ten thousand (it's similar to the English saying 'march of the thousands, though in China it would be march of the 万ten thousands', basically a huge number, the closest to infinity, ancient Chinese reached, with a word)".

-Shibo

[holyman]

the buddhist sign and the nazi's logo have different directions.

[pazu]

I've heard that the Nazi logo actually has nothing to do with 卍, that simply a symbol of "two S" which means (in German) Socila.dksjljdflshkfhfh (sorry I forgot the full name).

Incidentally, the Nazi logo is the same as the symbol of Bon religion (the Shamanism in Tibet before the introduction of Buddhism).

[shibo77]

Nationalsozialistischedemokratischearbeiterspartei?

Now I think he used it because it's a symbol from the Aryans in India.

[pazu]

Shibo, I think you maybe able to spell out all 100,000 words in the Oxford, if you can spell THIS word. Good for you!

[badatpool]

This character 卐 was mentioned in "Dream of the Red Chamber".

One day,Baoyu was bored of the Peking opera and then decided to stay with a painting of a beautiful woman,because Baoyu thought she would be lonely if no one appreciated her.

As he stepped into the room where the painting was, he heard something strange---his servant was having sex with a maid there...

The following conversation is a part of the novel ,talking about the maid's name '卐'

又问:"名字叫什么?"茗烟大笑道:"若说出名字来话长,真真新鲜奇文,竟是写不出来的.据他说,他母亲养他的时节做了个梦, 梦见得了一匹锦,上面是五色富贵不断头卐字的花样,所以他的名字叫作卐儿."宝玉听了笑道:"真也新奇,想必他将来有些造化."说着,沉思一会.

　

[skylee]

不是叫作萬兒嗎?

[badatpool]

in some other versions,such as "梦稿、甲辰、程甲..."

[nnt]

The story of the symbol can be found here:

http://history1900s.about.com/cs/swastika/a/swastikahistory.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swastika

This Indo-European symbol appeared long before Buddism too, and thus long before it became a Chinese word with the arrival of Buddhism in China.

The Indo-Europeans populated all the lands from Europe to India ("Aryans"). Nazi racists stole the word "Aryan" to designate the "pure superior race" , and used the swastika symbol for the NSDAP logo (For Shibo77: Nationalsozialistischedemokratischearbeiterspartei=NSDAP = nazi party ).

They also deviated the s-like rune symbol for their SS logo.

Now both the Swastika and the runes are associated in Europe with nazis...

[benotnobody]

I think the character wan4 (sorry, the machine i'm on at the moment has no chinese input, and im too lazy to copy it) is also used to denote a temple on maps etc. in japan.

[Ole]

Again I try to draw your intention to the stars:

please have a look....

here

[Széchenyi]

In India the swastika (Sanskrit: be good) symbolysed the sun. To the Germanics it was an emblem of Thor's hammer. That could be the reason the Nazis have chosen it. The other possibility is that they liked the indian (aryan) origin of the symbol. It is unknown, why it was turned around.

By the way, NSDAP is the abbreviation of "Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei". I know that some German words are quite long, but it is not as bad as shibo and nnt seem to think.