Idiom Explanation:
The metaphor is that the power of life and death is in the hands of others, and you are in the position of being slaughtered.
Pronunciation:
人为刀俎，我为鱼肉
rén wéi dāo zǔ ，wǒ wéi yú ròu
origin:
《史记·项羽本纪》，原句是：樊哙曰：“大行不顾细谨，大礼不辞小让。如今人方为刀俎，我为鱼肉，何辞为。”
In the Records of the Grand Historian Xiang Yu, the original sentence reads, “Fan Kuai said, “A great deed does not care about the smallest respect, and a great courtesy does not resist the smallest concession. Now people are on the chopping block and I am the fish, why should I resist?”
story:
In the late Qin and early Han dynasties, two generals from King Huai’s camp, Xiang Yu and Liu Bang, competed for the right to rule the Guanzhong region and had a face-to-face encounter over a meal at Hongmen. At the Hongmen banquet, there was no shortage of wine and food, but there was a hidden murder.
At that time, Xiang Yu had 400,000 troops in Hongmen, Xinfeng. Fan Zeng, Xiang Yu’s second father, who had always advocated killing Liu Bang, repeatedly signaled Xiang Yu to give orders at the banquet, but Xiang Yu hesitated and did not respond in silence. Fan Zeng called Xiang Zhuang to dance his sword for the banquet and took the opportunity to kill Liu Bang. But Xiang Bo, who had been bribed by Liu Bang, drew his sword and danced to protect Liu Bang.
At the critical moment, Liu Bang’s subordinate Fan Kuai barged into the military gate with his sword and shield, and looked at Xiang Yu angrily. When Xiang Yu saw Fan Kuai’s extraordinary bearing, he asked him who the visitor was. When he learned that he was one of Liu Bang’s men, he ordered his subordinates to give him wine, which he drank in one go. After that, Fan Kuai sat down next to Zhang Liang. After sitting for a while, Liu Bang got up to go to the toilet and greeted Fan Kuai to go out with him.
After going out, Liu Bang hurriedly asked Fan Kuai, “Is this the way to go? I didn’t say goodbye just now, what should we do?” Fan Kuai said, “Nowadays, I am a fish for the chopping block, why should I resign?” This sentence means, “You don’t have to worry about the smallest details when you do something big, and you don’t have to pay attention to the smallest courtesy when you talk about big manners. Now people are being like the knife and the cutting board for cutting meat, and we are the fish and the meat, so why should we say goodbye to them?”
After hearing these words, Liu Bang pondered for a while that this was indeed the case, so he decisively left and instructed his subordinate Zhang Liang to stay behind to say goodbye to Xiang Yu. When Zhang Liang waited for Liu Bang to go far away, he entered and said to Xiang Yu, “Our lord is not able to drink well and cannot come to say goodbye, so I now offer you a pair of white biscuits and a pair of jade doublers to the great general Fan Zeng, please accept them.” Xiang Yu, who did not know the depths of the matter, accepted the white biscuits and was so angry that Fan Zeng drew his sword and smashed the jade buckets.
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- 一无所知
