4 characters Idiom and proverb 13 140

We’re happy to bring you free Chinese lessons. This series dives into idioms and proverbs, meaningful and practical. Today’s phrase is 「屍祿素飡」, with its usage explained below.

Today, we explore the idiom 「屍祿素飡」. Below, we’ll cover its meaning and practical uses.

It refers to eating a salary without fulfilling one’s job and doing nothing. Same as “corpse vegetarian meal”.

The Mandarin pronunciation of this idiom is :

shī lù sù cān

while its Cantonese pinyin is :

si1 luk6 sou3 syun1

Chinese idioms are incredibly numerous, each carrying a special meaning and usage. This variety is a great reason to study them, and we hope these tools make that easier for you.