字形分析Character Analysis:
会意字。从女从子。
好 is a Logical Aggregate, formed from two semantic classifiers: 女(nǚ, literally means woman; female), and子(zǐ, literally means son; child).
本义original meaning:
女子貌美 (of a woman) beautiful
Lily explains 好 like this:
好 would become quite easy to understand if you've already followed our previous lessons of 安 and 嫁. In the feudal Chinese society, a woman was born for her husband and child instead of for her own clan or herself. For a married woman, the matter of prime importance was to give birth to a child, a boy more preferred than a girl, for old Chinese thought that only a male enjoyed the right of inheritance and could continue the family line of the parental clan. 好 had come be composed of 女 and 子, mostly because in Confucian thought, a woman bearing a child, exactly a boy or a male heir, was regarded highly would be of much beauty.
Other's comment
Reviewer: Jas
好 means good. Some words in Chinese, you can get the meaning of it by looking at the structure of it, but with this you can't.
Reviewer: Mark
I have looked at a few charachters and do not see a modern translation into english. This is not helpful.
Reviewer: Maarten
I learnt it was a combination of woman+young=good; that is young woman=good.
Reviewer: Martin
@jas, maarten
no, i think, this means that in feudal chinese society, if a man got wife and son, then he is "very prosperous" or "very lucky". if a man doesn't have son, only daughters, that's considered a bad luck, and that's not good (bu hao). that's why "hao" got the meaning "good". ni hao = how are you? ultimately means that they are indirectly talking about the family first: how about you, are you already married, are you already got son, etc. and the asked would automatically answers about family. if he is already got wife and son, then his condition is "truly good". having wife and son is the ultimate happiness in the feudal chinese.
Reviewer: translatorvasan
Martin's explanation seems to be correct rather than that of Lily. In any case, both the explanations will be helpful for remembering the character and its meaning, Thank you.
Reviewer: Sohng
In Korea, they explained in a different way. 女(female)+子(male) together makes this world going. Implying when there is a balance, 好(good) things happens... And, look 女(female) is ahead of 子(male) to lead the "好(goodness)" of the world.
