一叶障目 — Chinese idiom
一叶障目
yī yè zhàng mù
Traditional: 一葉障目
Meaning
- lit. eyes obscured by a single leaf
- fig. not seeing the wider picture
- can't see the wood for the trees
Character by character
- 一yīone; a, an; alone
- 叶yèleaf, page; surname
- 障zhàngto separate; shield, barricade
- 目mùeye; to look, to see; division, topic
Idioms sharing a character
- 一丁不识 yī dīng bù shí
- 一丘之貉 yī qiū zhī hé
- 一之为甚 yī zhī wéi shèn
- 一干二净 yī gān èr jìng
- 一了百了 yī liǎo bǎi liǎo
- 一事无成 yī shì wú chéng
- 一五一十 yī wǔ yī shí
- 一以贯之 yī yǐ guàn zhī
- 一元复始 yī yuán fù shǐ
- 一刀两断 yī dāo liǎng duàn
Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3). Retrieved 2026-10-22.