缘木求鱼 — Chinese idiom
缘木求鱼
yuán mù qiú yú
Traditional: 緣木求魚
Meaning
- lit. climb a tree to catch a fish ; fig. to attempt the impossible
Character by character
- 缘yuánreason, cause; fate; margin, hem
- 木mùtree; wood, lumber; wooden
- 求qiúto seek; to request, to demand; to beseech, to beg
- 鱼yúfish
Idioms sharing a character
- 一面之缘 yī miàn zhī yuán
- 前世姻缘 qián shì yīn yuán
- 前缘未了 qián yuán wèi liǎo
- 喜结良缘 xǐ jié liáng yuán
- 夤缘攀附 yín yuán pān fù
- 广结良缘 guǎng jié liáng yuán
- 有缘无分 yǒu yuán wú fèn
- 无缘无故 wú yuán wú gù
- 一木难支 yī mù nán zhī
- 刚毅木讷 gāng yì mù nè
Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3). Retrieved 2026-10-22.