Blinded by a Leaf: A Chinese Idiom

The idiom  “Blinded by a Leaf” originates in the Daoist classic Master He Guan, chapter Heavenly Laws. It serves as a metaphor for how people, blinded by the partial or the momentary, lose the clarity of sound judgment and thus fail to perceive the whole of things or grasp the essence at their core.

The Master He Guan, grounded in Daoist philosophy, reflects on the illusions born of narrow perception. During the Three Kingdoms period, the scholar Han Dan Chun took inspiration from its line “a leaf obscuring the eyes” (later rendered as  “Blinded by a Leaf”) in his “The Forest of Jests“, shaping it into a brief tale of irony and wit. Though “The Forest of Jests“ itself has long been lost, many of its passages survive through quotations preserved in later anthologies such as the “Extensive Records of the Taiping Era“ and the “Imperial Reader of the Taiping Era“.

In “The Forest of Jests“, Han Dan Chun relates the tale of a poor, bookish scholar. While reading an ancient text at home, he found a passage describing how the mantis hides behind a leaf to catch the cicada, unseen by its prey. Mistaking the line for fact, he came to believe that the leaf which hid the mantis could also render a man invisible. Captivated by the thought, he spent his days pacing through the woods, searching for cicadas. At last he spotted a mantis crouched behind a leaf, poised to strike. Stirred by excitement, he reached out to pluck the leaf, but it slipped from his grasp and fell among the countless leaves on the ground. With no other choice, he gathered them all in his arms and bore them home.

When he returned home, the scholar tested the leaves one by one, holding each before his eyes and asking his wife, “Can you see me now?”
“Of course I can,” she replied.
After he had repeated this many times, his wife, tired of his foolish game, at last said, “Fine, I can’t see you anymore.”
Hearing this, the scholar was elated. He hurried into the street, pressed a leaf over his eyes, and, before the astonished shopkeepers, began taking goods from their stalls.
Naturally, he was caught and taken before the magistrate. Astonished that anyone would steal so openly in broad daylight, the magistrate asked for an explanation. Upon hearing the scholar’s story, the magistrate laughed heartily and let him go free.

Since ancient times, people have found clever ways to apply the idea of “Blinded by a Leaf”, to the art of catching chickens. Using the bird’s instinct to peck at food, they would roll a leaf into a small funnel, thread a morsel of bait onto a thin twig and secure it within the cone of leaves. When a chicken pushed its beak in and bit down on the bait, the funnel slid forward, covering its eyes. Blinded and still, the bird froze in place, easy to catch.

Furthermore, the idioms  “Blinded by a Leaf” and “covering one’s ears while stealing a bell”differ profoundly in essence.  “Blinded by a Leaf” describes a mind misled by external illusion, resulting in folly and misguided acts, whereas  “covering one’s ears while stealing a bell” depicts one who, in committing wrongdoing, deceives himself into believing his act will remain unseen.

In this age of advanced technology and effortless convenience, have we not, like  “Blinded by a Leaf”, grown blind to the quiet dialogue within our hearts and lost the rhythm that once bound us to nature’s breath? Let us not forget: beyond this dazzling, kaleidoscopic world, humanity still longs for truth, goodness, and beauty.