敬而远之
jìng ér yuǎn zhī
In real, traceable use. Part of the curated seed collection; community review is coming.
Traditional: 敬而遠之
To stay politely away from someone or something: you show respect but do not want to get close. Used for people who are difficult, powerful or risky to deal with.
Bề ngoài vẫn tỏ ra kính trọng nhưng giữ khoảng cách, không muốn gần gũi. Dùng với những người khó chịu, có quyền thế hoặc dễ gây phiền phức.
Register: neutral
Examples
Editorial example (illustrative, not a corpus attestation) — awaiting a native-speaker check
Sources & notes
Hán-Việt bridge batch 061 (2026-11-13). Headword, Traditional form and pinyin checked against CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0) source ↗ · Hán-Việt reading: Unihan kVietnamese source ↗ ; en.wiktionary Vietnamese entries via kaikki.org extract, snapshot 2026-07-31 (CC BY-SA 4.0): Hán-Việt reading 而 = nhi; etymology of “kính nhi viễn chi” = 敬而遠之 · Vietnamese cognate: Idiomer entry “kính nhi viễn chi” (kinh-nhi-vien-chi). Definition, literal gloss and example sentence are original; the example has not had a native-speaker check yet.
Equivalents & related
Common questions
What does “敬而远之” mean?
To stay politely away from someone or something: you show respect but do not want to get close. Used for people who are difficult, powerful or risky to deal with. Literally: respect it, yet keep it at a distance
Is “敬而远之” formal or informal?
敬而远之 is generally neutral.