不法 (bù fǎ) — illegal, lawless | TongTong Chinese Dictionary

Definition

不法 (bù fǎ) means 'illegal' as an adjective — modify nouns like 不法分子 or 不法行为. Stronger than 不当 ('improper'), more concrete than 非法 ('unlawful') which sounds more legal/formal.

adjective

illegallawless

Examples

。
Jǐng chá zhuā zhù le zhè xiē bù fǎ fèn zǐ.
The police caught these illegal elements.
不法。
Rèn hé bù fǎ xíng wéi dōu yīng dāng bèi zhì zhǐ.
Any illegal behavior should be stopped.
不法。
Tā yīn wèi bù fǎ jiāo yì zuò le sān nián láo.
He went to prison for three years because of illegal transactions.

Origin

Compound word

构词法gòucífǎ

偏正piānzhèngModifier + head

The first part narrows down the second: it says what kind of thing the head is.

不 means not and 法 means law, so it describes something as not according to law.

Characters in this word

A drawing of the thing itself, worn down over three thousand years into a few strokes.

The picture in 不 originally showed a flower’s calyx; the “no” sense came later from a related character, not from this picture.

Most characters — around four in five — are built this way: one part hints at the meaning, the other at the pronunciation.

Meaning part形符xíngfú

氵Written in full as水shuǐwater

廌廌zhìa type of antelope or caprid

Sound part声符shēngfú

盍

盍hé法fǎ

The sound has drifted apartThe sound part was a clue two thousand years ago — it often still helps, but not always.

法's older form combined 氵 (water) and 廌 (a type of antelope or caprid), with 盍 as a sound part; later 廌 was dropped.

Appears in

HSK 3.0 Level 7-9 Law & Justice

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