发扬
fā yáng · HSK 7
to develop
🌱 发 (send out) + 扬 (raise up) = launch something upward and outward
Hair-ص発 originally meant 'release' and 扬 meant 'scatter to the wind.' Together they mean to take a quality or tradition and spread it far — to develop it fully, like scattering seeds so they take root everywhere.
发 — simplified form of 發; from 癶 (two feet) + 弓 (bow) + 殳 (weapon)
The traditional form 發 depicted shooting an arrow from a bow, with 癶 showing outstretched feet and 弓 the bow, giving the core sense of 'send out, discharge.' From this came extended meanings like 'issue, emit, develop.' The modern simplified 发 also absorbed 髮 (hair), so it now covers both 'to send out' and 'hair.'
扬 — hand radical 扌 + 昜 (rising sun)
扬 is a semantic-phonetic compound: the hand radical 扌 gives the meaning (an action done with the hand), while 昜 (sun rising over the horizon) supplies the sound 'yáng'. The original sense was to raise or lift up, which broadened to 'spread, scatter, make known'. The modern simplified form replaces the older 揚.