坚持不懈
jiān chí bù xiè · HSK 7
to keep going until the end
🐢 坚 firm + 持 hold + 不 not + 懈 slacken = hold firm and never slacken off
The last character 懈 means to slack or relax your effort; 不懈 is not-slackening. Paired with 坚持 hold firmly, the four characters stack into a steady firm-grip-that-never-loosens, like a tortoise that keeps plodding to the finish.
持 — hand 扌 + temple 寺 (phonetic)
持 is a semantic-phonetic compound. The hand radical 扌 carries the meaning 'to hold' or 'grasp', while 寺 supplies the sound (it once read close to chí). Originally depicting a hand holding something firmly, it broadened to mean 'maintain', 'support', or 'keep' over time.
不 — single pictograph; bird flying upward
Originally a pictograph in oracle bone script, traditionally interpreted as a bird flying up toward the sky and unable to come down, suggesting negation or refusal. Over time it became the standard negation word in Chinese, used before verbs and adjectives to mean 'not'.