懂
dǒng · HSK 2
understand
💡 忄(heart) + 重 (weight) — a heart that grasps the weight of things
懂 combines the heart radical 忄with 重 (heavy/weighty). To understand is for the heart to take on the full weight of a matter. Modern usage covers both knowing a fact and truly grasping a situation.
懂 — heart radical 忄 + 董 dǒng (phonetic)
懂 is a phono-semantic compound. The heart radical 忄 signals that the meaning relates to the mind or understanding, while 董 supplies the sound dǒng. It's a relatively late character used to mean 'to understand' or 'to comprehend,' i.e. to grasp something with the mind.