对牛弹琴

Pronunciation: duì niú tán qín Literal meaning: Play zither to cow

Origin & Usage

Gongming Yi played a refined melody to an ox, which went on grazing. He then played something imitating a gadfly and a lost calf, and the ox raised its tail and pricked its ears — the fault, the account observes, was not in the ox's hearing but in the mismatch. The story survives in a Han Buddhist apologetic. Plucking (弹) the qin (琴) to (对) an ox (牛) therefore describes sophisticated effort spent on the wrong audience, and the original is careful to blame the player rather than the animal.

Examples

English: "The professor's advanced theory completely confused the elementary students"

Chinese: 教授的高级理论让小学生完全困惑不解