If we open the emoji menu on our phone, we will see that there are 3 monkeys. One of them covered his eyes with his hands, one over his ears with his hands, and the last monkey covered his mouth with his hands. It looks like they're just ordinary emojis that we use to express changes in mood when we use social media. But in fact, if we dig deeper, we will find that behind the simple emoji of the three monkeys, there are some profound stories, and at the same time, they also embody a typical traditional Asian cultural characteristics.
In Chinese, these three monkeys are called "three monkeys" or "three no monkeys", that is, three monkeys that do not do something. In Japanese, they are known as "さんざる" or "さんえん" (Japanese: 三猿). In terms of English, due to the cultural differences between the East and the West, in order to let more people understand the meaning of this culture, the last three monkeys also have this English name, Three Wise Monkeys. The Greek-Irish writer and translator Lafcadio Hearn (pictured below) refers to the three monkeys as the three mystic apes.
Actually, this translation is still good. Because the original meaning of the three monkeys came from the way of life of the sages of Asia, teaching people how to deal with interpersonal relationships and how to be a gentleman. So year after year, hundreds of years, thousands of years, the ancients summed up a few experiences. As it is said in the Analects: "Do not look at what is not a courtesy, do not listen if it is not a courtesy, do not speak if it is not a courtesy, and do not move if it is not a courtesy." In addition, in addition to India and China, similar concepts have appeared in ancient Egypt, Angkor Wat, and other places. Gradually, the three apes became a kind of visualization of the concept of ancient Asian philosophy.
Nowadays, when we talk about the three apes, we may think of the Japanese three apes. In fact, this Japanese example is also the most typical visualization. But that doesn't mean the three apes are unique to Japan. Because according to some documents, the origin of this visualization of this unique philosophical concept of Japan came from India. Iconic are the blue-faced King Kong (first picture under this paragraph) (called "しょうめんこんごう") in Japanese), and the three apes who are often near him. The blue-faced Vajra is the incarnation of Vishnu, who is also the protagonist of the story of the Ramayana (महाभारतम्, Latin transliteration: Mahābhāratam), the protagonist of Rama, and the three apes are the incarnations of Hanuman (Sanskrit: हनुमान् Latin transliteration: Hanuman) who serves Rama. Legend has it that in order to seal the three corpse insects, the three corpse insects are to observe people's evil deeds and report them to the gods, so people take out three monkeys that cannot see, hear, or say evil things to cover up people's wrong behavior. Eventually, it evolved into a folk belief that blended Taoism, Shintoism, some Hindu beliefs, and native Japanese beliefs, known as the "Gengshin Faith" (こうしんしんこう) [the last two pictures in this paragraph]. Eventually, the three phrases "視る", "聋ざる", and "言わざる" (which roughly means: what is not seen, what is not heard, and what has not been said) also appeared in Japan, and there are also some elements of the god society with the three apes.