4

I would translate it to "Death is dishonest." and Google translate seems to concur. However, Jisho.org where I got this example from, says it means "Death is preferable to dishonor."

Improve this question
2
  • 3
    Everywhere I can find when I do a Google search for it references the Tanaka Corpus (which provides the example sentences used in most free online dictionaries, including virtually all that rely on EDICT). What's important to remember regarding that as a source is that it is pairs of sentences composed and translated by students. As such, there are going to be occasional mistranslations and ungrammatical phrasings in whatever was not a given student's native language.
    – Kaji
    Apr 30, 2014 at 10:22
  • 1
    I guess this mistake comes from the fact that "death before dishonor" is a popular slogan, e.g. in the army.
    – Szymon
    Apr 30, 2014 at 10:59

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
4

I think Jisho.org is incorrect on that one. 不正直 would not mean "dishonor".
I'd translate rather as Dying is dishonest, or To die is to be dishonest, but it'd be a weird sentence.

Improve this answer

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .