People use the see-no-evil monkey emoji and its counterparts in a variety of ways, and as noted above, they’re seldom used with the original meaning with which the saying was created for.Īll three wise monkey emoji enjoy popularity because monkeys are cute, and the covering of one’s ears or mouth has a way of conveying a feeling with few words: embarrassment, surprise, self-deprecation, questioning, and “la la la, I can’t hear you!” to name a few.įor example, although the three wise monkeys in unified pose don’t seem quite adequate for the inspirational thought expressed here, we think we get the real idea at play here. If the core concepts of the maxim remain, well, that’s pretty impressive, right? And, like its cohorts, the emoji is often used in lighthearted ways, and certainly not with the serious thought its creators intended.īut, hey, that’s what happens when a couple of thousands of years pass. The see-no-evil Mizaru emoji- like its cohorts, Kikazaru and Iwazaru-was approved as part of Unicode 6.0 in 2010 and added to Emoji 1.0 in 2015. The Hindu interpretation of the fourth monkey was more along the lines of “don’t flaunt your happiness” than “don’t do evil things.” The monkey, Shizaru, symbolized “do no evil,” and was shown either crossing his arms or covering his genitals. reads, “Look not at what is contrary to propriety listen not to what is contrary to propriety speak not what is contrary to propriety make no movement which is contrary to propriety.”Įarly Buddhist and Hindu versions of the idea varied, and in some illustrations there was a fourth monkey that referred to that last principle in the Confucian expression. Monkeys are important in the Shinto religion, and the adage was represented with three monkeys in the carving: Wise monkey Mizaru, covers his eyes, and sees no evil Kikazaru covers his ears, and hears no evil and Iwazaru covers his mouth, and speaks no evil.Įarly Chinese Confucian philosophy certainly played a role in the birth of the adage, as a Confucian phrase from the third or fourth century B.C. The saying embraces a Buddhist tenet of not dwelling on evil thoughts, though in Western cultures, the adage is colored with the idea of pretending to be ignorant or choosing to look the other way, and it implies some question of character. Three Wise Monkeys illustrated the idea of protecting one’s self from unsavory or challenging behavior, thought, or language. The ancient Japanese proverb “see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil” was popularized in the 17th century as a pictorial Shinto maxim, carved in the famous Tōshō-gū Shinto shrine in Nikkō, Japan.
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