Taxonomy of meanings for 恨:　　

Additional information about 恨

說文解字:

Criteria
• LOVE
  

  1. The clearly dominant word referring to love is ài 愛 (ant. hèn 恨 "dislike"; rarely zēng 憎 "dislike"; and wù 惡 "hate"), and this word refers both to the feelings of love and to the expression of love in loving care for another person as well as in sexual relations. (Occasionally, the word may refer to the emotional preference that a small child feels for its parents. For this meaning see PREFER.)

  2. Cí 慈 (ant. xiōng 凶 "vicious") refers to loving care, prototypically by mothers for minors or their offspring. When the word refers to ordinary love, it always connotes a high degree of intensity of the caring emotion.

  3. Tì 悌 refers to love between brothers, particularly the love one owes one's eldest brother, and the word is rarely extended to mean brotherly as opposed to erotic or commiserating love.

  4. Xiào 孝 refers to loving respect for one's parents and ancestors in attitude and action, and is a major traditional virtue.

  5. Chǒng 寵 refers to enjoying the attentions and/or affections of a superior.

  6. Xìng 幸 "give sexual favours to (a subject)" and xìng yú 幸於 "enjoy the sexual favours of (a ruler) refer to love sexually expressed.

  7. Bì 嬖 refers to the enjoying of favourite status with a superior, and the term often connotes sexual relations, occasionally even of the homosexual kind.

  8. Mù 慕 prototypically refers to loving devotion of a distant kind, but the word is also used in a more generalised way to refer to affection.

  9. Hào 好 refers to love as a matter of a strong and habitual emotional preference for something. (See PREFER)

• DISSATISFIED
  

  1. A general word for dissatisfaction of any kind, and for any reason, is hèn 恨 (ant. qiè 慊 / 愜 "be satisfied"), but this word is rare in ancient times, the current way of expressing this idea is to use bù yuè 不悅／說.

  2. Yàn 厭 / 饜 typically refers to dissatisfaction as a result of overexposure to something.

  3. Hàn 憾 refers to a nagging kind of lingering grievance or personal dissatisfaction.

  4. Bìng 病 refers to dissatisfaction as a result of a considered judgment that something is unreasonable or not right.

  NB: There are a number of poetic words for dissatisfaction, notably in CHUCI, which are hard to define in terms to synonym group contrasts.

• CONSCIENCE
  

  The notion of an inner organ of moral judgment is not well attested in pre-Buddhist China. Having a "good conscience" is unheard of, and having a "bad conscience" in the form of feelings of moral distress is, in the LY-tradition, but first attested in Taó Qiān, nèi jiù 內疚. typically takes the form not of remorse so much as of varieties of regret 悔 or 恨. The history of strong regret huǐ 悔 is an important part of the history of emotions in China.

• REGRET
  

  1. The current general word for regret of one's actions is huǐ 悔, whereas the current general word for regretting past experience is hèn 恨.　LH: 鳥與人異，謂之能悔。

  2. Jiù 疚 refers to specifically moral regret.

  3. Xí 惜 refers to emotional and sentimental regret.

• HATE
  

  1. The dominant general word referring to intense dislike is wù 惡 (ant. ài 愛 "love") which can relate to all kinds of concrete or abstract objects.

  2. Yuàn 怨 is resentment due to identified concrete causes, and the emotion is typically directed towards superiors or equals.

  3. Zēng 憎 (ant. ài 愛 "love") is a rather mild and lingering form of resentment directed at a person.

  4. Jí 疾 / 嫉 can refer to intense personally focussed resentment.

  5. Jì 忌, jí 嫉, and dù 妒 refer to intense personal resentment typically occasioned by envy for some success in love (jealousy) or in politics.

  6. Hèn 恨 "nourish feelings of hatred" is relatively rare in this meaning in pre-Qin times, and it stresses the emotional aspect of hatred.

  7. Yàn 厭 "come to be fed up with" (ant. hào 好 "be fond of") is a resentment due to overexposure to some condition or to a person's behaviour.

  8. Fán 煩 "be irritated at, be annoyed with" refers to a dissatisfaction due to overexposure to some condition or to a person's behaviour.

  9. Kǔ 苦 "resent bitterly", huàn 患 "REGARD AS DISASTROUS> be upset by", and bìng 病 "feel profoundly offended" focus on resentment of some prevailing condition as insufferable and may be directed at responsible officials but not primarily in a personal way.

  10. Wàng 望 is archaising word typically referrring to resentment against superiors.

Word relations
• Ant: (HATE)欣 / 歆/DELIGHT Xīn 欣 refers to grateful delight in what is designed to gratify one's desires.
• Contrast: (HATE)忿/ANGER Fèn 忿 (ant. yuè 說／悅 "feel not the slightest anger but on the contrary feel pleased") refers to momentary and intense anger, and it does not typically focus on an show of emotion. There is a difference of degree between nù 怒 "show (often great) anger (怒甚, 大怒) and fèn 忿 "be momentarily angry" (there is no dà fèn 大忿, fèn shèn 忿甚). Nù 怒 forms vtS, whereas fèn 忿 does not have that function. [INTENSE], [MOMENTARY], [PERSONAL]
• Assoc: (HATE)忿/ANGER Fèn 忿 (ant. yuè 說／悅 "feel not the slightest anger but on the contrary feel pleased") refers to momentary and intense anger, and it does not typically focus on an show of emotion. There is a difference of degree between nù 怒 "show (often great) anger (怒甚, 大怒) and fèn 忿 "be momentarily angry" (there is no dà fèn 大忿, fèn shèn 忿甚). Nù 怒 forms vtS, whereas fèn 忿 does not have that function. [INTENSE], [MOMENTARY], [PERSONAL]
• Assoc: (HATE)怨/HATE Yuàn 怨 is resentment due to identified concrete causes, and the emotion is typically directed towards superiors or equals. 1 Attribution
• Assoc: (HATE)恚/ANGER Huì 恚 is a general word for anger that is remarkably frequent in collocation with near-synonyms.