Home·Korean Idioms

Situations

焦眉之急

초미지급

jiāo méi zhī jí

Cho-mi-ji-geup

그슬릴 초

눈썹 미

갈 지

급할 급

Character by character

Meaning

Urgent enough to singe your eyebrows.

Origin

From Chan Buddhist dialogue, in an exchange about what matters most urgently.

How it is used

Used for deadlines and incident response — things that must be handled now.

Hanja焦眉之急
Simplified焦眉之急
Korean reading초미지급
Pinyinjiāo méi zhī jí

Frequently asked questions

Q. What does Cho-mi-ji-geup mean?

焦眉之急 · Urgent enough to singe your eyebrows.

Q. Where does Cho-mi-ji-geup come from?

From Chan Buddhist dialogue, in an exchange about what matters most urgently.

Q. How is Cho-mi-ji-geup used?

Used for deadlines and incident response — things that must be handled now.

Idioms in the same group

The idioms used in Korea mix phrases from the Chinese classics with ones coined in Korea. Where an expression is not used in China, the entry says so.