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MatFayLong
Good point Dim Sum Saying, I think that's a good match.
Tang, if someone says hypocrite to me in English, someone can be a good person but still 'act like a hypocrite'. In English I don't think the term implies destructive lying or deceiving people on purpose. That would imply 'fraudster, conman, deceitful' or more negative terms. Growing up I thought of 'hypocrite' as a noun of a person just describing one part of their personality.
I don't know if this helps your translation search any but that is what the word meant to me growing up.
Would someone like to explain the Cantonese cultural differences between 偽君子 and 虛偽嘅人? I'm thinking one person is a f.ake honorable person (based on characters) and the other person just talks f.ake because of a 'lying nature'.
Thank you,
Matt
虛偽嘅人 means "hypocritical / untruthful person"
偽君子 means "A person who pretends to be a virtuous gentleman but deep down, is morally bankrupt "
Typically, 偽君子 would maintain a gentleman image, talk and act virtuously in public. Only engages in immoral acts in secret.
However, 偽君子 also routinely engage in immoral acts with very thin disguise, when it serves their purpose. For example, many politicians claim the new health care bill would give young and healthy people the freedom of not having health insurance. Ignoring the fact that millions of old and sick people will die because of it.
Almost all 偽君子 are evil in nature. The most evil part is they can justify their evil acts with twisted logic and convince themselves that they are the good guys.
假道學 refers to hypocritical people. They criticize others being immoral or indecent; while they secretly are doing the similar immoral or indecent things. For example, if a guy said watching pornographic is indecent, but has a hard drive full of gay porn in his computer. He is a certainly a 假道學 (hypocrite)