[I found this post](https://redd.it/4nfbdj) when searching my question which talked about the usage for 先 in both time reference and non when it translates to, “ahead”, “past”, and relative future representation.
While I believe I understand most of what was said, how does this corelate to when it is used in 先週? It feels like its usage as “ahead” and using “past”, in the way that the post explains the usage of it being “past”, do not work in the same way it does when it becomes 先週 ‘previous week’. I would think from reading this it would refer to the upcoming week “ahead”.
3 comments
Ahead is probably the closest if you’re strictly analyzing the word. If you stack all the weeks in front of you, the one that you hit first is ahead of the others
If you wanted to stretch it out further 先生 is someone that lived ahead of you not after you
Also beware reading too hard into vague meanings of individual characters. Not every word is a sum of their letters
The kanji “先” has a nuance of “a direction towards the back” from the current location, so it indicates a direction away from the present, regardless of whether it is facing the future or the past.
However, the kanji “先” pronounced as “sen” has always the meaning of the past.
For examples:
先祖 (senzo): ancestors
先客 (senkyaku): a customer or guest who arrived before others
先代 (sendai): previous generation先日 (senjitsu): the other day
On the other hand, the kanji “先” pronounced as “saki” can mean both the future and the past, with different pitch accents. If it’s used for the past, the “SA” part has a higher pitch.
For examples:
先延ばし(sakinobashi): procrastination
先のことは分からない(saki no koto wa wakaranai): don’t know what will happen in the future
先の大臣 (saki no daijin): former minister
This is because the kanji character “先” originally meant something that comes before a certain point in time in Chinese. However, it was adopted for use in the Japanese language for “さき”, which could mean both the past and the future, which caused the contradiction you’re observing.
Depends on frame of reference. Are people who are born ahead of you older in age? Those who are born after are younger in age. Ahead/Before is how you should think of it.