神机妙算 第6期

This idiom comes from Romance of Three Kingdoms・Chapter 46. It is recorded that in 208 BC, Cao Cao led a army of two hundred thousand soldiers to wipe out Sun Quan's forces. Liu Bei sent his prime minister, Zhuge Liang to Dong Wu to ally with Sun Quan to resist Cao.

The commander-in-chief of Dong Wu, Zhou Yu was a famous commander with superb talent, but he was very jealous of Zhuge Liang's talent and ability. He always wanted to wipe him out when given the chance. For the sake of the overall situation and alliance with Dong Wu against Cao Cao, Zhuge Liang had to work with him.

Once, Zhou Yu asked Zhuge to make ten hundred thousand arrows within three days and asked Zhuge to write a military pledge that if he couldn't get the arrows on time, he would be killed. But Zhuge had a excellent plan in mind. He only asked Lu Su to give him twenty boats and thirty soldiers in each boat and put nearly a thousand scarecrows in the boats.

Two days passed, Zhou Yu found that Zhuge had done nothing about the arrow-making, so he considered that Zhuge was sure to die. Unexpectedly, in the early morning of the third day, it's fog-shrouded, and Zhuge Liang ordered all the boats with scarecrows to row close to Cao's water camp.While drinking with Lu Su in the boat, he ordered the soldiers to beat the drums heavily to pretend to attack the enemy.It made Cao's troops missunderstand that Dong Wu's troops would attempt a sneak attack in fog. Cao Cao ordered all his soldiers to shoot arrows both on land and water. As a result, the scarecrows on the boats were full of arrows shot by the enemy, and the number of arrows were more than a hundred thousand.

After Zhou Yu heard about this from Lu Su, he heaved a deep sigh and said "I can't compare with Kongming's wonderful foresight."

Now we use it to describe that the wonderful foresight has reached the miraculous level.

此语出自《三国演义》四十六回。公元208年，曹操率领二十万大军，准备南下消灭孙权的势力。刘备派诸葛亮去东吴联合孙权，共同对付曹操。

东吴大都督周瑜是个才华出众的名帅，但他总嫉妒诸葛亮的才能，总想借机除掉诸葛亮。而诸葛亮为了顾全大局，联吴抗曹，只能与其共事。

这一次，周瑜要诸葛亮在三天内造出十万支箭，并让他立下军令状，到时交不出就要斩首。诸葛亮心中自有妙计，他只是向鲁肃要了二十只船，每只船上配三十名士兵，船上扎放稻草人上千。

过了两天，周瑜见诸葛亮没有造箭的动静，认为他必死无疑。不料到第三天凌晨，诸葛亮趁江上笼罩大雾，下令将草船驶近曹营水寨。他一面在船中与鲁肃饮酒，一面让士兵在船上擂鼓呐喊，装作攻打曹营的样子。曹操以为吴军趁雾偷袭，命令水陆两军万箭齐发朝江中射箭，结果二十只船上的草人都挂满了箭，远远超过十万支。

周瑜听鲁肃讲了诸葛亮草船借箭的经过，长叹一声：“孔明神机妙算，吾不如也。”

后用此典形容计谋高明，已达到神奇的程度。